Vrystaat Confessions

Whaddabout?

  • Textile Giant in Harrismith

    Textile Giant in Harrismith

    Old-Harrismithian Harry Pikkie Loots found a history of the South African textile industry 1820 to 1948 by James Carol (Paddy) McDowell for his Master of Commerce (economic history) thesis at the University of Natal Durban in 2000. I skimmed through it, taking out some of the Harrismith-related bits.

    As with all my history pieces: Pinch of salt. Those who know more, do please tell.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Interesting indeed. I always knew our local boere had lots of sheep (Sheila always says ‘He’s got more money than God’s got sheep!’). I also knew they used to compete for the biggest wool clip amongst each other, and occasionaly even in the country. Some would cheat by buying in sheep just before the shearing season to boost their yield! It’s a boy thing. Small penises?

    But this was new to me: Our boere started their own woollen mill in 1922. Good for them! I suppose a kooperasie type of deal? But it went bankrupt in 1927 cos the machinery was unsuitable.

    They sold to Harris. He then discovered the machinery was unsuitable! Eish! What to do? Replacement would have been costly but the outbreak of a fire in that section of the factory that had the unsuitable machinery meant an insurance payout saved the day.
    Hmmm . . . God moves in mysterious ways.
    ..
    I don’t think I ever heard the names Celia (nee Harris) and Fritz Raphaely mentioned in my time in HS?  They came to town to run the mill in the 1930’s. But then I’m a bietjie jonk, nê! Must ask Mother Mary. Her mother Annie would have known. As would Annie’s good friend Glick.
    ..
    Then in 1938 a cotton mill was started in HS. We had wool and we had cotton! And when the cotton bolls got rotten I hear you couldn’t pick very much cotton . . .

    Then Philip Frame came to South Africa in 1925. As a 21yr old, he was already experienced in the textile industry. He worked for the Harris family, then the Mauerbergers, the two biggest textile tycoons of their day – and ended up buying both their whole businesses!

    “The deal was struck in 1959 in the Harrismith Royal Hotel and was written and signed on the back of the menu!”

    Ah, myths and legends . . . At least they didn’t use the napkin this time. We probly used cloth napkins in our smart hotel! I’d love to actually see all the paper napkins with million dollar deals on them! And cigarette boxes with complex engineering drawings!

    Soup; Fish; Meat and two veg; Rice pudding; I’ll buy your businesses; Deal! Signed: Philip. Me, I’ll never forget how tiny that piece of fish used to be in those hotels. Remember that? Didn’t seem worth the waiter’s shoe leather, walking it over to the table. Or is this just my memory?

    A typical self-made risk-and-reward capitalist man, he did it all by himself, with only the help provided by friends’ loans, the government, the laws, apartheid, tariff protection, decentralisation subsidies, minimal wages, laws hampering unions, being a Nat supporter and (probably) donor, having the government finance minister Nico Diederichs as a ‘huisvriend,’ being on a govt advisory board, being allowed a virtual monopoly, etc. But other than that, ‘all by himself’ – ‘self-made.’ Yeah, right.
    ..
    Seems to me Frame was um, difficult? demanding? putting it very mildly. As much as his biographers try to polish his marble . . the fashion of rich people being called ‘philanthropists’ started way back . .

    School friend and family friend Mariette van Wyk’s Dad Theunis was a Frame director and ran the Harrismith operation. She tells this story:

    Phillip Frame lived in the same modest house that he first bought on arrival in Durbs. All other directors, including my dad, urged him to buy a new car, but he refused point-blank. His ancient Merc was so bashed up and tatty, but he thought it did the job just fine. And another anecdote: every Sunday, he and Selwyn Lurie would take a walk down to the golf club, buying the Sunday paper on the way. The arrangement was that they would alternate in paying for the newspaper. One Sunday (when my dad was visiting) they had this massive argument because Phillip maintained it was Selwyn’s turn and Selwyn was adamant it was Phillip’s turn. My dad ended up paying for the damn paper. Phillip was as mean as they come in terms of spending money.

