Zurich Steam Swallows
| Creator | Peter Balzer (drawing) |
|---|---|
| Printing year | 1894 |
| Printing technique | Lithography |
| Printer | Art. Orell Füssli Institute, Zurich |
| Condition | |
| Asking price (CHF): | |
| Sheet size (cm) | |
| Categories | over the water, Zurich |
1 in stock
The "Dampfschwalben" were screw-propelled steamboats about 14 meters long that, starting in 1892, departed from Zurich’s Rathausbrücke for Wollishofen, Tiefenbrunnen, Küsnacht, and Thalwil, thus providing tram-like local transportation across Lake Zurich.
The Zurich Steamboat Company, founded in 1890 (now the Lake Zurich Shipping Company) was so successful—even though, just a short time earlier, the booming railroad had threatened to render the steamboats, which operated without a central organization, obsolete—that it commissioned larger ships as early as 1895.
It’s really just a timetable, but—as was customary during the Belle Époque—it was so elaborately illustrated and printed that it also served as an original promotional poster. An extremely rare piece of local history.
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