The former Government Printing Office | A handsome edifice of yesteryear

Originally the Government Printing Office, completed in 1899.

A NECESSITY OF PRINTING HAS ARISEN IN KUALA LUMPUR

The earliest government offices built in Kuala Lumpur after the town was declared the administrative capital of Selangor in 1880 were clustered around Bluff Road (now Bukit Aman where the Royal Malaysian Police is headquartered).  The government offices strategically located on Bukit Aman comprised various departments of the Selangor state administration office. It was where Kuala Lumpur in particular and Selangor in general were administered initially.

On 29 January 1890, the Government Printing Office was first established in Selangor when the necessity for the printing office arose.  At this time there was no printing office premises yet. The Straits Times dated 4 February 1890 reported about the government's plan to secure a temporary building for the printing office. The Kuala Lumpur correspondent reported "The establishment of a Government Printing Office,the building of which will be commenced without delay, recommends itself most heartily to the public generally, and will probably prove, not only exceedingly useful to the authorities, but a source of profit as well. With a large and annually increasing revenue, the State funds can meet, without any undue pressure, more than the demands which may be fairly made upon them."

In setting up the printing plant and office, John Russell was brought to Selangor from England by the British Selangor State Government to head the Selangor Government Printing Office.  His job in Selangor was to set up a printing office in Kuala Lumpur and to head its operations.  On 15 March 1890 John Russell with his wife and children arrived in Singapore.  They reached Kuala Lumpur on 23 March from Klang by train.

Since the arrival of John Russel in Kuala Lumpur, he was assigned to set up the printing plant and office at the new premises provided by the government.  At this time the Government Printing Office was situated on Bluff Road (now Bukit Aman).  Refer to the Kuala Lumpur map in 1895 below.

The first Government Printing Office premises located on Bluff Road

This map drawn in 1950 shows the layout of Kuala Lumpur in 1895 based on the 1889 map

The Selangor Government Gazzette of 27th June 1890 was printed in Selangor for the first time. Subsequently The Selangor Journal: Jottings Past and Present was first published on Friday 23 September 1892 and cost 25 cents.

By 1898 the printing jobs were getting heavier and the present Government Printing Office could hardly cope with the volume.

John Russell's report for 1897, written in February 1898, showed that the expenditure of the printing office was $25,274.02, and the income $10,180.69. The report suggests that a new larger building will be ready next year:

“The Year was an exceedingly busy one, and the amount of work to be done was at times very difficult to cope with. More men and more machinery would have been of the greatest assistance but there was no room for either. In my reports for 1895 and 1896 I have referred to the need for more room. At the time of writing, an addition has been made of a temporary structure with an attap roof, and it is to be hoped that before this time next year the new Printing office - for the construction of which provision has been made in the 1898 estimates - will be occupied. When it is remembered how prolific of Enactments the year was, and that, with the exception of the work for Perak, all the native States printing, as well as a good proportion of the Federal work, is done in this office, it can easily be understood that this means a very large amount of work to turn out. The staff have worked well and hard throughout the year, and as in my former reports, I can speak very highly of Mr Brown’s services as Assistant printer".

A PERMANENT BUILDING FOR THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

The new Government Printing Office, was built on the southern edge of the parade ground, later called the Padang, and now renamed Dataran Merdeka. Unfortunately there seems to be a lack of written documents on the architect responsible for designing this elegant building. Although many tourism pamphlets and guide books have credited Arthur Charles Alfred Norman as its architect, according to The AB Hubback Project blog entry here, by the time initial designs were drafted out in September 1897, Norman had already served the Selangor State as District Engineer of Kuala Lumpur (his former position as State Architect was abolished in June 1896). 

The blog has this to say about the architect of this building and it reads as follows:

Enter Thomas Plowman Hangling King from Liverpool. King arrived on 28 October 1897 to work as Assistant Architect at Selangor PWD but two months into the job he had to fill in as Acting Factory Engineer – the post that Hubback had left vacant. Upon resuming his original position, King was entrusted with the new Government Printing Office project. Unfortunately, he did not fare well in the humid tropics - bogged down with fever so often that he was absent from work most of the time. The big boss of Selangor PWD, State Engineer Charles Edwin Spooner, found King to be ‘slow and inaccurate’, especially after discovering major mistakes in the costing and design of the Government Printing Office - so much so that he called for King’s dismissal in December 1899.  While on medical leave or at the Factory, King’s job at the Drawing Office was undertaken by B. Ramakristna Row. Performing dual duties of Architectural Assistant and Draughtsman, we believe it was Ramakristna who completed the design scheme and detail drawings under Spooner’s direction. 

The building was designed in consultation with Government Printer John Russel and it was constructed by FMS Factory. The architecture style of this building was described by CE Spooner, the Selangor State Engineer, as Jacobean in style.

The Government Printing Office in 1909.  A hand-coloured black and white photo  was made into a postcard. Image source: The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Picture Collection, The New York Public Library. 

