Marc Latilla does a great job keeping Joburg’s history alive. Here’s a great post on Idols – and Mandys – Nightclub. I think I jol’d there one blurry night in 1977.
No too far from Mandys – Norman House in Doornfontein, I chose as the feature image.
Author: bewilderbeast
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Annie’s Consolation
Or: Moenie worry nie
Or: There, their, they’re
The big annual prize-giving took place in 1972 and I didn’t win a single trophy, cup, certificate or handshake. But I was not to worry, Annie insisted. Here’s the letter she wrote me from George in the Southern Cape where she spent the only three years of her ninety outside Harrismith:
15th
Have just received your mother’s letter, containing the report on school prize-giving. Good for you son – I’m very pleased with your results. I’m sure you are not upset about not winning a cup. Think of the bother of cleaning them. In any case you can always show off the Bland Racing Cups!
Love to all
Annie
So there! Who needs to win trophies anyway? Unless it’s for horseracing. That’s different and highly prized. Even if that sport may have contributed to losing the farm.
I just love the characteristic unemotional, no-nonsense approach. That’s me Gran! That’s her in George, looking queenish with matching twinset and corgi accessory.
Here she is in George again round about the same time, in a dress and uncomfortable shoes cos it’s a wedding. Corgi at her feet. Not her corgi, mind you. She didn’t do animals, she played golf and drove motorcars. Also owned and ran a Caltex garage and a Volkswagen motorcar agency. At one time she sold 1200cc VW Beetles for R1199.
~~oo0oo~~
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Uncle Hec and Stoppit
I saw this pic . .
. . and I thought of Hector Fyvie when he and Tabs got a new dog called Rocket on Gailian.
“Stoppit Rocket,” he would say repeatedly with a smile in his mild, friendly voice.
And Uncle Hec just smiled again when we said, ‘This dog thinks its name is StoppitRockit.‘
~~oo0oo~~
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Greatest Place on Earth
Staunch Methodist and Mom Mary’s teacher in Harrismith way back when, Tom Moll, sent a note for the centenary of the old church. It included this truthful bit of important information, which I repeat here cos I luvvit:
When we first came to Richmond, Natal in ’47 we met up with a Mr Jim Barclay, who had been a policeman at Kromhof (near Mont Pelaan, the then Christina) and he had quite a bit of contact with Harrismith during the rebellion, so we had an interesting chat, and he gave me this little piece of doggerel:
I always thought that Johburg was, and has been since its birth,
Without equivocation, the greatest place on earth.
I also thought that London was the greatest city known,
With its many million people, and the Queen upon the throne.
But now a brother tells me
That this is all a myth,
For the greatest place upon this earth
Is known as Harrismith !~~oo0oo~~
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Methodist Organ Grinders
I often say My Mom Mary played the organ in the Harrismith Methodist Church for a hundred years and I had to go to church twice every Sunday for all those years and more.
I exaggerate.
Her predecessor, Uncle Wright Liddell actually played for longer than she did, and he was the organist for sixty three years. I’m not sure how long Mom was. A guess: Uncle Wright died in 1967, so it was before that that he pulled Mary aside and said I want you to take over from me. So if Mary played and sang from ’67 to ’97 it was thirty years. I must ask her.
Here’s Uncle Wright when he was little – out at Witsieshoek at a wedding. He’s the liddellest Liddell seated on the steps front right.
The pic is from the lovely story of the Cronjes of Witsieshoek. Mom always spoke of Corrie and Len Cronje. Corrie’s daughter Liz Groves-Finnie has written the family story. If you want to read it, write to her at lizfinnie@gmail.com – she’ll tell you where you can read it.
~~oo0oo~~
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How Hard Can It Be?
Dad, I can’t think what to have for our third supper camping. Don’t wurrie Jess, I’ll do the first night, you just do two suppers. What’ll you do Dad? she asked, maybe regretting opening her mouth. Don’ wurrie Jess, I have a plan.
Her query had reminded me that our cottage came with three stainless steel braais, two built-in, and three braai grids, and two huge bags of charcoal – not your garage forecourt size – and eight plastic-wrapped bags of braaihout.
I packed the grid, a bag of braaihout, fahlahter, safety matches, and two T-bones. I was going to become a brauer. How hard could it be?At Bonamanzi there’s a built-in brick braaiplek, no grid. I go scouting the sixteen sites, only two occupied, and find one. Collecting twigs as I go. At dusk I set the well-packed pyramid-shaped pyre alight and stand back watching the blaze with satisfaction, marveling at how easy this is and how okes gaan aan about their secret and foolproof ‘methods,’ etc and blah blah.
