Postcard Amsterdam Haarlemmersluis with canal cruise boat, Krüger Sleding

Dutch postcard from the nineteen-sixties or seventies showing a colour photograph of the Haarlemmersluis in Amsterdam, one of the oldest still-functioning locks in the city. The image shows a canal cruise boat with glass upper deck passing through the lock, filled with seated passengers on a sunny day. In the background the characteristic row of historical Amsterdam canal houses with their stepped and bell gables in red brick, on the Haarlemmerstraat side of the lock. Left and right on the lock gates, the cast-iron operating mechanisms and infrastructural signage of the nineteen-sixties. At the top of the image, a natural framing by overhanging leaves of a canal tree, typical of the Krüger composition. On the verso the publisher's indication Krüger number 51.935.170 with the Sleding logo, and the caption "AMSTERDAM - De Haarlemmersluizen" with the Krüger small map of the Netherlands. The verso is unwritten and unposted. The card is in good condition.

The Haarlemmersluis was originally constructed in 1602 at the place where the Singel canal flows into the IJ, to prevent salt sea water from entering at high tide and to supply the canals with fresh water. The current lock construction dates from a major renovation in 1681, making the lock one of the most important infrastructural works of the seventeenth-century Golden Age city. The bridge over the lock was built in 1809 and widened in 1879 for the horse tram. The lock connects the Brouwersgracht at its eastern end with the Singel and still forms part of the daily functioning Amsterdam canal system: every night the lock is closed to flush the canals with fresh water, a system in unchanged use since the seventeenth century. The area around the Haarlemmersluis was for centuries the centre of Amsterdam's herring trade, known as the Haringpakkerij with as its central point the Haringpakkerstoren demolished in 1829. The publisher Krüger, active during the second half of the twentieth century, together with publishers such as Sleding set the standard for Dutch tourist postcards of the post-war decades, with distribution through Bruna kiosks and VVV tourist offices throughout the country.