It is hard to imagine that the small park adjacent to Redhill School and opposite the Morningside Shopping Centre in Sandton was once a major 'outspan' where weary travellers (and oxen of course) rested on the way to Johannesburg. The following article, first published in the 1984 Sandton Historical Association journal, brings the story alive.
An old 'outspan', at least 150 years old, has just recently become a new Sandton Park, and will be preserved forever as an open place. This is Outspan Park in Morningside.
When the early farms were laid out in the Transvaal as the Voortrekkers surged northwards in the 1840s and 1850s, and the first Land Grants were made, special attention was given to allowing open spaces between farms, where travellers or visiting families could graze their oxen while resting overnight or for several days to attend the markets. Known as 'outspans' they were, in fact, the first public parks. Many of these public areas remain today, and are of great significance when nearly all those original farms have been divided and sub-divided. One such "Outspan" in Sandton is in Morningside, just near a road which was thoughtfully named Outspan Road. In October of 1983, a special cairn was erected by the municipality near a small spring on the 'Outspan', and this was officially unveiled by the Mayor of Sandton [we could not find this on a site visit].
It has become a tradition that on Spruit Day in October each year (the anniversary of the...
It is hard to believe that the land to the east of the Bryanston CBD was once home to a grand hunting estate. The following article, originally published in an old journal of the Sandton Historical Association, sheds some light on the fascinating story.
Over fifty years ago, to the north of what is Sandton today, there was a fine hunting estate called 'Craigieburn', which echoed to the sound of happy guests, and where, each Sunday, the Union Jack was raised with royal precision to announce that the owners were in residence. A small farmhouse stood among the graceful pine trees, and it was a place of beauty and peace, a country retreat safe from the hubub of fast developing Johannesburg. Today, some of those pine woods remain, but they are fast being swallowed by townhouse developments to meet the need of our expanding population.
'Cragieburn' was just off what was then the main road to Pretoria (still called Main Road) and had been part of the original farm granted to JP Badenhorst in 1859 when land registrations were formalised in the Transvaal in the July of that year. The farm was 'Rietfontein 15' and was one of the five which made up our modern town of Sandton, the others being: Witkoppen, Driefontein, Zandfontein and Cyferfontein.
North of where Sloane Street, Bryanston is today, 'Cragieburn' comprised 23 Morgen through which a small stream runs northwards. Parkland has been retained on either side of this as well as an adjoining park to the...
Every day thousands of people pass Sandton's first monument without realising it is there. On a small piece of land tucked away near the top of South Road lie the graves of some of the original settlers in the area and the monument erected in their honour. The Esterhuysen family owned the farm Zandfontein in the middle of the 19th century. It is on a portion of this farm that the modern skyscrapers of Sandton have emerged. Below are a few passages from various old Sandton Historical Association journals providing some background on the heritage site.
"Just as we go to press comes the news that the graves of the Esterhuysen Family in Sandown, Extension 24, are finally to become Sandton's first historical monument . On October 30th [1982] there will be a ceremony at the Monument, when the Mayor of Sandton will receive from the developers Schahat Cullum, the deeds to the stand on which are buried Jan Christoffel Esterhuysen and his wife Maria Buitendag and others."
The Monument from a distance (The Heritage Portal)
"Eight years have passed since our association first started trying to ensure that these graves were preserved for posterity, and we can justly claim credit for helping to bring this campaign to a successful conclusion."
"The Esterhuysens came to the farm Zandfontein in 1836 and we hope that their monument will stand for many more centuries." [this date needs to be...
Most people are familar with Douglasdale (the suburb and the famous milk brand of course) but who was the Douglas in Douglasdale? Below are a few excerpts from the 1980 journal of the Sandton Historical Association answering this question.
Douglasdale is situated in the north of the municipality of Sandton, west of Bryanston and just south of Fourways, with the western boundary following the Klein Jukskei river.
Since local history is the story of the land and the people who live on it, there are two stories to be told - that of 'Douglas', the man, and 'Dale', the place. Both stories, strangely enough, began around the middle of the last century - one in a small Scottish town, and the other in what were then the bleak uninhabited areas of the Transvaal, between Potchefstroom and Pretoria in the days before gold was discovered and when Johannesburg itself did not exist. [This article will tell the story of Douglas the man]
It was in 1859, on July 26th, that the original farm Witkoppen was granted by land grant from President Kruger to P.E. Labuschagne and on July 5th of the same year that Driefontein 3 was granted to L.P. van Vuuren, and these land grants can be seen today in Pretoria, although the farms have now all been considerably sub-divided. Not long after, in the year 1863, Thomas Douglas, one of a family of five, was born in the small town of Stranraer in Wigtownshire, Scotland.
