Humberstone and Santa Laura Saltpeter Works

Outstanding Universal Value

Brief Synthesis

In the remote desert Pampa, one of the driest deserts on earth, thousands of people lived and worked from the first half of the 19^th century to process the largest deposit of saltpeter in the world, producing the fertiliser sodium nitrate that was to transform agricultural land in North and South America, and Europe, and produce great wealth for Chile.

Humberstone and Santa Laura works are the best preserved and most representative remains of a series of over 200 saltpeter works that once existed, all of which were interconnected by a specially built modern railway system, and constitute an exceptional testimony to technological progress and global exchanges which were the cornerstone of the industrial era. In this area, workers, drawn from Chile, Peru and Bolivia, to this hostile environment, lived in company towns and forged a distinctive communal Pampinos culture, manifest in their own rich language, creativity, and solidarity, and above all in pioneering struggles for social justice, that had a profound impact generally on social history.

The industrial heritage site was developed from 1872 and until mid 20^th century; it is located 45 km. from the port of Iquique in the midst of a desert landscape.  The property covers a surface area of 573.48 hectares, with a buffer zone of 1,826.39 hectares that encompasses the two main sites which stand at a distance of approximately 1 km from each other. These complement each other, because the industrial area of Santa Laura is better conserved, while Humberstone has better preserved residential and service areas.

The site of Santa Laura conserves the remains of the industrial installations that were used for saltpeter processing such as industrial installations and equipment, including the only leaching shed and a saltpeter grinder that remain intact today, installations for manufacturing iodine, for energy production and buildings such as the administration house and the main square. The Humberstone site contains the attributes that express the quality of urban settlements, such as the living quarters, public spaces and the regular grid pattern of the Camp, with a main square around which communal buildings are clustered.  Other relevant attributes are the remains of the railway line that linked Santa Laura and Humberstone, the gravel heaps, the construction techniques, architectural styles and materials, in particular the costrón and the Pampa concrete,  distinctive construction materials together with the calamine and timber that were brought from other latitudes. 

The remains of saltpeter works are also present in the buffer zone which is also significant for the conservation of the characteristics of the natural setting of the Pampa which illustrate the relationship between the built environment and the adaptation to the natural setting.

The two saltpeter works are the most representative remaining vestiges of an industry that transformed the lives of a large proportion of the population of Chile, brought great wealth to the country.  The output of the industry, nitrate fertilisers, had indirectly a transforming influence on existing agricultural lands in Europe, and on newly cultivated land in other latitudes and indirectly supported the agricultural revolution of the late 19th century in many parts of the world. The remaining buildings are testimony to the social order and technical processes that drove the industry.

The pioneering social agenda of the saltpeter workers’ unions had far-reaching effects on labour laws throughout Chile and further afield. The distinctive culture of the Pampinos that evolved in association with the industry, which expresses the language, the memory of the saltpeter culture and its influence on social process, has resonance amongst the local population today and is another important attribute of the property. The place still has a strong symbolic and evocative association for the people from the Pampa, former workers and their families, who use the place for meetings and commemorations such as Saltpeter Week. 

Criterion (ii): The development of the saltpeter industry reflects the combined knowledge, skills, technology, and financial investment of a diverse community of people who were brought together from around South America, and from Europe. The saltpeter industry became a huge cultural exchange complex where ideas were quickly absorbed and exploited. The two works represent this process.

Criterion (iii): The saltpeter mines and their associated company towns developed into an extensive and very distinct urban community with its own language, organisation, customs, and creative expressions, as well as displaying technical entrepreneurship. The two nominated works represent this distinctive culture.

Criterion (iv): The saltpeter mines in the north of Chile together became the largest producers of natural saltpeter in the world, transforming the Pampa and indirectly the agricultural lands that benefited from the fertilisers the works produced. The two works represent this transformation process.