    As a kid I remember seeing those huge and ugly grey corrugated iron buildings near the entrance to the park where we played rugby and athletics. Never did get to see inside them. Mariette did. Working some school holidays in the factory. I say ugly, but:

    Mariette tells me Phillip Frame always praised Theunis van Wyk saying that his Harrismith factories were by far the neatest of all the factories in the Frame empire. He said even the rubbish dump was a work of art! 🙂

    The bottom pic showed Mariette’s workstation, where ‘I used to do production control during the hols’

    ~~oo0oo~~

    boere – farmers

    kooperasie – co-operative

    bietjie jonk nê! – I’m a bit young (to remember that)

    huisvriend – ‘home friend;’ knew him well enough to be invited to his home

    Our huisvriend Mariette also tells this story.

    billionaire philanthropist – pay no tax, plough a small part of excessive profits back in a hobby-type charity that employs your unemployable children and provides paid exotic holidays; wear a halo

    ~~o00o~~

    Thank you Paddy McDowell, that was most interesting, especially the bit about the Harrismith Royal Hotel, owned by my great-grandad from about 1890-ish I’d guess, to his death in 1939.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    PS: I had the site of the Royal Hotel too far away. It was much nearer the station. I have fixed that with a new arrow!

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Another overall view on the Frame empire:

    A Trip Down Memory Lane…When South Africa Had The Biggest Blanket Manufacturer in the World

  • Table Tennis Champ

    Table Tennis Champ

    Somewhere around 1969 I won the world-famous Harrismith Methodist All-Stars inaugural (and last) Table Tennis Tournament held in the Wesleyan Hall on Warden Street. This was a huge event for us dedicated Harrismith Methylated Spirits. There must have been . . what? half a dozen or more people watching, spellbound. Many of them would also have been among the entrants to this high-level event. Which I won, did I mention that?

    My prize: The Gold 🏅 Medal and a vinyl LP by The Tremeloes! except for the medal. The LP was real and was my first ever. And maybe my only? I don’t remember owning any other LPs.

    How hip was the Harrismith Methodist Church?! I’d love to know who donated this lovely prize.

    The feature pic shows our table tennis table on the side veranda at home. Training ground.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Wait, I did own two other vinyls: A seven single and an EP. Both by the beroemde Harrismith se Laerskool se Seunskoor.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    beroemde – world-famous; ‘world’ in the same sense as ‘the world series’ in America

  • Inmate Mary

    Inmate Mary

    They put us out on the veranda in the sun. It got quite hot out there. There were four of us and we started singing.

    We sang: ‘I’m behind a prison wall; The bed’s too hard and much too small; There’s no pyjamas here at all; Oh, Mother, what’ll I do now?‘

    Always complimentary, Mary had to make it clear the food at Azalea is excellent, they weren’t complaining like George, just singing his song!

    She wondered what pyjamas inmates would wear in prison and we agreed probably they’d wear their clothes night and day.

    And you can be sure, even at 90 they were thinking of their Moms as they sang Oh Mother. Dear Mom Mary would be thinking of her dear Mom Annie.

    ~~oo0oo~~

  • Sinner Mary

    Sinner Mary

    Jessie’s second pre-school was ‘Sinner Lizabeth.’ I think it’s Anglican, but I don’t know, cos I wasn’t interested. I was only interested in the fact that Aitch had chosen it, so I knew they’d look after my Jessie. And they did: Rose and two Pennys treated her good the two years she was there.

    But today I found out about Sinner Mary. This was news to me. I gasped.

    Gasp!

    Right through school Mary, now universally know as Mary Methodist after playing the organ in the Harrismith Methylated Spirits church for something like a hundred years, was churchless!

    Her Mom Annie, my gran, was blissfully unimpressed and uninvolved and probably played golf on Sundays. I’m guessing she would use as an excuse, if pushed by the pious, that Harrismith didn’t have a Presbyterian church (it had folded).** I’m not going to say that proves God is Methodist, but you can see right here how the thought did flit across my mind. That would be if She existed, of course.

    So Mary the scholar was churchless! I love it! She tells me her teacher Mr Moll – who taught singing, woodwork and religion – never gave her very good marks probly cos he knew she didn’t go to church! She’s joking of course, and her bad marks were probably 80%, but anyway, Tommy Moll was very involved in the Methodists.

    So when Mary got married they had to ‘make a plan’ and the wedding made the newspapers. The headline blared: ‘Four denominations at one wedding’ or something. Not ‘and a funeral.’ (Sheila had the actual cutting so I now know my recollection was exaggerated).

