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Client  Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk (Netherdutch Reformed Church of Africa) Built: 1970 Type: Retirement Home Architect: Taljaard Carter Building contractor: J. J. Gräbe Location: Observatory Ave, Johannesburg. Status: Unknown Also see: Ons Tuis Elderly Care Homes " Die hoeksteenlegging van die nuwe Ons Tuis, Observatoryweg, Johannesburg, was `n andersoortige gebeurtenis — eintlik 'n hoeksteenonthulling — aangesien die ligging van die grond 'n hoeksteenlegging tydens die boubedrywighede onmoontlik gemaak het. Hierdie praggebou, wat huisvesting aan 115 inwoners bied, met argitekte Mnre. Taljaard en Carter, en bou-aannemer mnr. J. J. Gräbe is al feitlik voltooi — 60 bejaardes onder die bekwame sorg van Matrone Botha en haar personeel het alreeds intrek geneem — toe op Saterdag 16 Mei 1970 om 10.00 vm. die onthullingsplegtigheid deur mev. Betsie Verwoerd, Ere-Presidente van Ons Tuis, waargeneem is. " (1970) Sources Herbst, R. (1970)  'n Nuwe Mylpaal uit Ons Tu...

Aka:  Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk (Netherdutch Reformed Church of Africa) Built:  1974-1975 Architect:  Vermooten, Du Plooy & Baker Building contractor:  Weeshuis-bouers Location:  10th Avenue, Edenvale, Johannesburg. Status: Extant, repurposed after 2022. View from west (1975)¹ The church was inaugurated  in October 1975. Since the founding of the congregation in 1952, there had already been ideals of owning its own church building. However, a church hall was built first, which was commissioned on 23 October 1954. Over the years, the need for a large and effective church building grew increasingly greater. At the beginning of this decade, the congregation's intention to build a church took concrete form when the architects Vermooten, Du Plooy and Baker were approached to draw up building plans for a church to be built next to the old church hall. It was then also decided to simultaneously convert the old church hall into an effective hall for congrega...

Built: 1946-1965 Architect: Kennedy, Furner, Irvine-Smith & Joubert Aerial photo with legend. (Source: SARN, 1959) Earlier history Park Station (First) Park Station (Second) Park Station Third " Prior to 1946 alternative station sites were investigated by both local and overseas experts but it was clear that by far the most satisfactory solution was to take over the old Wanderers Ground situated immediately north of the station and to build facilities on a bold scale over the increased area thus made available. "³ By the late 1940s Johannesburg’s railway station had already been rebuilt twice on the exact same site in less than seventy years.Work had begun in 1946 with the goal of turning Park Station into one of the most modern terminals in the world. When finished, the complex would rival New York’s Grand Central in scale. By 1959 it was handling 450 passenger trains, 178 goods trains and roughly 180,000 travellers per day. The final construction cost was expected to ...

Built: 1961-1963 (planned in 1959-1960) Architect: Kennedy, Furner, Irvine-Smith & Joubert Location: Leyds St, Johannesburg Status: Extant Rotunda and Admin Building, c.1976. (Source: Frans Erasmus II on FB) The building was SAA’s Johannesburg city terminal for check-in, reservations, waiting, and transfers to Jan Smuts Airport (now OR Tambo). It was an integrated transport hub - passengers could move seamlessly between rail concourses, the Rotunda, buses, taxis, and parking. The circular layout made one-way passenger flow very efficient. It accommodated all the passenger facilities required in a city terminal - enquiry office, reservations, tourist office, luggage areas, waiting rooms, tea room, shops, bookstall - built next to the taller office block on the new deck slab between Rissik and Harrison Streets / Leyds Street, west of the Rissik Bridge. It formed a striking architectural trio with the main station concourses and the adjacent tall SAA Administration Headquarters b...

Date: 1889-1890 The Rand Tram, also known as the Rand railway line, was the first railway in the Transvaal Republic (now part of South Africa) and played a pivotal role in Johannesburg's explosive growth during the Witwatersrand gold rush. Following the discovery of gold in 1886, the mining boom created an urgent need for reliable coal supplies to power the mines, as ox-wagon transport proved far too slow and expensive. In 1888, the ZAR Volksraad granted a concession to the Netherlands-South African Railway Company (NZASM), a Dutch-backed firm, to build a light steam-powered line primarily to haul coal from the Boksburg collieries westward to Johannesburg. Despite its "tram" nickname - reflecting its initial modest scale and tram-like character - it was a proper Cape-gauge (1,067 mm) railway using lightweight rails and small locomotives. Construction began in January 1889, and the initial 27 km section from Boksburg to Braamfontein (Johannesburg) opened on 17 March 1890,...

