Vrystaat Confessions

Tag: Dossie Farquhar

  • More Mary Memories

    More Mary Memories

    We used to do ballet and a bit of tap dancing in the Masonic Hall. Cathy Bain gave us dancing lessons. Dossie and Ursula were very supple, me not so much.

    Singing: Sometimes we’d get together at the Methodist Manse. Tommy vd Bosch would play his guitar and sing ‘Jimmy crack corn and I don’t care, the master’s gone away!

    Trudi Els and I would sing, Heigh Ho Come to the Fair; Kom Dans Klaradyn; and Because, as a trio, with PietNel van Reenen’s sister Dalene. Mamie Smith (Putterill) would play the piano.

    I was the hockey captain even though Sylvia Bain was a better player than me. I played centre forward and Sylvia was centre half. Joey de Beer was in charge of getting the balls back to school. We would walk back, crossing over the railway line on the pedestrian bridge with zinc tin sidings. We would hit the sides with our hockey sticks and make a big noise!

    Bobbie or Bertie Bland died in WW2 of malaria.

    Me: Wasn’t it WW1 Mom?

    Or was it WW1? she muses.

    ~~oo0oo~~

    The bird?  Just holding the place till I find a relevant picture.

    Now (Feb 2025) Mom learned her dear friend Trudi Els passed away.

  • Mom’s Friends

    Mom’s Friends

    Phoned Mom yesterday and she started talking of her old friends.

    Joey de Beer (Onderstall), Dossie Farquhar (de Villiers) and Ursula Schultz were big and close friends at school in Harrismith.

    The picture was taken at their 45th matric reunion.

    Ursula used to get comics, or comic books and I would visit her and her Mom and we’d read them. I felt sorry for Ursula and her mother as their husband and Dad was locked up for World War 2 as a possible German sympathiser.

    Sometimes us kids would play cards while the ladies played bridge. Mrs Woodcock, Mrs Schultz and maybe Mrs Rosing would play. Maybe Fanny Glick too. Not my Mom Annie, she was at work, running her Caltex garage.

    Joey’s sister was Marie de Beer, who became Marie Lotter of Havengas bookstore.

    ~~~oo0oo~~~

    The conversation wandered on to the lovely stewed fruit Sheila makes for Mom.

    Yes, I share it with my tablemate in the diningroom. I call her my ‘stablemate.’