    The bride ‘was Presbyterian’ they said (but we now know she was actually – gasp -a ‘none’); the groom was Dutch Reformed (‘another faith’ they said, but he too was in reality a ‘none’); the Methodist minister was on leave, so the Apostolic Faith Mission man tied the knot.

    Later, when Mary returned to Harrismith, having lived in Pietermaritzburg for a while, where she became Mom to Barbara, she decided to get church. She chose the Methodists as a lot of her friends were Methodists. She maybe forgets she told Sheila the Methodist boys were nicer than the Anglican boys, so she tells me something about not liking the Anglicans’ ‘high church’ aspect. So this twenty five year old mother leaves her baby Barbara with Annie and Dad at Granny Bland’s home in Stuart street, where they have the room with the big brass double bed, and goes off to confirmation classes with a group of schoolkids. She aces the class, gets confirmed in the Lord, sanctified, and starts her epic Methodistian journey, which continues today, sixty seven years later, her only sin on the way being an occasional single ginger brandy with ginger ale while everyone else was drinking bucket loads. When she plays the piano of a Sunday in the frail care dining room in Maritzburg these days, those are Methodist hymns she’s thumping out joyfully.

    I sort of feel like I have an excuse for being churchless now if I need one. ‘I’m just taking my twenty five years off now, Ma,’ I’ll tell Mary when she asks.

    (BTW: In the pic, Mary is the bridesmaid, back left. The bride is her dear friend and cousin Sylvia Bain who married John Taylor, another ‘none’ I’ll bet).

    ~~oo0oo~~

    – Jess in Livingstone uniform with her Mad Hatter Tea Party hat – 2008 –

    After ‘Sinner Lizabeth’ pre-school, Jess went to a remedial primary school whose school song, which they sang with gusto, went:

    Live in Sin, Live in Sin, Progress Voorspoed, Live in Sin

    Eat cake, Eat soap, Eat porridge too.

    Believe in yourself Live in Sin

    Can’t say we didn’t give our JessWess a good grounding.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    “Have faith, have hope, have courage too. Livingstone Remedial.” Tom loved telling me the “Live in Sin” real words, Dad!’

    ~~oo0oo~~

    I see anyone can apply to become an Apostolic Faith Mission Marriage Officer! Just download the application form online here. Maybe this is an out if we can find errors in that 1951 dominee-ring application!?

    ~~oo0oo~~

    ** Harrismith’s historian Leon Strachan tells a lovely story – I’ll find it – of how Hans Lötter met a Harrismith couple on the train ride from Durban to Harrismith. He was going there to settle, having bought a bookstore sight-unseen. He asked them ‘What church does Harrismith NOT have?’ They racked their brains, then said ‘There’s no Presbyterian Church.’

    ‘Ah, then I’ll be Presbyterian,’ Hans announced firmly.

    –oo0oo–

  • What’s Wrong Swanie?

    What’s Wrong Swanie?

    This was the problem: Most of the guys and gals I would do river trips with had a serious deficiency: a lack of some specific paddling strokes one should use on a river trip. They all had the boring stroke where you reach forward, grab a big helping of the river, and pull it back to level with your hip. Over and over. Most of them, however seldom executed my favourite stroke: Place the paddle on your lap, fold your arms, gaze around in awesome wonder, and allow the boat to gently rotate in the current. The Swanie 360° River Revolution, or Swannee River for short.

    They were racing snakes. They’d say ‘Let’s Go,’ and then they would actually do that! Isn’t that weird? Then they’d look back, wait till I eventually caught up and ask, ‘What’s Wrong Swanie?’ I was, of course much too polite to reply, ‘Nothing. What’s The Hurry?’ I’m polite that way. What I meant was, ‘I don’t want this day to end.’

    And so we would gently bumble downriver. Every few hundred metres they’d wait, or one of them would paddle upstream (more weirdness) back to me and ask ‘What’s Wrong Swanie?’

    Strange. Although I must admit, you wouldn’t want me in charge of timing or logistics on a trip!

    When the current was swift enough my speed could match theirs. It was the flat water that was tricky. In their defence, they were actually going slowly and enjoying the scenery in awesome wonder too. It’s just that their slowly and mine was out of sync!

