Category: 1_Harrismith
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Mary and Jean
Mom: When the Colemans arrived in Harrismith for Ken to start work in ‘the milk factory’ we met them right away as Dad was a great friend of Ken’s older brother Wally. Wally had been his tutor as an appy electrician in the Pietermaritzburg Post Office back in 1938. I recall visiting Uncle Wally as a kid once – I think in Howick?
– Wally Coleman in the white coat – Dad standing second left – 1938 PMB – Ken and Jean started building a new house on the corner of Hector street and Berg street, the road that led out of town to our plot less than a kilometre away. While the builders were at it, some leave time came up and Ken took the family away, prompting Dad to opine to Mom, ‘I would never go away while someone was building my house! I would watch their every move.’ Right.
Mom’s not sure, but thinks Donald was already born when they arrived in Harrismith. When Anne was born soon after me, Mary was chosen as her godmother as ‘Jean was a great friend even though she was Anglican.’ Mary Methodist speaking!
Then Eddie was born and we were like this:
Koos, Anne, Donald & Sheila ca.1959 
Donald, Anne and Eddie in front – Durban ca.1965
In 2015 Sheila wrote: Mum says when we still lived on the ‘townlands’ on the way to the waterworks, Jean would often ‘phone and say ‘Have you got a little visitor?’– once again her son Donald had gone missing and she knew exactly where he was – he used to walk all the way to our farm to visit his great mate, Koos. The two were inseparable.
Today in 2020 Mom’s version was slightly different: ‘You used to walk to Donald without telling me. I would phone Jean and ask ‘Is there anything there of mine?’ Maybe the strolling went both ways?
What started this reminiscing was Eddie sending me pics of Jean’s 80th birthday celebration in June 2008, when Anne and Eddie took her on a very special outing:
– Eddie, Anne and Jean with Cathkin Peak and Champagne Castle behind – They got together for Mary’s 80th in September 2008
– Mary turns 80 in PMB – 2008 – For years after the Colemans left Harrismith we heard about their farm outside Winterton. About how Ken built the rondawels and bathroom very rustically. But I never saw Donald again and only lately found out that I had heard from him once!
– view from Craggs outside Winterton – looking at Cathkin and Champagne – 
– Jean and Ken – ~~~oo0oo~~~
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Chopin Mom Used to Play – Polonaise in A flat major Op.53
The whole thing goes over seven minutes. I copied just the part I remember from Rumiko Isaksen on vimeo.com
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Padarewski Mom Used to Play – Minuet in G
We’ll let Padarewski play this one himself, but not for long. Sheila says she has a recording of Mom playing this. When I get it, it’ll be ‘Roll Over Padarewski!’
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Louis, Imperial Schoeman
Mom Mary fondly says bachelor Louis Schoeman was quite important and quite full of himself – ‘He thought he was the Prince Imperial!’ she says teasingly. ‘Louis the Seventeenth,’ she says, adding one to the last of that French line of kings.
‘He played polo, you know, and that was very posh. He walked with a regal bearing. So when he walked in to Havengas bookstore one day and threw down a document on the counter in front of Dad saying, ‘Pieter! Sign here!’ Dad said ‘What for? I don’t sign anything unless I know what I’m signing!’ all the assembled men’s heads turned to Louis, sensing drama.’
‘I’m getting married!’ he announced, ‘to Cathy, the sister at the hospital.’ Well, like sympathetic, caring, thoughtful bachelors will do when a friend is in need, the men roared with laughter and teased Louis unmercifully!
‘And you know what?’ says Mom Mary: ‘It was the best thing that ever happened to him! Cathy bore them five lovely children and was a wonderful companion, mother and home-maker. Wonderful sense of fun and humour, and they were very happy together.’
~~~oo0oo~~~
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Liszt Mom Used to Play – Liebestraum
Quite one of my favourites, this would invoke peace. Some of the others caused some melancholy! Not this one.
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Kathy Putterill’s School
Wild-haired Kathy Putterill ran a nursery school in her home. Their house was on a long thin plot on two levels. The lower level had Shetland ponies on it. And I think she had dogs. I seem to remember small dogs.
That’s about all I remember. They had a funny car. Right? And Kathy enjoyed a smoke and a drink?
Their house (her husband was Leonard, Len Putterill) was where Warden Street T-boned into Murray Street. Below them Murray Street got steep as it rolled down, kinking left just before it crossed McKechnie Street and ducked through the subway under the railway line. Their house is gone now.
Leon Fluffy Crawley and Noeline Bester remembered the ponies! They say Fridays was horseriding. Noeline says it was the highlight of the week and the only reason she hung in there! Fluffy tells how his gardener used to accompany him to school on his go-cart all the way up from Garvock Street – going home would have been easy: downhill!
Fluffy remembers Kathy smoking, and says sometimes you’d get there in the morning and have to wait outside while Kathy got ready – late start!
– It’s Friday! Here’s us three on Kathy Putterill’s Shetland ponies. The brown horse is winning. They always do – if you must gamble, always put a tenner on the brown horse – ~~oo0oo~~
Vrystaat Confessions 