BIOGRAPHY OF HJALMAR EJNAR SKOUGOR
Storyline
This biography is a character portrayal of the early life of young Danish engineer Skougor, from his granddaughter's perspective. The portrayal is based on reviews of experts' analyses of his visionary accomplishments in Quebec, Canada, and the Atacama Desert in Chile. It considers external interpretations that Skougor's plans aimed to create a "socio-industrial utopia".
The portrayal also describes the visibly egalitarian thrust of Skougor's intentions in projects implemented in partnership with Columbia University architect Harry Beardslee Brainerd. It also reflects on Skougor's personal motivations, actions, and outspoken views expressed while residing in New York City.
Timeline
1905 Twenty year old Hjalmar Ejnar Skougor arrived in New York from Copenhagen, Denmark to pursue a professional career as a consulting engineer.
In the next twenty years, he envisioned, planned, and implemented projects in four countries in North and South America:
United States: New York and New Jersey
Canada: Saguenay, Quebec Province
Mexico: City of Rosita
Chile: The Atacama desert
1913-1920 Skougor was engaged by the Guggenheim Brothers, Chile Exploration Co. and Braden Cooper Co., as designing engineer for the Chile Atacama Desert project.
1918 A New York Times article described Skougor's unprecedented proposal to construct a moving sidewalk between Times Square and Grand Central Station, to replace the underground subway.
1919 Skougor designed a strategy and plan for developing the shipping port network on both sides of the Hudson River abutting New York and New Jersey.
1921 Skougor was granted a US Patent for MATERIAL HANDLING EQUIPMENT US 1520150 A.
"Be it known, that I, HJALMAR E. SKOUGoR, a subject of the King of Denmark, residing at Brooklyn, in the county of Kings, State of New York, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Material Handling Equipments; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, and exact description of the invention, such as will enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains to make and use the same.""
1921 Skougor designed and published a development plan for Rosita, Mexico.
The proposal is considered as one of his best known works, which is cited by architects and scholars of industrial cities. Hjalmar used this city as a model for the design of buildings he co-engineered in Chile.
2021 Chilean geologist Patricio Espejo-Leupin published Edgar Stanley Freed, los Guggenheim y la industria del salitre, a lengthy book describing the ambitious Guggenheim project that developed nitrate sources and businesses in the Atacama Desert.
Leupin describes the project's success in building the first large-scale mechanized plant and its company town, which Skougor designed.
The author wrote the following about Skougor's role:
This article analyzes the little-known but significant role of the engineer Hjalmar Ejnar Skougor in the history of the nitrate industry through the design of the plant and company town of the first nitrate work that used the so-called "Guggenheim system", proyect originally called Canada, then Coya Norte and finally María Elena. That method meant one of the greatest innovations in the nitrate business in the twentieth century. Along with his biography, we examine the case of María Elena and one of his previous commissions: Nueva Rosita in Mexico, whose design we propose inspired part of his first nitrate project. Due to his participation in the planning of the copper plants of Chuquicamata and El Teniente, and the second mechanized nitrate work, Pedro de Valdivia, we highlight Skougor as one of the engineers with the greatest impact in large-scale mining in Chile in the first half of the twentieth century.
1925 Skougor and Columbia University architect Harry Brainslee Brainerd drew up the plan which the Alcoa aluminum company used to develop the city of Arvida in Saguenay, Quebec.
It was a city built by Alcoa in 125 days, described by the New York Times as a "model town for working families" on "a North Canada steppe".
Plan for the City of Arvida, Saguenay, Quebec, Canada
2025 University of Quebec Professor Lucie K. Morisset describes the significance of the project in the following publication: Les villes industrielles planifiées et le patrimoine industriel en contexte de désindustrialisation.
Sources
Culture et Communications Quebec, Digital Cultural Plan of Quebec.
Arvida A Planned Industrial City.
Espejo-Leupin, Patricio.
El ingeniero danés Hjalmar Skougor y la oficina salitrera María Elena. Una historia de diseño industrial y arquitectura en la pampa chilena bajo el "Sistema Guggenheim"-Espejo- Taltalia16.
Morisset, Lucie K.
Les villes industrielles planifiées et le patrimoine industriel en contexte de désindustrialisation.
Glaser-Schmidt, Elisabeth.
The Guggenheims and the Coming of the
Great Depression
German Historical Institute, Washington, DC.
BUSINESS AND ECONOMIC HISTORY, Volume twenty-four,no. 1. Fall 1995.
Copyright¸1995 by the BusinessHistoryConference. ISSN 0849-682.
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