These rare pictures are from the collection of Mrs Daulat Feroz Kassam of Mississauga, Ontario, Canada.
According to the inscriptions on the back of the pictures, they are from His Highness the Aga Khan’s visit to the Daily Nation newspaper’s printing office on Victoria Street (now Tom Mboya Street) in Nairobi, Kenya in October 1962.
The Daily Nation and its sister Swahili language paper, Taifa Leo, were founded by His Highness in 1960 and were printed in this location. In the pictures, His Highness is accompanied by Mr. Michael Curtis, the first editor of this newspaper, and subsequently an Executive Assistant to His Highness.
About Michael Curtis
In 1959, Michael Curtis launched the Nation Media Group on behalf of the His Highness the Aga Khan, which published the Sunday Nation and subsequently the Daily Nation in Kenya, competing successfully with the existing colonial newspapers, the Tanganyika Standard and the East African Standard. Sales rose rapidly from 17,500 to 35,000 and ultimately to 165,000.
At the culmination of the process of Africanising the company, Curtis stepped down in 1977, and moved to Aiglemont to lead the Aga Khan’s social welfare department until his retirement in 1994.
Research Zahir Dharsee
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