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Watch Luca Sestak (then 14yrs-old) show us how to do the Swannee River:

  • Canary Bird Bush

    Canary Bird Bush

    Yay! Science! Botany in this case: I just found out what the very first flower I ever drew was/is: A Canary Bird Bush Crotalaria agatiflora.

    I suppose for a school project? I collected a few in our garden and drew the flower and the leaf. I was fascinated by the shape of the flower: like a yellow bird, butterfly or ship.

    I saw this on iNaturalist.org thanks to prolific iNatter @troos (Troos vdMerwe) and there’s a lovely twist: He photographed it in the favourite gardens of a favourite schoolfriend of my Mother Mary’s!

    Harrismith 1945 matriculant Joey de Beer became Jo Onderstall and became a founder member of the Lowveld Botanic Society and the Lowveld Botanic Gardens in Nelspruit, now Mbombela. She wrote the book on Lowveld flowering plants.

    – Jo Onderstall’s 1984 book –

    A lovely full-circle kind of story.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Joey matriculated with Mary in Harrismith in 1945. When she heard Mary was going nursing she expostulated: What A Waste Of A Good Brain! She was right, but Mom decided she needed to do something that earned her a salary and cost her widowed Mom Annie nothing. Typical Mom. Joey went on to study phys ed teaching in Bloem, then married ‘doctor/farmer’ Bill Onderstall. They moved to Nelspruit in 1950. Bill gave Jo a camera for a wedding present and so she herself took a lot of the pictures in the articles and books she wrote. I didn’t know her mother Bessie de Beer had been chair of the Drakensberg and Eastern Free State branch of the Botanical Society, so Jo followed in Bessie’s footsteps. Must tell Mom that. Jo herself seems as self-effacing as Mom. She writes in the introduction that her name on the book ‘is but the visible tip of an iceberg’ and the fact that she took most of the photos is mentioned nowhere. All other photographers are acknowledged, but even the fact that she took the front and back cover pictures is only added in the ‘errata’ – like an afterthought! I’m guessing some of her friends insisted on that.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Yellow bird! Who remembers Johan Pheiffer who came from the city to Harrismith to visit his cousins the du Plessis in the dorp, whipped out his guitar and sang Yellow Bird?

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Later: Mom said, ‘Thanks for this.’ Sheila read it to her. She didn’t know Bessie had also been involved in things botanical. She did know that Bessie used to take people for the drivers test. ‘You would drive her round the block and she’d say OK, you have your licence. None of this parking into a garage stuff.’ So says Ma.

    Her good friends Joey de Beer and Dossie Farquhar said Mom must take science. She found it hard, but enjoyed it. She didn’t like the science teacher, Swart Piet du Toit, though. There was also a teacher called Wit Piet du Toit, who later was called Whitey. Wit Piet married one of the girls he had taught in Std 6. Beautiful girl. Later he married Doris.

    Old memories flooding back, Ma?

    ~~oo0oo~~

  • Quick Chat

    Quick Chat

    I can’t talk long cos they’re coming to take me away. From my warm armchair – its falling to pieces, mind you – in front of the heater and wrapped under a blanket. To the piano, where I’ll play a bit before lunch. Lunch is a roast and vegetables and then ice cream cos its Sunday. And Sundays we get egg and bacon for breakfast.

    You know Kosie, it’s amazing how an old tune suddenly comes back into my head and I start playing it. Then I keep playing it each day and it gets better every time!

    You go, Ma! Remember to eat your vegetables, or you won’t get any ice cream. **Laughs** I eat all my vegetables except pumpkin, and that’s why I haven’t got curly hair. That’s what we were told when I was small.

    Oh, Dad says the temperature is going to drop steeply tomorrow, you must wear warm clothes, she tells her 66yr-old son.

    OK, Ma.

    ~~oo0oo~~

  • Bain Brothers

    Bain Brothers

    So Stewart an’ James ‘ey pits on ‘eir keps an’ ey’re aff owre ‘e links is hard is ‘ey can pin, t’ see fat’s come o’r. ‘Ey pairted at ‘e point ‘e Niss. ‘Ey searched ivry hol an’ corner. ‘Ey cried an’’ey fustled, bit ‘ere’s nee try nor token o’ work. An noo’ is ‘ey cam back t’ far ‘ey pairted, ‘ere ‘e fowg lifts, an’ ‘e shore’s a’ ifore ‘em bit id’s ‘e same teel. ‘Ey thocht at mebbe they’d geen t’ Seeth Efrica for a folly. Manny’s ‘e nicht ‘at ‘ey hed sorned roon’ ‘ir faither’s hoose tryan’t t’ get ‘eir een ipo’r, fan ‘ey wud be at ‘e mill here gettan ‘eir pickles o’ corn vrocht.