When I have glowing hardehout coals – and admittedly still a bit of flame, I’m hungry so I sandwich the Spar-marinaded vacuum-packed very thinly-sliced bargain T-bones into my nifty snap-shut stainless steel braai grid that came wif the cottage, and plop them on top of the camp grid over the red hot coals. With a bit of flame. I’m attending them noukeurig when the other camper drives in in the dark and I make the mistake of shouting across my coals, How was your drive?Turns out he thinks he should tell me. He bustles over and tells me. I didn’t catch his name but if it isn’t Earnest it should be. Great detail about how their drive was not good, no elephant. Then where he’s from and what his 4X4 is and which one he actually wanted to buy (Nissan Pathfinder / Nissan Patrol) and how – exactly how – he built his own camper trailer on his parents farm and what he kitted it out with with his own hands and how although the trailer was old, the wheel bearings were still shiny silver when he took them apart. Also the pros and cons of a gazebo.
I’m shuffling and he’s getting into his stride and I’m polite. A fatal combination, which brings Jess with a torch to say, Dad you’ve burnt the meat!
~~oo0oo~~
braai – barbecue
braaihout – barbecue
braaiplek – barbecue
brauer– barbecue deskundige
deskundige – expert, but only in pyromania
noukeurig – barbecue with focus
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Lamborghini Boere
The O broers, Frik and his boet were legends in Welkom. They owned a large transport company and made serious money. Built like double-door refrigerators, they wore khaki. Khaki shirts, khaki shorts, khaki long socks and sturdy velskoens. Brown. En ‘n hoed.
They also wore thick brown spectacle frames and tinted lenses. Safilo Elasta if you know frames. Tough. Heavy. Severe.
The pinch-of-salt story was told how they walked into a car dealership in Joburg and asked to look at the cars. The salesman took one look and decided those velskoens were not going to press the accelerator in his Lambos; and so gave them short shrift. They asked to speak to the boss and bought matching Lamborghinis from him. Paid cash, of course.
Well, I don’t know exact facts, but I certainly saw the two Lambos in Welkom. Lekker bright yellow ones. One was parked right outside while I tested Frik’s eyes.
Apparently they had a large fleet of trucks shipping coal to power stations. Maybe even to Newcastle. And they flew a helicopter or two. ‘They’ said. Some people just go big! Or Gaan Groot!
– seen on the Welkom horseshoe – or maybe not – ~~oo0oo~~
I checked the detail with my Welkom boss from back in 1978 and he said, in his laconic way, Yep, About Right.
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The MacFadyen Boys
Mr & Mrs MacFadyen had a shop in Harrismith where they sold implements. Farm implements? I dunno, says 96yr-old Mom, I think so. They lived in a house near Dr Reitz. That’s in the centre of town. They had four boys and Margaret. Then I think Mrs said enough.
We always pronounced their name ‘MacFadgin.’ I don’t know why. It was spelt with a Y but pronounced MacFadgin or MacFadjin.
All four boys went to war and only two came back.
Douglas and Ian died, Billy and Bruce made it home. When the King and Queen came to Harrismith in 1947 they made a point of calling Mr & Mrs MacFadyen up to shake their hands.
~~oo0oo~~
The feature pic is Kaoxa Camp near Mapungubwe. I used it because across the road is a Duncan MacFadyen gate to the Oppenheimer ranch/diamond mine. He is a conservationist and maybe a descendant of our MacFadyen boys, who knows?
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Fore, Jimmy!
Mom was playing golf on the front lawn of Granny Bland’s home in Stuart Street. Her Dad Frank had laid out a course and Annie, Frank, cousin Leslie and her youngest son Michael joined in, Michael only about 4yrs old. As they were playing, James Farquhar Esq walked past, raised his hat and said in his broad Scots accent, straight from Orkney Archipelago, “Good Morning Frank!” Frank replied, “Good morning Jimmy.”
Raising his club lil Michael called out, “Good morning Jimmy!”
Mom and Leslie packed up laughing. That just wasn’t done, you know, back then, says Mom chuckling now, eighty years later. For a little boy to call a gentleman by his nickname!
