Die dood van die kinders by die Vyfhoek Primary School hierdie week het ons hele stad sleg getref. In 2008, vir die Eeufeesbylaag van die Potchefstroom Herald het ek 'n lys gemaak van groot rampe wat die dorp oor die jare getref het. Na groot brande in 2011 het die...
Soldate vs studente
Gemoedere wat hoog loop veroorsaak van tyd tot tyd gespanne situasies op die kampus. Vandag se studente was egter nog nooit die slagoffers van geweld, soos wat hulle oumas en oupas in 1940 beleef het nie. Dit was midde-in die Tweede Wêreldoorlog en die Pukke was “in...
First sporting hub of Potchefstroom
Today Potchefstroom is undeniably one of the sporting hubs of the country. Due to the internationally regarded High Performance Institute at the North-West University Potchefstroom Campus, international athletes are flocking to train here, mostly during the summer...
Alexandra Park – the lost green heart of Potchefstroom
“A delightful resort . . . very popular with residents and visitors. There are shaded walks, arbours, a rosary and well-cultivated gardens, an added charm being the large furrow which passes through.” This is how a brochure to promote Potchefstroom described the park...
Street names reflect history 15 – W & Z
Do the residents of Zeederberg Street know that their street was named after a now extinct form of travel? Or that the Weeks family, after whom that street was named, suffered a terrible tragedy? Or that Rev Wynne, after whom that street was named revolutionised...
Street names reflect history 8 – M & N
A dominee with strange advice on how to alleviate loneliness, a music professor who died after a car accident, a doctor who died of the Spanish Flu and another music teacher all lend their names to streets in this category. Maherry Street (South) J Maherry, an...
What happened in the Potchefstroom concentration camp
This week’s news reports about the current spike in the Covid pandemic echo down the ages to 120 years ago. Stories about the measles outbreak in the winter of 1901 in the Potchefstroom concentration camp sound eerily familiar with overcrowded hospitals, exhausted...
Remembering a genocide
The public holiday of 16 June is known as Youth Day, commemorating the death of 60 youths shot by police in 1976. But for the Afrikaners 16 June signifies the day the British forces started the genocide of the Boer nation. On 16 June 1900 Lord Robberts set the...
As ’n biblioteek brand . . .
Die brand wat die biblioteek van die Universiteit van Kaapstad Sondag deels in puin gelê het, het boekliefhebbers én dié wat die geskiedenis van die Ferdinand Postma-biblioteek ken, laat sidder. In 1949 is die biblioteek van die destydse Potchefstroomse...
Street names reflect history 5 – G & H
Many colourful characters are remembered in streets named after them. Under the G’s and H’s are a stable boy, one of the first owners of a car – nicknamed “Knight of the Road” and Potchefstroom’s first tree hugger. “Knight of the road” Gaisford Street (Potchindustria)...