Thanks to simatani for letting me use this photo of Lanzhou city centre, taken in 1994. I've tried to recreate it below.
1994
2009
1914 - FRANK MEYER
Frank Nicholas Meyer (1875-1918) was an explorer for the United States Department of Agriculture. He went on several expeditions to Europe, Russia and East Asia collecting specimens (this lemon was named after him, for example).
He was in Lanzhou in December 1914, and took this photo of Zhongshan Bridge (the arches were added in 1954):
“Iron bridge over a ice choked river with buildings on the hills in the background”
The scene in 2009
Meyer noted that “the water from this river is drunk unfiltered and the waste of the city is deposited into this river again, thus making the people immune from intestinal diseases unless they should die before.”
I stumbled across the website of Rolf Gross the other day, which has an incredible selection of photo-diaries, travel writing, and assorted essays. What caught my interest particularly was his description of a visit to Lanzhou in 1983.
The first photo on the page is of a sick child being wheeled along on a pushcart, with a mosque in the background. At first glance, I was pretty sure that I knew which mosque it was, and we confirmed this through a short correspondence, and by cross-referencing Rolf's route that day (along the north bank of the river upstream from Zhongshan Bridge) to another online photo.
Rolf has given me permission to republish his photo of the 'Waterside Mosque' (水上清真寺) here. The photo was taken facing west, which means Rolf was standing midway between Zhongshan Bridge and the mosque:
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