A different view on current affairs & history
Blogs on Port Elizabeth
The Campanile was erected to commemorate the landing of the 1820 Settlers and is situated at the entrance to the railway station and docks in Strand Street, the spot where it is said the settlers landed in Port Elizabeth. The architects were Jones & McWilliams with construction starting in April 1921 and it was completed in October 1923.
After losing all their possessions in a great flood of the Gamtoos River in 1906, my paternal grand- parents purchased 3 plots in an isolated hamlet called Schoenmakerskop during July 1918. On erf 17 – what was to become Number 32 Marine Drive – they constructed a wooden restaurant, which in its early years was called “The Hut”. With only a limestone and sand road from Walmer, their customers must have been paltry. Against the odds, luck was on their side. On Wednesday 6th December 1922, Marine Drive was opened. It became a magnet for the rich and well-heeled in Port Elizabeth. Soon The Hut was overflowing with customers and the whole family was pressed into service catering for this demand.
This blog is a pictorial replication of that drive on Sunday 10th December 1922 with contemporary photographs and drawings.
Main Picture: The start of the drive was at the Port Elizabeth Town Hall. One hundred and fifty model T Fords line up to make the journey around the Marine Drive. This is the actual photograph of the vehicles lining up.
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The harbour in Port Elizabeth has always been intimately connected with the City. When the 1820 Settlers arrived, they found wide expansive, almost virgin beaches devoid of human habitation except for the occasional Khoi San nomads. Fort Frederick had recently been constructed and some troops were manning it. Apart from that it was desolate and unoccupied.
Essentially the harbour’s history can be trifurcated as follows:
Main picture: An early view of the harbour from the Donkin
Nowadays our children shun these jobs mainly because their parents supply them with too much pocket money. Forty to fifty years ago if one wanted something special like a watch, one would have to work for it – not in some make work scheme at home but a proper job. We all had those types of jobs. In this blog I will relate the jobs that my brother and I had.
Main pcture: Blaine worked in the Port Elizabeth harbour as a Tally Clerk before he went to Varsity.
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In the modern era when multiple modes of travel are available, the importance of railways is forgotten. It was the only means of rapid transport of bulk commodities and passengers over vast distances. It made industrialisation possible. Visit any industrial area and disused railway tracks are still in existence. The ease of transport for all but bulk commodities has been replaced with trucks and cars.
Main picture: Railway line from Uitenhage to Port Elizabeth
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Unlike adults, at the age of 15, one is never affected by the weather. Even if it was raining, we would go swimming in the sea. Whether it was night or a howling gale force wind was blowing, we would be swimming. No matter how atrocious the weather conditions were or what the time of day was, it was time to swim.
There was only one exception to this rule: the water temperature. If the sea water was freezing cold, we would not swim but that would not prevent us from wading in the water and even “catching” a few waves. Nothing seemed to deter us or maybe we just never noticed what the weather was like.
Main picture: This “river” which runs through Happy Valley is normally no more than a trickle and would normally be classified as a placid stream.
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For me Port Elizabeth represents my roots, physically and emotionally. It was only the lack of work opportunities after I had completed my Articles of Clerkship, that I was forced to relocate to Joburg in 1980. Emotionally it is more that the place where I grew up, went to school and university. My roots go much deeper than that. One of the first citizens of Port Elizabeth was my great great great grandfather. With his house at Number 7 Castle Hill being a National Monument, I can truly feel a part of Port Elizabeth’s illustrious history.
Main picture: The central suburb of Port Elizabeth.
Granny Mac was more than our grandmother, she was the matriarch of the family. Adversity came in many forms, all steeling her for the next calamity. But she endured, persevered and overcame all these trials and trubulations. First the family lost its farm on the Gamtoos due to floods, then the cattle herd at De Stades due to rinderpest, but the cherry on the top was the death of her husband, Harry William, due to Black Water Fever in 1925. Despite all this misfortune and adversity, she survived and prospered. With her tiny frame and diminutive size, she was the epitome of the fighter that she was.
This is the story of that amazing woman.
Main picture: Schoenmakerskop and Daisy’s Tea Room with its famous home-made buns became a popular destination due to the convergence of a number of simultaneous events namely the invention of the motor car and the opening of the coastal road to Schoenies in 1922.
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