    And if you believe I know what I’m writing about you’ll believe anything, and I’ll sell you a sandstone bridge across the Vulgar River in Swinburne; but most of the above is actually in Scots – true’s bob. It’s from E Silkie Man by David Houston – but it’s not about Stewart and James and Seeth Efrica – I just added that in. What I’m trying to say is Stewart and James decided to leave Wick maybe cos there was no work and no fish, maybe the work there was didn’t suit ’em; and they buggered off to South Africa. Maybe there was too much fish – smelly herring in wooden barrels it was.

    – barrels o’ herring on Wick harbourside –

    Maybe adventure? or maybe this: Views of the Character of Wick in 1845 from the Old Statistical Account:

    “Maniacs are very rare. Idiots and fatuous persons are remarkably common.”

    “Unchastity, both in man and woman, is lamentably frequent, which appears from the records of the kirk session to have been always the case.”

    See here for some better sense about how they woulda spoken Scots in ‘Caitnes,’ don’t trust me! The compilers of the Old Statistical Account said in 1791 that the speech in Wick was the ‘common provincial dialect of the north.’

    Listen to how Oupa Bain’s sisters and lady friends woulda probably sounded like around about the time he left for Durban:

    Like she says, she speaks normal, she speaks Caithness . .

    …

    Now, when these Bain brothers got to Durban, I think this is how it went down: They were unemployed fishermen, and . . read the rest here

    ~~oo0oo~~

    Go to the fascinating website https://friendsoftherail.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15037 – A forum post about a book project by Les Pivnic and Charlie Lewis, “Soul of A Railway“, a photographic history of the South African Railways at the end of the steam era. The post also mentions another book, “Tracks Across the Veld”, by Boon Boonzaaier.

  • Bertie on Bespoke

    Bertie on Bespoke

    Bertie van Niekerk was tall and impeccably dressed and rich. He wore a big hat, drove a lang slap American car and rode beautiful horses. One was called Bespoke and the rooineks were too scared to tell Bertie you didn’t pronounce that as though it was haunted.

    I remember him in a tall hat – not a tophat, though, I don’t think – and a black coat with tails – the Afrikaans word ‘manel‘ springs to mind, but quote me at your peril. Special Vrystaat horseriding gear. ‘n maneljas, amiright?

    Dad remembers him winning one ‘Best Farm Horse’ (beste boerperd?) award at the show: Everyone had to put their horses through their paces. Their mount had to stay put when the reins were tossed over its head and left to dangle; it had to not flinch when its owner cracked a whip next to its ear; and other stuff. After he’d done all he needed to do, Bertie kicked his boots out of the stirrups, got up on the saddle, stood tall and looked around. Then he removed binoculars from his pocket and gazed around serenely, still standing on the saddle, his horse dead still and calm.

    The crowd loved it and roared their approval! A few might have muttered ‘windgat,’ maybe?

    ~~oo0oo~~

    I wish I had pictures! The pics above remind me of what I saw at the show all those years ago – horses stepping exaggeratedly with a rider or pulling a cart. A trap? Lots of brown cows and then one brown cow was mysteriously chosen as the champion.  Also jars with jam in them and crocheted doilies and amateur paintings, some with a gold dot on the frame, some a silver dot and some a brown dot. Some no dots. But memory is dodgy, so it’d be great to see authentic Harrismith pics from back then. They’re out there somewhere.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    binoculars- verkykers

    Verkykerskop – Mt Binocular

    windgat– showman

  • Sweet

    Sweet

    The Old Goat’s usual crap when he phones: ‘What’s for supper?’ Sweet potato, I say. Blah blah, something about the price, always the price. The price here, the price in America, the price of everything . .

    Ouma used to bake them in the oven with lots of sugar and some butter, he recalls. I can remember the taste as if it was yesterday.

    Wasn’t yesterday. That was a helluva long time ago.

    ca.1927 if he was 5yrs old.

    ~~oo0oo~~