ASPHALION

Photographer Frederick Garner Wilkinson (1901-1975)

Date29 March 1930

Object number00041514

NameGlass plate negative

MediumEmulsion on glass

Dimensions83 x 108 x 2 mm

ClassificationsPhotographs

Credit LineAustralian National Maritime Museum collection

Terms

DescriptionASPHALION can be seen from a distance, anchored in Athol Bight on Saturday afternoon 29 March 1930. This photograph was taken at 5.10pm from a ferry travelling between Circular Quay and Taronga.HistoryASPHALION was a British cargo vessel of 6273 ton, built in 1924 by Scotts Shipbuilding at Greenock. ASPHALION operated for the China Mutual Steam Navigation Company. In February 1944 the vessel was damaged by a torpedo in the Bay of Bengal but later repaired. It was scrapped at Hong Kong in 1959 by Dah Cheong Hong Ltd.SignificanceThis photograph is part of the F G Wilkinson Photograph Collection, comprising more than 700 glass plate negatives of ships in Sydney Harbour between 1919 and 1936. The collection provides an extensive and well-documented coverage of the changing styles of shipping in the port of Sydney before the gradual decline of the coastal trade, and in a period which was probably the peak reached by commercial shipping in Australia. The backgrounds also reveal the changing face of the city and harbour foreshores.