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Box caisson being towed by the steam-powered ‘Möwe’ tugboat in 1950 (with Kiel in the background), Bundesanstalt für Wasserbau

From the collections: The Historical Images Archive of the Bundesanstalt für Wasserbau

04.03.2015 Wiebke Hauschildt (Online Editor)

The Bundesanstalt für Wasserbau (Federal Waterways Engineering and Research Institute) has over 10,000 photographs and images in the Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek, rendering 150 years of documented German waterway history accessible to the general public.

The material is surprising and also fascinating. Anyone looking for early pictures of the building and operation of water installations across Germany will find them in the Historical Images Archive of the Bundesanstalt. The photographs focus not only on preparatory work and the construction of installations but also on copies of old plans and prints, which are likewise being added to the Historical Images Archive. They include old illustrations of riverscapes such as the lithograph of Altlauffen am Necka by Louis Wolf (c. 1830) and an 1850 photograph of barges in the old port of Heilbronn.

Lithograph of Altlauffen am Neckar. Photographer unknown (1830)

The Images Archive shows a wide variety of colour and black-and-white motifs. They range from photos of technology and the manufacture of auxiliary devices designed to protect canal banks (e.g. the building of fascines at the training centre for waterway engineering workers in Koblenz) to the construction of locks and canals on inland waterways, the de-icing of buoys in the Baltic Sea, the laying of marker buoys on the lower reaches of the Weser river, bridge construction, inland ports and inaugurations of canals.

Trainees working at the training centre for waterway engineering workers in Koblenz. The photo shows different stages in the manufacture of fascines, with completed fascines in the background. (1956)

The de-icing of a marker buoy in the Baltic Sea:

Workmen on the deck of a buoy layer chip ice from an iced-up buoy floating in the Baltic (1996)

Most of the image processing involves pictures of Germany’s inland waterways and coastal routes taken in the last 120 years and their filing according to technical category. The editorial department have classed photos of particular historical significance for the national waterways as Category K2200. These include pictures of the box caisson being towed by the steam-powered ‘Möwe’ tugboat in 1950 (with Kiel in the background) and the construction of the old canal bridge at Minden on the Mittellandkanal in June 1913.

Box caisson being towed by the steam-powered ‘Möwe’ tugboat in 1950 (with Kiel in the background)

Construction of the old Minden canal bridge / Mittellandcanal (1913). View of south side of bridge; on the right the eastern end trestle with uncompleted auxiliary pumping station. From right to left: the arch under construction above the channel (reinforcement), the bridge pile in mid-canal, the large flood arch with bridge pile, and flood arches on the far bank.

All material from Bundesanstalt für Wasserbau in the Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek

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