South Africa General

This work has its origins in doctoral research I was conducting in 1982 in the field of the indigenous vernacular architecture of southern Africa. At that stage I was searching for the links, if any, that might have existed between the so-called “civilizing” mission of white European and North American religious zealots, and the changes which had begun to become manifest in the local built environment as early as the 1860s. By the 1920s other, and equally overt, influences had also begun to emerge. The mines at Kimberley and on the Witwatersrand, migrant employment in urban areas, the educational curriculae of Missionary Trade Schools, the introduction of industrial building materials into the rural economy, and the training given on an ad hoc basis by white farmers to their laborers, were beginning to create a fabric of competing influences which made it easy for racially-motivated detractors of Black culture to dismiss the achievements of rural builders as the product of a “civilizing” and “technically superior” white presence.

Originally this work began as a simple hand-written listing of some 1030 mission stations established by some 60 missionary societies over a period of 125 years. Its purpose was to show, by means of five maps set at 25-year intervals, the spreading geographical presence of missionaries over southern Africa. These are my working notes upon which a listing was based and were originally produced by a crude cut-and-stick method of collation that preceded the use of personal computers. 

During the process of photocopying, the...

Nedbank’s history is an assemblage of 15 entities that merged into the group throughout the past two centuries allowing Nedbank to trace its origins back to 1831. This collective consists of entities such as the Board of Executors (BoE), Syfrets, the Permanent Mutual Building Society, the Cape of Good Hope Bank Savings Society, Boland Bank, UAL, the Natal Building Society, and of course the Nederlandsche Bank en Credietvereeniging.

Pretoria roots

The first South African branch of the Nederlandsche Bank en Credietvereeniging was opened in Church Street, Pretoria, in 1888. By 1897, the bank’s presence had grown exponentially, and a larger building was built. The structure, designed by WJ de Zwaan, was completed in 1897 and still stands today, and is in use by the Tshwane Tourism Office and is still known affectionately as the Old Netherlands Bank Building. This sandstone masterpiece served as Nedbank’s head office until 1953, when the bank moved into its third, and final, Pretoria-based head office, designed by Norman Eaton. It is still in use today, on what is now known as Thabo Sehume Street.

The first South African branch of the Nederlandsche Bank

Old post...

What do Rod Stewart, Elton John, Phil Collins, Jools Holland and Pete Waterman have in common? Before stating the obvious, just try and think of what shared interest other than music they could possibly have. Well it may be hard to believe but the fact remains they all share a love for model railways and have their own layouts.

Railway modelling or in American parlance model railroading, is a hobby that has had an enduring appeal for over 130 years and to define it one could say it is “the art of creating in miniature a replica of a full-size railway”. The term “Toy Train” to describe a model railway is demeaning as it does not do justice to the hobby, as the railway modeller is not only concerned with the engine and carriages (the train) but also with the other aspects of railway operation such as trackwork, signalling, stations, lineside structures and civil engineering works, all of course in miniature.

The first introduction to the hobby is usually when a child reaches the age of six and it is when he or she receives the “Big” present from “Father Christmas” – the “Train Set”, this being a boxed starter set containing all that is needed to run a train on an oval track, which after opening is laid out on the floor or on a table top. Dad is usually the more enthusiastic one and takes charge of the power controller, leaving the child wondering who the present was really meant...

If you thought climate change was still a debatable issue, look at the way the World Heritage Committee, the body responsible for international policy pertaining to heritage, is beginning to warn on the threat of climate change to heritage around the world. The World Heritage Committee, part of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), is responsible for establishing World Heritage Sites, which are sites with legal protection for having cultural, historical, scientific or other form of significance.

Greek architecture undergoing maintenance as a key tourism and heritage asset, 1971 (Valerie Strever)

UNESCO and safeguarding cultural heritage

The international community established the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1945 as a mechanism to safeguard human heritage around the world. The UNESCO World Heritage Convention was launched in 1975 to identify and protect examples of the world's natural and cultural heritage considered to be of Outstanding Universal Value. The Convention is governed by the World Heritage Committee and this committee is supported by three technical advisory bodies: the IUCN or International Union for Conservation of Nature acting as the Advisory Body on natural heritage, the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM) and the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) representing cultural heritage.

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It was as recently as 140 years ago that our forebears’ lives were scarcely touched by electricity, bar the occasional lightning strike in a summer thunderstorm. Back then lighting, heating and cooking all entailed a naked flame, whether it emanated from a source fuelled by wood, coal, oil or gas and refrigeration for the lucky few was by ice in the “Ice Box”. Nineteenth century scientists would unlock the secrets of electricity and magnetism, which would lead the way for electricity to be harnessed for the benefit of Mankind; if you like the Second Industrial Revolution.

Electricity has created our modern world and the first fruit of its use was the electric telegraph, the precursor of the telephone and the internet, which from the 1840’s would enable a message, in Morse code, to be sent along a wire; hence the saying “to send a wire”. Lighting by electricity would be the next goal and by the 1870’s the race was on to perfect the incandescent light bulb. It was Thomas Edison who would take the plaudits but it was in fact Joseph Swan who would beat him to it and they would later come to an agreement to form a company, in 1883, with “Ediswan” as its trade mark.