Integrity

The attributes at the nucleus of the complex of the two saltpeter works still reflect the key manufacturing processes and social structures and ways of life of these company towns. As opposed to what occurred in many other saltpeter works, Santa Laura and Humberstone were not fully dismantled when they were no longer functional. However, looting, demolition and lack of conservation and maintenance that occurred until the declaration of the site as a National Monument in 1970 compromised the overall integrity of the two works.

Efforts have been made by the State Party to reverse the conditions that threaten the integrity of the property.  Notwithstanding these works, interventions are still needed to ensure that no further erosion of integrity occurs, particularly by addressing the considerable damage that exists at some of the industrial structures in Santa Laura which are still at risk.

The State Party is stressing the multidisciplinary analysis of vulnerability of the materials and the instability of the structures, the assessment of the composition of the materials and their pathologies, the effect of environmental conditions on them, the soil and mechanical actions on structures, so as to identify the best methods of conserving and maintaining them and the use and historic functioning of machinery and buildings.

The buffer zone is an attempt to protect the desert landscape and its relationship with the built environment, as well as the remains from still older saltpeter works and mining camps, including railway lines and roads as well as pedestrian footpaths which give a certain sense to the historic reality of the saltpeter canton (complex of several interrelated saltpeter works). However, no formal buffer zone has been established to control and regulate activities that occur in the surroundings to mitigate the visual impacts on the setting derived from contemporary industrial buildings.

Authenticity

The two saltpeter works have remained better conserved that any other saltpeter works in the Pampa of northern Chile and what remains at the site is authentic and original.  The relatively few interventions, the lack of additions of architectural elements or constructive materials from outside or which are different from those used originally have helped in maintaining the authenticity of the property. 

The authenticity of the site is heightened as a result of its characteristics and its relationship to the landscape which illustrates the occupation of the territory in the saltpeter era and powerfully evokes how the desert was conquered. 

The conservation of manifestations of intangible attributes of the saltpeter era also contributes toward the authenticity of the site.  Humberstone houses the most important gathering of a commemoration of the industry as a whole: the Saltpeter Week which annually gathers together people from all over the Pampa; i.e. former saltpeter workers and their descendants.

However, there are significant challenges for the conservation of the conditions of authenticity, in light of the nature and vulnerability of the materials in the specific environmental conditions, and the identification of interventions which do not compromise these characteristics. 

Protection and management requirements

The property is a National Monument in the category of Historic Monument – the maximum level of protection of heritage in this country -.  It is administered by a private entity, the Saltpeter Museum Corporation, under the supervision of the National Monuments Council, a state institution responsible for the protection of Chile’s cultural heritage. A 2004-2009 Management Plan was produced and now needs to be updated. In addition, the human and financial resources for its sustained implementation will need to be secured and provided to the Corporation.

The formal definition of a buffer zone and the establishment and enforcement of regulatory measures is also an action that needs to be implemented as a crucial measure to protect the desert landscape both geographically as well as in relation to the remains of mining exploration and the transport of the saltpeter in general.

To ensure the conservation of Outstanding Universal Value, authenticity and integrity of the property, the Priority Interventions Plan needs to be implemented, including the structural consolidation and the recovery of buildings at risk.  Physical conservation must be addressed bearing in mind the effects of the camanchaca - dense and frequent mist generated by the Pacific Ocean - and its high saltiness, capable of seriously damaging metals, timbers and even stone materials.  It is necessary to conceptually reflect on authenticity which opens up a space coherently with replacing those pieces and sections that have irredeemably deteriorated, defining a criteria for change associated with that degradation, in order to maintain them for all time.  This must be done in addition to the protection of materials with anti-corrosion treatments.

An essential imperative for the protection, conservation and management of the site is an in-depth knowledge of the techniques, construction systems, and ways of life, exploration systems and the economic conditions at the time. The importance of the technology itself of this exploitation is of great singularity and the complexities of life associated with saltpeter impose a considerable challenge on how it is all interpreted.  Also essential is protecting, conserving and managing those artistic elements that are a part of the history of the site whilst it was functioning and being abandoned, such as the “graphic designs” on the walls, and the movable assets.

Links

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