BAY HARBOUR ELECTRIC INC history

From September 1861 the Royal Observatory at Cape Town sent a daily impulse over the telegraph system to a time-ball, which was mounted on a mast in the vicinity of Table Bay.

The Trojan served as a hospital ship during the Boer War. (The Cape Argus 1880-06-12; Crutchley Comdr.

From April 1882, electric arc lamps illuminated Cape Town’s Table Bay docks.

A small electric motor was demonstrated at the South African Industrial Exhibition held in Cape Town in August and September 1884.

Horse-drawn trams were in operation in Johannesburg in 1891.

Pretoria and Johannesburg also had small lighting plants in use in 1892.

The generating station, on the banks of the Molteno Reservoir, has been proclaimed a national monument. (Cape Town Mayor's Minute, 1895; The Cape Times 1895-04-15) It was not until nearly two years later, on 13 April 1895, that Mrs Smart, Mayoress of Cape Town, switched on electric streetlights in the city centre.

In 1896 a hydro generating station was built at Brown's Hill using two Escher Wyss Girrard impulse turbines coupled to Siemens 160 kW alternators.

The Rand Central Electric Works Ltd proceeded to erect the first commercial supply undertaking at a site later to be known as Brakpan​. Power from The Rand Central Electric Works Ltd​ was first generated in May 1897.

A subsidiary company, the General Electric Power Company Ltd, was established to deal with this concession, a year later in 1898.

WC Jackson, switched on the first twelve electric streetlights in East London at a ceremony on 5 October 1899.

The East London Municipality inaugurated their electric tramway on 25 January 1900.

The De Beers Consolidated Mines at Kimberley commissioned a Central Station in August 1903, at which the first 1 MW turbines in South Africa were installed.

A 200 kW set was installed at the Porges Randfontein Gold Mine and a 500 kW turbine at the Driehoek Power Station in 1904.

A subsidiary company, the Rand Mines Power Supply Company, was formed by the VFP in 1908.

By 1915, four VFP thermal power stations Brakpan​, Simmerpan​, Rosherville and Vereeniging​, collectively had a total installed capacity of more than 160 megawatts.

The recommendations contained in Merz’s report, which was submitted to the government headed by Jan Christiaan Smuts in April 1920, were received favourably.

In 1945, he acquired two undeveloped mangrove swamp islands off 96th Street on Miami Beach, which were all but out of sight at high tide.

On June 15, 1947, the first building permit was applied for.

In 1951, the Broad Causeway was opened, joining the islands with the mainland of North Miami-Dade County.

Shorten JR, The Johannesburg Saga, 1966 p.599

Shepard Broad was elected the first mayor of the Town and served 26 consecutive years until his retirement from office in 1973.

Johannesburg - One Hundred Years, Chris van Rensburg Publications 1986 p.22

Then, in 1993, David V. Johnson dreamed of transforming this abandoned moonscape into the most luxurious residential community on earth.

What followed, in March 1995 was another “big bang” – the explosion that would blast away the barrier between Lake Michigan and a quarry letting water rush in at one million gallons per minute.

These were 2000 candlepower "Brush" arc lamps.

Broad passed away November 6th, 2001 at his home in Bay Harbor Islands.

Honor Award (2002)SmithGroup – JJR for Bay Harbor, American Society of Landscape Architects