32o35 - River Hull, barges and ISIS Oil Mills,
1982 - River Hull
Previous
Next
A view of Hull
Still Occupied
Images on this site are arranged into rough areas by location as in my book 'Still Occupied', available on Blurb. Eventually this site will contain all the images in that book and more.
The ISIS Oil Mills in Morley St, built for Wray, Sanderson & Co but more recently a part of Croda, were designed by Hull architects Gelder & Kitchen and built in 1912 and are a remarkable ensemble, though I think only the silo was Grade II listed in 1994. It was acquired in 1985 from Croda by Cargill plc and is apparently still crushing rapeseed - up to 750 tonnes a day to produce around 320 tonnes of rape seed oil and 420 tonnes of rape meal used in animal feed etc.
The large chimney beyond is 'Reckitt's Chimney', the tallest in Hull, built to discharge sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere at a height of 463 ft. Scandalously this acid rain producing discharge continued until the start of the current century, when finally a desulphurisation plant was added - and a few years later the works closed. Reckits's sold the plant, which produced large quantities of synthetic ultramarine, used in various products including Reckitts Blue laundry whitener in 1994 to Yule Catto and it later became part of Holliday Pigments, and then Hunstman. They are still the largest producer of synthetic ultramarine in the world but it now comes from their more modern French plant.
The barges in the picture reflect the importance of the River Hull for transport to the industries along the river in the past. There is now very little river traffic, but some very busy roads. The name of the nearest barge is something of a mystery, appearing to contain the letters 'OTMOT' which I can't make into anything I recognise, but moored in front of the silo is 'Ringplover'.
Peter Marshall
01784 456474