The Nagasaki Hammerhead Crane (again)

I am posting another picture of the crane because the one earlier taken from Glover Garden (グラバー園) house was during a rainstorm and required quite a bit of Photoshoping to get clear.

This photo is clearer but suffers from being taken from inside the shipyard so it was difficult to get far enough away to get a good shot. The rain didn't help either.

The Mitsubishi Shipyard didn't seem to worry all that much about us wandering around.

There is also an excellent Museum on site which was well worth visiting.

Ships and Cranes

The Mitsubshi shipyards were an important industry in the Nagasaki area. They were established as the Nagasaki Ironworks in 1857 with help from Dutch naval engineers as a government facility. However after the Mejii restoration the shipyards were run by Mitsubshi-sha headed by Yanosuke Iwasaki.


There is an excellent museum on the site in the former wood-pattern shop. This contains a number of pieces of important machinery and documents relating to ship construction.

Of course the discovery of a 1909 Hammerhead Crane by William Arrol still working in the Mitsubishi shipyards was a plus as was the fact that we could go in and photograph it.

Knacked in Nagasaki

Its been a wet day in Nagasaki today. After viewing the commuter rush we headed out to view the "battleship island" , Hashima Island, (sometimes also called Gunkanjima Island) our trip was cancelled due to bad weather but we went to a rather ordinary museum on the subject instead. We could see the island from the coast.




Apart from these photos we learned nothing new and wasted the morning being led astray when there was so much more to be seen. We drove back into town where after a brief stop at a telegraph station we went to the Kosuge Ship repair dock. This dates from 1868 and was the first patent slip in Japan. The slip and the engines were modernised in 1937 but the original engine and 1901 boiler are still there. This is a realy great site with lots of interest. Of course I had to find mud to step in and dust to lean against much to the amusemt of our party.