Power generation, whereby a power station could supply electricity to a neighbourhood, was Edison’s aim and he heavily invested his time and money in developing Direct Current (DC) technology, however he would have a keen competitor in George Westinghouse who championed Alternating...

In 2021 the Carnegie Corporation of New York celebrated its 110th anniversary. Perhaps this is sufficient reason to remind readers of the generous philanthropic endowments first made by Andrew Carnegie and thereafter by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, to South African libraries during the early years of the twentieth century.

Andrew Carnegie Portrait (Bill of Rights Institute)

In 1906, Vryheid became the first South African town to receive a financial grant from Andrew Carnegie for the establishment of a public library. By 1917, when the last endowment was made for a similar library in Krugersdorp, twelve South African towns had received financial assistance, totaling the not insignificant amount of $123 855, to establish free library services to their local communities.

These twelve libraries served their local communities faithfully for the next 35 years, until the promulgation of the Separate Amenities Act of 1953, limited their use to the White population only. By the early 1970’s, overtaken by a combination of demographic and technological developments, five of these old buildings had reached the end of their lifespan and were demolished. Fortunately, one hundred years later we can still admire and enjoy the remaining seven of these fine Edwardian buildings.

Andrew Carnegie

Andrew Carnegie had a very personal interest in libraries. Being a ‘self-made man’, having made...

South Africa was one of the last bastions for steam locomotives and they attracted many tourists from across the globe to travel on our trains or watch them go by, camera at the ready. Steam engines have an enduring appeal to railway enthusiasts (buffs & gricers will also do) as they seem to live and breathe just like a wild animal. In fact it was seriously considered to make a “Reserve” for steam engines along the Garden Route, in the province of the Western Cape, centred on the city of George, where a Steam Museum resides. Alas Mother Nature intervened, when a land slip, after torrential rain between the 1st & 3rd August 2006 (300mm), closed indefinitely the 42 mile (67km) long branch line from George to Knysna, on which the  steam hauled “Outeniqua Choo Tjoe” ran. The branch was the showpiece for the Transnet Heritage Foundation and it was run on similar lines to a “Preservation Line” in the UK and it was often referred to as “the world in one branch line”. Its closure was a great set back, let us hope that one day it will re-open again.

Outeniqua Choo Tjoe crossing the Kaaiman’s River bridge (Peter Ball)

The reason for the longevity of the steam engine in South Africa is due to politics and economics. South Africa was blessed...

In the article below, journalist Lucille Davie unpacks the story of South Africa's obsession with Rodriguez. The article was first published on the Brand South Africa website on 21 February 2013. Click here to view more of Davie's work.

South Africa’s most unlikely export must be Rodriguez, a singer-songwriter from Detroit in the US. The Mexican-American cut two albums in the early 1970s which went nowhere in his homeland but were a huge hit in South Africa, culminating in the 2012 hit movie Searching for Sugarman.

Movie Poster

On stage in Johannesburg during his February 2013 tour he said: “The last time I was this happy was the last time I was in South Africa.” That was in 2008.

After his albums, Cold Fact and Coming from Reality, flopped in the US, he disappeared for decades into a working class suburb of Detroit where he still lives, continuing his work as a labourer on construction sites, until two South Africans went searching for him.

Album Cover

The discovery of the aged hippie has the quality of a miracle, with a man who was thought to have died, rising from the...

This article certainly deviates from the more serious range of articles on South African photographic history published by the author from time-to-time. An early caution therefore - The images included in this article are not visually aesthetic.

Many, many millions of snapshot photographs were produced by amateur photographers between the 1920s and 1940s - some of which were good, some bad, some provocative, some botched and some indifferent.

None of these should be ignored in that with time they have become historic records in themselves. With their endless ability to surprise, they have become a quirky alternative to photographic history.

This article reflects on the more trivial aspect of photography, namely botched snapshot photographs – those unintended photographic faux pax’s achieved during the earlier years of amateur photography.

Botched photographs fall into the category of found photographs.

Plenty vegetation, with only one young face barely visible. If it was not for the inscription on the back: “School picnic”, this image would not have made much sense

Guess what this could be? A German monument in Windhoek (Namibia). The identification of this “ghost” structure was simplified in that it is recorded in the album that the photographer was seconded by a South African petroleum...

The primary purpose of this article is to introduce the first known catalogue of Anglo-Boer war stereo photographs produced by the American based B.W. Kilburn & Company (Version 1 – as at June 2021 - click here to view).

This article is the second in a series on South African Anglo-Boer war stereo photographs, also referred to as stereoviews, produced by American based entities. The first in the series was on the Anglo-Boer war stereo photographs produced by another American entity, namely Underwood & Underwood (in this article the stereoview is also described in more detail).

“Long Cecil” the big gun built by the de Beers company during the siege of Kimberly (sic). Long Cecil is a single cannon, designed by an American citizen, George Labram. Today the gun is located on the stylobate (facing the Free State) of the Honoured Dead Memorial in Kimberley.

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