This fascinating piece was compiled by Janet Lee in 1993. She turned back the clock one hundred years to describe what life was like in Johannesburg in 1893. The article first appeared in the Johannesburg Historical Foundation’s journal Between the Chains.
The year 1893 was comparatively uneventful, if activities leading up to the Jameson Raid are anything to go by. And by comparison with other years in the history of Johannesburg and the Rand, it was not a year of such great moment. Nevertheless there were a number of events of note in many fields for which the year 1893 will be remembered.
The first mining finance house to explore deep levels was Rand Mines Limited, which was formed in 1893, taking over from its predecessor, H Eckstein & Company. In January of that year Lionel Philips, as outgoing President of the Chamber of Mines, mourned the death of Herman Eckstein, who had died earlier that month in his home-town Stuttgart, at the age of 47. Eckstein had been much respected by his colleagues on the Rand where he had come from Kimberley to found H Eckstein & Company to investigate the mining potential of the Witwatersrand.
Born in the same year as Eckstein, the Hungarian entrepreneur, Hugo Allois Nellmapius, died on is farm at Irene also at the age of 47, only a few months after having witnessed the opening of the railway from Johannesburg to Pretoria on January 1. Irene was one of the few halts on this three hour journey...
