One of the most iconic statues in Port Elizabeth and it withstood the onslaught of having paint thrown at it some years ago. In the days before the Internet and Encyclopedia Britannica, the library opposite the City Hall was the place to go for information. Floors of books, all indexed on a card filing system, were a wonderland for this boy. In my primary school years, I used the North End Library which was down the road from the school that I attended. On my most recent visit to PE in 2018, the North End Library was closed due to a labour dispute and I was unable to gain access. The Main Library was undergoing renovations and that was also off-limits, hence me settling for the picture of Queen Victoria.
This was Pearson High School where I spent my high school years from 1966-1970. Not the happiest time of my life, but I do have a couple of good memories. Doing end-of-year productions with Clem Tholet and Jandy Offerman. Mr “Zombie” Lombard telling me to leave his maths classroom and go and do history instead and the prim and very proper Miss Wallace wrote on one of my test papers; “Your handwriting is so tiny that I cannot read it by electric light”.
The school building is now home to Erica Girls School, while Pearson moved to Summerstrand some years ago. Had it not been for COVID-19 lockdown, I would have attended my Matric 50th reunion.
Thanks to my long-time friend Jock Austin, (we have been friends for 61 years!) who was able to get the words to the school song. (BTW, back when the song was written “gay” had a different meaning):
“…Our hearts will respond to the sound of Pearsonites steadily forward. So hold up your head and be gay. Though others press gallantly onward, let Peasonites show them the way”
This is where my love of the theatre started, albeit in amateur dramatic productions. In 1966, both my sister and I were in a PEMADS production of Macbeth. We played two of the ghosts of Banquo’s children. On the far left of this image is the tiny stage door outside which our Dad would wait for us. All we had to do was walk across the stage, get into the car and go home. But we were on stage. Macbeth has always had a series of superstitions attached to the production and this was no different. The cauldron caught alight on the opening night and the ensuing blaze had to be quenched by a modern fire extinguisher that was slid onto the stage.
It was here that I made my first set mistake when I painted a rostrum with enamel paint instead of a water-based quick-drying product. This was for a production called The Journey, if memory serves me, and was for a Salters Cup festival.
It was also here after I had finished school that I made my first real friend of colour. Johnny used to work in the club where the theatre was situated and we would spend time talking while I was rehearsing and I seem to remember that he visited me at my parents’ home, where I was living before I left for Johannesburg in 1975. (To go into professional theatre as a lighting designer and technician.)
Before going to leap into the pool or have a milkshake at the Tea Room, there was always time to stop and play on some of the equipment in St George’s Park. Back in the day, there were no health and safety regulations and falling off the various rides was almost considered a right of passage.
Before we had a pool at our house, the municipal pool in St George’s Park was where we went swimming. It was also here that our high school held its Gala Day as there was no pool at the school. I have been to the top board only once, but I was not able to bring myself to jump off…let alone dive. Standing on the edge and looking down was frightening, to say the least. I seem to remember competing in only one gala and that almost had an unhappy ending. I swam the penultimate leg of a relay and the final swimmer took off before I had touched the side, hitting me on the head in the process.
In the 1950s this rather unassuming-looking Tea Room was run by the mother of international playwright Athol Fugard. It was to become the setting for one of his most powerful works on privilege and apartheid, ‘Master Harold and the Boys’.
This Museum Building in Bird Street was originally the home of Henry Rutherford and was built in 1861. The building was converted into a museum and opened as such in October 1918. Due to a lack of space, both the museum and the adjacent snake park were moved to a complex just off the beachfront in 1961. I can clearly remember that as you walked through the front doors there was a huge Gorilla that was positioned at the entrance. I have been told that I kept saying that the gorilla had “hers”(a mispronunciation of ‘hairs’) on its chest.
Before it was moved, all the exhibits were placed into a warehouse where they were slashed by some early Eco-Warrior. What he did not seem to realize was that all the exhibits had been in the museum for many years and none were killed specifically to be placed in a glass box.
The lighthouse and the pyramid were completed in 1861 and the pyramid was declared a National Monument in 1938. Both of these can still be found at the top of the Donkin Reserve that looks out over downtown Port Elizabeth, the harbour and across the Indian Ocean as far as the horizon. The reserve was named after Sir Rufane Donkin founder of the town which was named after his wife.
FYI: This is the inscription on a plaque on the pyramid, from Sir Rufane Donkin to his deceased wife. “To the memory of one of the most perfect of human beings, who has given her name to the town below.”
Pretty gulls all in a row…
Did you know? There are no such species as seagulls. They are all Gulls but over time the prefix ‘sea’ seems to have attached itself by default.
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