Charles John Wood, British civil engineer and a member of the (British) Institution of Civil Engineers, published a paper on "Tunnel outlets from storage reservoirs" in the Minutes of Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1880. A few years later he was appointed at the request of the Cape Town City Council, through the Institution of Civil Engineers, to recommend a scheme for the repair and partial reconstruction of the Molteno water reservoir in Cape Town. He arrived in January 1884 and found that work on the reservoir had been poorly executed. He submitted his Report on the reconstruction of the Molteno reservoir in March that same year, with detailed recommendations on how to make it waterproof. Subsequently he remained in Cape Town to supervise the work, residing at Sea Point. He reported progress in a paper entitled "The Molteno reservoir...", which was published in the Minutes of Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers (1886-1887), and also as a pamphlet (1887).

Wood was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. In 1891 or 1892 he became a member of the South African Philosophical Society, but his membership had lapsed by 1897. In that year he applied for work as an engineer in the Natal Colony.

List of sources:
General directory and guide book to the Cape of Good Hope and its dependencies, 1886, Alphabetical directory.

National Automated Archival Information Retrieval System (NAAIRS). http://national.archives.gov.za/naairs.htm Documents relating to Wood, Charles John.

South African bibliography to the year 1925. London: Mansell, 1979.

South African Philosophical Society. Transactions, 1892, Vol. 8, list of members.

Water History. Molteno... The Water Wheel, November/December 2015, pp. 18-21. Retrieved on 8 June 20212 from http://www.wrc.org.za/wp-content/uploads/mdocs/WW_Nov15_Molteno.pdf

Compiled by: C. Plug

Last updated: 2021-06-08 13:51:16