‘Het Steiger, Rotterdam’
A badly faded stereograph but important. It’s a rare view of pre-war Rotterdam, taken c.1860. The canal, one of many in Rotterdam, was called the Steiger, translated as the Scaffold. The church in the background is the medieval Cathedral of Great St. Lawrence. The church was gutted by fire during the Nazi air-raid on the city in 1940. The centre of Rotterdam was almost completely destroyed and afterwards rebuilt in a modern style. The cathedral was one of the few buildings to be reconstructed to its pre-war appearance. Click on ‘Rotterdam’ in the tag cloud to the right to see a few more pre-war images of Rotterdam.