The year it was completed was almost certainly in 1899 especially based on a letter from John Russell asking for cupboards and a wooden screen for his office door before he can move in which was dated 30 October 1899. In addition, according to JM Gullick in 'A history of Kuala Lumpur, 1856-1939' although P. Clague (P. Clague wrote 'John Russell 1855-1930 : A Tale of Early Days in the Malay States') gave the date of the second printing office as 1909, contemporary annual reports and photographs established that it was completed in 1899.

John Russel was said to have been involved in designing the building so as to make sure the design of its interior was suitable for a building that housed a printing plant and office.  As a result its interior had no obstructing columns running in the middle of the building to accommodate a large printing press machine.  Instead its interior had a structural support system of cast iron columns and trusses (Something advanced and rare at that time).

The building’s exterior façade was designed in Jacobean style, the odd-one out among the surrounding public buildings designed in Indo-Saracenic style.  It featured exposed bricks, plastered columns, large semi-circular windows decorated with keystones and oriel windows. Whereas at each corner, the parapet wall was adorned with the flemish gable and garlic-shaped finials.  Canopy roofs above the first floor windows were added during renovation work in the 1940s though, as protection against the harsh tropical weather.

Since this building originally was going to serve as the printing plant and office it did not have a pronounced entrance or front porch, but just a simple door located on the western side. Do notice that the windows of this building are huge.  As this building was completed at a time before electricity was available, the printers needed all the natural light they could get to assemble each page of the newspapers and to do the typesetting. This was the place where the Government reports, official government books and even train tickets were printed. News from back home in England was also printed here apart from the local publications at the time like the Selangor Journal.

Oriel window, flemish gable and garlic-shaped finials

The building's original main entrance facing west is without any front porch

Huge windows facing north (The Dataran Merdeka formerly the Padang)

Since 1899, for more than 50 years this 2-storey building with 30,000 sq feet of built-up area had served as the Government Printing Office producing various publications and printouts.  In 1904 the Perak Government Printing Office located in Taiping ceased its operation and was merged with the Selangor Government Printing Office to become federal Government Printing Office. 

The Straits Times 17 June 1904 Page 5 reported "Perak and Selangor Printing offices are to be amalgamated into one Federal establishment. In the event of this federation, in all probability Mr. J Russell, Government Printer, Selangor, will be given the Federal appointment. Mr. S E Williams, Government Printer, Perak, has been offered the appointment of Superintendent, Government Printing Office, Singapore."

In 1961 the building discontinued its function as the printing office after it was taken over by the Ministry of Labour, and subsequently in 1977, the building was converted to the Metropolitan Postal Security Office.

The new building that houses Kuala Lumpur Library located next door to the old building.

In 1986, the Kuala Lumpur City Hall bought the building for over RM3 million, then renovated and furnished it with quality library equipment, making it the first public library in Kuala Lumpur. The Kuala Lumpur Memorial Library, as it was named, also acted as a research centre on all things related to Kuala Lumpur – its history, administration and development, as well as exhibitions on objects and artifacts connected to the heritage of the city. After opening its doors in 1989, the library grew quickly and after three years, it made history by being the first public library in Peninsular Malaysia to go on-line.  The library was renamed the Kuala Lumpur Library in 2000, and a new annex was added on in 2004 for the Kuala Lumpur Library to move in.

Inside the Kuala Lumpur City Gallery - Its showroom

The historic building has been gazetted as National Heritage by the National Heritage Act 2005 (Act 645).  The building has now been renamed Kuala Lumpur City Gallery opened since January 2012. It is owned and managed by ARCH - a brand represented by an extraordinary range of made-in-Malaysia souvenirs and among its unique products are the handcrafted miniature model of the Malaysia's heritage buildings.

ARCH states in its website that Kuala Lumpur City Gallery tells the story of Kuala Lumpur through photos, prints, and miniatures. Please head over to the ARCH website to know more about the products it offers and visit Kuala Lumpur City Gallery to shop for its products as well as to see for yourself the exterior and the interior of this 120-year historic edifice.

Kuala Lumpur City Gallery

The west side where the original main entrance was located

[Updated on 8 June 2020]

REFERENCE

Chin, K.Y., & Chen, V.F. (1998). Kuala Lumpur, a sketchbook. Singapore: Archipelago Press

Dearie:Russell Family History. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.clairegrey.co.uk/hogg_dearie_children/jack/jack_sources.html

Gullick, J.M. (2000). A history of Kuala Lumpur 1856-1939. Kuala Lumpur: MBRAS.

Kuala Lumpur City Gallery. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.klcitygallery.com.my/history

Ng. D., Tan. S., & Tate M.D.J.  (1987). Kuala Lumpur in postcards 1900-1930. Petaling Jaya: Penerbit Fajar Bakti. 

Selangor News. (1890, February 4). Straits Times Weekly Issue.

TheABHubbackProject. (2020, May 24). Not by Hubback: Government Printing Office Kuala Lumpur [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://www.abhubback.com/post/not-by-hubback-government-printing-office-kuala-lumpur