– Granny Bland standing on the fairway – ~~oo0oo~~
Orkney is 10 miles colder than Wick in Caithness, where our great-grandad Stewart Bain came from. It’s off the Scottish mainland and consists of seventy little islands. So it should be called Orkney Islands, or Orkney Archipelago, but no, the Orkney ous call it Orkney and they call the biggest of those tiny islands “the Mainland.”
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There was a Good Harry Smith
I don’t like Harry Smith, so make my bias obvious upfront. I have taken the things I dislike about him from some very interesting writings on him by Andrew L. Harington and Thomas Keegan. So this is not a one-eyed view; I believe it to be true as these fellas do their homework! Maybe his redeeming quality was his abiding love for his wife; and maybe the fact that he was just doing what the white supremacists who reigned at the time and who were his ‘bosses’ and his fellows, secretly or overtly actually wanted him to do.
Henry Wakelyn Smith or, as his juniors sometimes called him behind his back, Hurry Wackalong Smite’s first entry into Grahamstown as governor of the Cape ‘was the greatest celebration the town had ever known. Triumphal arches and every means of decoration and salute that could be devised adorned the streets.’
The white people of Grahamstown were welcoming one of the most villainous characters in South African history, renowned for his excitable nature, appalling temper and unfortunate habit of ferocious swearing. They were wanting him to lead the war against the Africans who lived there. Smith was, by all accounts, incredibly belittling and aggressive in his interaction with the native chiefs. Soon after arriving at the Cape in 1847, Smith announced himself as the ‘Paramount Chief’ and ‘father’ of all the Xhosa. Smith believed that, ‘The Kaffir, like every other barbarian, is a desponding creature; and, when, once subdued, easily kept subordinate.’ On a number of occasions Smith presented himself as an overly antagonistic bully. Upon his arrival on the docks at Port Elizabeth, he was greeted by hundreds of individuals who gathered to hear him speak. One of these was said to be Chief Maqoma of the Ngqika Xhosa – a general who had fought against Smith to great avail in the Sixth Frontier War of 1835. Upon seeing Maqoma, Smith apparently glared at the chief whilst half drawing his sword from his scabbard. After the speech, Maqoma was summoned by Smith and ordered to his knees. Smith lay his boot onto Maqoma’s neck and is claimed to have said, ‘This is to teach you that I am come hither to show Kaffirland that I am chief and master here.’ Later, in an incident wherein Chief Sandile offered to shake Smith’s hand, Smith ordered that he kiss his boots instead. He was also said to have torn up a piece of paper, symbolizing the treaty of 1835, in front of a gathering of Xhosa chiefs, and thereafter ordered these chiefs to once again kiss his boots.
To this day we are are living the consequences of his – and many others’ – brutal arrogance.
There’s a good Harry Smith?
Wikipedia has four baseball Harry Smiths; six cricketer Harry Smiths, one who appeared to always bat number nine for Transvaal and South Africa, yet never bowled! Ten footballing Harry Smiths; And sundry others, one of whom I think was a good Harry Smith: Harry Leslie Smith, born in England in 1923 and died in Canada on 28 November 2018.
My kind of Harry Smith tweeted common sense like this at the age of 92: If a dentist can afford to spend $50,000 to kill a lion, it tells me the rich aren’t taxed enough. #CecilTheLion http://t.co/8kKuzPRE0b — Harry Leslie Smith (@Harryslaststand) July 28, 2015
This Harry Smith was the son of a coalminer; he grew up in poverty after his father became unemployed. His sister Marion died of tuberculosis. When he was seven he was working as a barrow boy for a beer bottler in Bradford, supporting his entire family. They moved frequently and he spent time sleeping in workhouses. He joined the RAF, subsequently spending several years in Germany as part of the Allied occupation force. While there he met his future wife, Friede.
Here’s Good Harry Smith’s decision to not honour ongoing warfare:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/08/poppy-last-time-remembrance-harry-leslie-smith
Modest Circumstances
SIR Harry Smith’s biographers will tell you he was also born in modest circumstances. However, there’s modest and modest: He was born in Whittlesea, Cambridgeshire in 1787, where his father was a surgeon. In 1805 he caught the eye of Brigadier-General Sir William Stewart, who made him an officer, immediately hugely improving his prospects.
~~o0o~~
update: So I for one am happy to call my town by the old name for the mountain that makes the town what it is: Ntabazwe
~~oo0oo~~
Here’s a kinder look at the soldier Harry Smith by Harrismith blogger Sandra of deoudehuizeyard.
Vrystaat Confessions 