Eight early photographs of IEC workers setting up a power line in some settlement in the land of Israel. c. 1920s.
The story of the Palestine Electric Company is intertwined with the story of the Hebrew settlement in modern times and with the vision of the establishment of the Jewish state in the Land of Israel in Hebrew work. The company was founded as the ‘Palestine Electric Company’ on March 29, 1923 by Pinchas Rotenberg. In the same year, the first power station was opened, which supplied electricity to the city of Jaffa and Tel Aviv. In June 1923, Allenby and Nahalat Binyamin streets in Tel Aviv were illuminated for the first time, and in November 1923, King George Boulevard (now Jerusalem Blvd.) was illuminated in Jaffa.
In 1920, Rothenberg submitted to the British Mandate Government the results of a survey he conducted on the possibilities of exploiting the country’s water resources. Based on this survey, Rotenberg proposed the construction of thirteen hydroelectric power plants on the banks of the Jordan River and its tributaries, from Lebanon to the Dead Sea. The Mandatory authorities saw great importance in establishing a modern electricity infrastructure in the Land of Israel and granted Rothenberg in September 1921 two concessions that allowed him, exclusively, to utilize the waters of the Yarkon, Jordan and other water sources of the country to generate electricity. Hebrew workers from the Third Aliyah were employed in the construction of the lines.
Same size: 9×14 cm. Few stains. Good condition.
