FINALLY clearing out some more boxes from the garage. It’s nine years since Trish died, fifteen years since we moved here, and some of the boxes haven’t been opened since even before that.
And I was to find out some haven’t even been opened since LONG before that! Like this one:
This was a bachelor box! That typed letter was the school newsletter – no, the school newspaper! – from 1971. A previous school newspaper ‘Die Kanêrie’ had existed. In our time it was edited by Francois Rope Marais. It died, like all good canaries should. In matric Jean Roux, Fluffy Crawley and I – and a few others – decided to revive it, but we wanted a new name. We were in a big Beatles phase, so its new name was Let It Be.
Racy scandal, very much tongue-in-cheek, we were determined to be irreverent. “Jou Mielie!” was a popular insult, so the mielie cob was our emblem, the paper was a member of the ‘mielie groep,’ and although this issue of 19 February 1971 was the first and probably the only issue, we made sure to put “Established 1971” in the banner to give it an air of gravitas. You never knew, maybe it would start a publishing empire? ala Rupert the evil Aussie, or Lord BeaverBroek? I mean, it would have been celebrating the 50th year of its existence next year had it gone on a few issues. So there’s that. And it wasn’t free. You had to buy it. Let It Be serious.
Memories of the ‘roneo machine’ – you typed on blue wax paper, then you drew your pictures or wrote your headings in freehand with a metal stylus; then you carefully put your precious waxpaper koerant into the roneo machine. The ink ran into all depressions in the wax – hammered by the typewriters and tikmasjiene in Ou Rot se klas, or scratched by hand. We used typewriters for the Engelse stories and tikmasjiene for the Afrikaans stories. Then you turned something manually, and out came copies of what you’d done – reproduced by the magic machine. Any mistakes were permanent. And there were a number! Jean wrote the Pop Music Column ‘On The Knob With Roux.’ He was from a metropolis much larger than Herriesmif – Bloemfindyn, I think? – so more up-to-date with his music, as Bloem is nearer to London than Herriesmit.
Someone wrote to the paper – an anonymous Letter To The Editor! It was a whinge. Someone had been applauding too enthusiastically at a debate contest! Gasp! They were applauding and stamping their feet! Instead of only giving contestants ‘their rightful applause!’ There was some question as to the character of someone who would let themselves go like that! Like Victoria, Nik and Nak were not amused. Well! There you go. Thanks to our Freedom of Speech approach as editors of Let It Be, they were able to vent and kla.
One article confidently announced we’d soon go international (it didn’t say that all that meant was we had asked the previous year’s USA exchange student Larry to write to us). Sadly we went belly-up before the eagerly awaited Letter From Larry – a notorious procrastinator – reached us. I think we were a one-issue outfit, like some famous one-hit wonders in the music world. Journalism Schools will probably write learned theses on What Might Have Been. Maybe we can claim to be very early victims of the innernet which was yet to be born?
We – the Std 9’s, Grade 11’s – were also announcing a ‘Ritmiese Ete’ at the country club where one would get a full supper and music by the vdLinde Trio – at R2 a head – to raise funds for the Matric Farewell.
Military news of past-pupils was: Sparrow was in the lugmagkoor – and was even chosen as a ‘solios‘ – or so we said. Pierre was off to Bloem as a parabat. Steph was off to Walvis Bay.
A ‘kringleierskamp’ was held on Clawervlei, Casper Badenhorst’s farm, led by ds Venter, ds Smit, Eben Louw and Giel du Toit. Liewe Bliksem! Must have been a riot! ‘Besprekings’ (read Propaganda!) of about an hour were held morning, afternoon and evening. The weekend ended on Sunday with a church service and a group photo.
Evidence of the rooinekkery of this koerant was a report on the dorp’s new Boy Scout troop: We had done swimming badges under the watchful eye of Cyril Nocton at Ralph Morton’s pool. Also a report on the Methodist Guild, who held a braai in which ‘all the members’ arrived dressed as tramps.
Some blerrie Eland – signing himself Phomolong – wrote the athletic day report and crowed about the Kudus winning, them second and us, the Impalas coming our usual third out of three – to which he said foei! Blurry hell! He would eat his words one year later when we, the Impalas, swept the boards! At least an Impala, De Wet Ras, broke the twenty-year-old pole vault record this year.
A long report on a debate – the ontgroeningsdebat – is a bit faint to follow easily. Seems the debate decided history should not be a compulsory school subject. Ha! ‘Jammer Mnr Stander,’ said the reporter to the history teacher!
Costa Georgiou and Erika du Plessis were chosen as Mr and Miss Standard Six.
Fluffy Crawley wrote an article on Town Cricket, asking for players to join him in strengthening a sport which had been waning and was now being rebuilt. Forthcoming matches were against Old Scholars (Bethlehem?) and Frankfort. He also gave a report on a drawn match against Bethlehem Defence in which they scored 95; We managed to drag out our innings for two hours, forcing a draw; De Wet Ras scored 25, Fluffy scored 14 and Dave Davies hung in to score 5 and achieve the draw. Our best bowler was De Wet, 6 for 25! Fluffy never gave up on cricket – he remained involved with Free State cricket for decades – as a batsman, then an administrator!
Tuffy Joubert was our be-speedo’d swimming reporter. He announced the team going to the Provincial Gala at Mazelspoort, outside Bloemfindyn. Boys: Leon Blignaut, J Nel, Steve de Villiers and himself; Girls: Sonja du Plessis, Sheila Swanepoel, Jenny de Villiers, Marita Badenhorst, R vd Merwe (probly Ilse), J Eksteen and L Ros (Lulu Ras – our reporter would end up marrying her despite this spelling mistake!). Sonja duP was chosen for the OFS team and went on to win bronze in the 100m freestyle girls under fourteen at a national gala.
Under the commercial section there was one advertisement: A 15ft fibreglass canoe for sale by one P. Swanepoel. It would have been blue with a red deck. The seller probly underpaid for the ad which wouldn’t have helped the paper’s financial woes.
~~~oo0oo~~~
mielie groep – maize or corn future publishing empire; ‘jou mielie’ was a popular insult at the time; it had . . connotations; hey! sixteen year old testosterone
on the knob – DJ’s twiddled knobs, and . . connotations. hey! sixteen year old testosterone
koerant – newspaper
tikmasjien – typewriter
Ou Rot se klas – the typing teacher’s nickname was Rat; pointy nose, bristly moustache, dodgy reputation with the young ladies
Ritmiese Ete – rhythmic dinner – grub and dance fundraiser
lugmagkoor – airforce choir
kringleierskamp – ringleaders camp’ propaganda event
besprekings – discussions; propaganda
foei! – shame! or ag shame!
ontgroeningsdebat – initiation debate for Std Sixes, just entering high school
speedo – tiny swimming costume; budgie-smuggler
~~~oo0oo~~~
Careful readers would have seen a promise for this promising and exciting newspaper to go INTERNATIONAL! Well, I’m not sure we even made a second edition, but we DID receive the promised input from afar: from New York. Larry was late, though. Nothing new there. His letter of 22 April would have reached us on 29 April soonest by which time Let It Be might have run out of oxygen. No billionaires to rescue us – they hadn’t been invented yet. Note the formal address: Die Redakteur, “Laat Dit Wees / Let It Be!! I don’t know why he put our name in inverted commas, though? Would he have written “New York Times” – ? I must speak to him!
PS: I would have included his “ballsup” PS had we had another edition.
~~~oo0oo~~~
Vrystaat Confessions 