The British Departure on the Mauritius
In 1933, an agreement was negotiated to increase the terms of the D’Arcy concession to 1994; however by 1951
said contract was annulled and the British were expelled from the Braim with riots which came to be known as
the Abadan Crisis. In October 1951 all the remaining British employees and their families gathered in Gymkhana Club and boarded the Mauritius and slowly headed up the river with the band playing “Colonel Bogey”.
Damluji, Mona. “Documenting the Modern Oil City: Cinematic Urbanism in Anglo-Iranian’s
Persian Story.” Ars Orientalis, Online, 42 (October 2012). http://www.asia.si.edu/research/articles/
documenting-the-modern-oil-city.asp.
Damluji, Mona. “Documenting the Modern Oil City: Cinematic Urbanism in Anglo-Iranian’s
Persian Story.” Ars Orientalis, Online, 42 (October 2012). http://www.asia.si.edu/research/articles/
documenting-the-modern-oil-city.asp.
October, 1951
Damluji, Mona. “Documenting the Modern Oil City: Cinematic Urbanism in Anglo-Iranian’s Persian Story.” Ars Orientalis, Online, 42 (October 2012). http://www.asia.si.edu/research/articles/documenting-the-modern-oil-city.asp.
Local Beggar and British Family
This image depicts the reality in the 'company town' of Abadan in which the British, and the foreigners in general, were above the locals in the social hierarchy. Iranians did not receive the benefits of the new found oil wealth, but were instead in marginalized.
Ajammc
ww.ajammc.com/2015/02/18/abadan-capital-of-the-world/
Housing in Bahmashir
The houses in Braim were designed to house workers and aimed to appease the 'local' architecture and needs. These houses were much smaller than the ones in Bawarda and Braim, which housed 'foreigners'. The houses were designed as a series of row houses with a central courtyard in the middle and averaged 120 m2 and had a density of 26-31 units/hectare.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
House in Braim
The houses in Braim were based on the Garden City ideal and the planner of the city, James M. Wilson. The are of Braim was also known as the 'bungalow area' and housed the British personnel and was located south-west of the refinery area. It was also in Braim that the more communal building were also housed such as Gymkhana Club and lush gardens. The latter need intensive labor and the transportation of equipment and labor from Kew and New Delhi.
Charles Schroeder Collection, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University
Charles Schroeder Collection, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University
Charles Schroeder Collection, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University
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Aerial view of the Garden Suburb of Bawarda.
"‘Since the War’, Wilson reported, ‘a very great and widespread spirit of Nationalism has been introduced and fostered throughout the Middle East. . . Though the Company probably incurs less of this [jealousy] than the
political services do elsewhere, it must introduce measures to meet it’. If the new concession was one such measure then housing was to be another. Wilson pointed
particularly to the disparities in housing provision as contributing most to the dangerous divide between the Iranian and British employees. He proposed to meet this problem with a new residential area, to create Bawarda as a kind of manifesto of racial mixing, an experiment in non-segregation whose very design would ‘afford that link or bridge over the present gulf between these two groups of individuals’" [Quoted in Mark Crinson, “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company,” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341, doi:10.1080/026654397364681.]
Damluji, Mona. “Documenting the Modern Oil City: Cinematic Urbanism in Anglo-Iranian’s
Persian Story.” Ars Orientalis, Online, 42 (October 2012). http://www.asia.si.edu/research/articles/
documenting-the-modern-oil-city.asp.
Damluji, Mona. “Documenting the Modern Oil City: Cinematic Urbanism in Anglo-Iranian’s
Persian Story.” Ars Orientalis, Online, 42 (October 2012). http://www.asia.si.edu/research/articles/
documenting-the-modern-oil-city.asp.
1920s
Plan of Bawarda.
The city of Bawarda was designed by James M. Wilson in 1926 and was inspired by Lutyens’s remodelling of the Garden City and City Beautiful ideas in New Delhi (1911–1940). Bawarda was an attempt at social and ethnic mixing and also offered larger institutional buildings such as the Abadan Technical Institute.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
Aerial View of Bawarda's Center.
The city of Bawarda was designed by James M. Wilson in 1926 and was inspired by Lutyens’s remodelling of the Garden City and City Beautiful ideas in New Delhi (1911–1940). Bawarda was an attempt at social and ethnic mixing and also offered larger institutional buildings such as the Abadan Technical Institute.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
'Dutch Style' Bungalow in Bawarda.
These houses which are designated for Senior European personnel were based on the 'bungalow' prototype which were set on large green lawns. They are typically surrounded by parks and gardens and each house was lined with English hedges. Unlike the workers' houses, these houses are typically built on lots around 1,000 m2 and there were 4.5 units per hectare.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
Crinson, Mark. “Abadan: Planning and Architecture under the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.” Planning Perspectives 12, no. 3 (1997): 341–59. doi:10.1080/026654397364681, pp 349.
Lunch Time For Workers in Our Back yard
The images which was taken by Charles Schroeder depicts Iranian [? or local] workers in the backyard of Schroeder's house. It portrays the way in which the locals were seen as archaic and unsophisticated: they are having lunch on the dirt ground outside. The mesh on the window further instigates the difference between locals and foreigners and how each perceived the other.
Charles Schroeder Collection, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University
Charles Schroeder Collection, Fine Arts Library, Harvard University
Chairmen of APOC.
A quick look at the people in key positions of oil companies in the Middle East from the late 1800s to the early 1970s results in the same image across the board: white, middle-aged, Anglo-Saxon. While the initiatives of many of these oil companies operating in the Middle East was to train the ‘locals’ to eventually take over mid-level and upper-level positions, the realities were far from it. The reality was a class and ethnic segregated environment in which the ‘westerners’, the ‘centers’, live in a more lofty life, looking over the ‘locals’ have lunch in the backyard.
Bamberg, James H. The History of the British Petroleum Company: The Anglo-Iranian Years, 1928-
1952. Vol. 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994., pp. 14-15.
Bamberg, James H. The History of the British Petroleum Company: The Anglo-Iranian Years, 1928-
1952. Vol. 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994., pp. 14-15.
1927-1941