Aka:  Rissik Street Bridge Built: 1952 Engineer: South African Railways & Harbours The stairs in the foreground provide pedestrian access to the western entrance to the station (SARN, 1959) "...a gracefully curved viaduct that swept over the main station parking deck, and constituted a major design component in the overall complex." (Chipkin, 1993) Locality map Sources South African Railway News. May 1959. Johannesburg Style. 1993. Chipkin, C.

Aka: Protea Court Built: 1935 Architect: Kallenbach, Kennedy & Furner Location:  48-50 Wanderers St, Johannesburg Photo c.1959: "Gardens laid out by the S.A. Railways Horticultural Department." Google Street View of entrance, 2017. Corner window. (Photo: Agent Gedeon Mwanza) Entrance to an apartment. (Photo: Agent Gedeon Mwanza) Lobby. (Photo: Agent Gedeon Mwanza) Locality map Google Street View, 2025 Sources South African Railway News. MArch 1959. The Heritage Register

Built: 1958 Architect: Unidentified "The new Westgate railway station, in the heart of industrial Johannesburg which was opened on November 1 (1958), for non-European passengers has quickly established itself as a point of arrival and departure for workers who reside in the residential areas on Johannesburg's southern and south western boundaries. On November 4, the station handled 19,000 passengers, arrivals as well as departures. Two days later, November 6, the number had increased to no fewer than 22,000 and to 32,800 on November 7. The Railway Administration hopes that non-Europeans who work in the vicinity of this station will not hesitate to use it since the facilities provided there plus its strategic situation in relation to the industries of Selby Township at the bottom end of Sauer Street will save them both time and trouble. It takes ten minutes less from Westgate to New Canada than from Johannesburg to New Canada. At present 26 trains a day (weekdays) are schedul...

Built: c.1959 Architect: Unidentified Status: Extant Artist's impression by unidentified artist. Locality map Google Maps Street View, 2010. Description "A new catering depot for the South African Railways, in the form of an eight storey building, is taking shape on a site just west of the Queen Elizabeth bridge, near Johannesburg station. It will cost about £245,000 and will house the administrative offices of the catering department and the catering warehouses. The main feature of the new depot is that the Departmental headquarters and Johannesburg stores of the catering department will be housed in one building. At present they occupy several buildings in various parts of the Braamfontein yard. The design of the new composite block is unusual, since the two separate blocks, one for the warehouses and the other for the administrative staff, will be linked by through passages. The warehouse side will be five storeys high with provision for one more, and the adminis...

Aka:  Wits Sport Conference Centre Built: 1958-59 (opened 2 May 1959) Architect: Unidentified Location: Enoch Sontonga Ave, Sturrock Park, Milner Park, Johannesburg Photo during construction in 1958. ( South African Railway News) "The new building, which is being built on contract at a cost of £90,000 [final cost £127,000], will be the most central sporting venue in Johannesburg. It is being erected at Elizabeth Sturrock Park near the show grounds, on the site of the old Milner Park Municipal swimming bath. Johannesburg provides well for its sporting public, including railwaymen, with the result that the need for special facilities for the latter has not been as great as in other centres. In the Railway Recreation Club building, however, the old premises has become increasingly inadequate. The new building will be two storeys high and it will house all the usual club facilities including an entertainment hall, with stage, which will be able to accommodate about 500 people, ...

Aka: Doren Fontijn View from the Yeoville ridge: suburban development on the farm Doornfontein in distance. (Source: Grocott & Sherry's, Album of Johannesburg, 1898) Notes Owned by B.C. Viljoen In 1853 the inspection commission received requests for inspection from the occupiers of several tracts of land on the Witwatersrand, who wished to obtain title to them as owners' farms ( eigenaarsplaatsen ). Reports submitted included one for "Doren Fontijn" owned by Mr Barend Viljoen. It was listed as having one spring and being 6 hours from Pretoria (the nearest town). It was inspected with riding times: North 16 min, West 15 min, South 30 min, East 45 min. Barend Christiaan Viljoen (1807 - 1859) married Judith Cornelia Theresia Booysen (c.1807 Graaff-Reinet - c.1861 Cape) A diagram of the farm in 1853 which only roughly corresponds to the later surveyor's map. ( Copy of the Sketch accompanying the inspection report. Reproduced in MH Kunneke' s unpublished resea...

Full name:  Scott Dreyer Alexander Lifespan:  1848 St Helena - c.1938 Transvaal Family:  He married Alice Elizabeth (unknown surname) (c.1850 - ?) in 1870 in St Helena. They had two children, Reginald Scott Spencer Alexander (1871 St Helena - ?) and Charles Spencer Alexander (1874 St Helena - 1934 Rhodesia). Occupation: Prospector, merchant, stratigraphist, mill manager Scott Alexander, the ‘Rand Stratigraphist’, as he appeared in the South African Mining and Engineering Journal, 3 June 1921. Timeline Advertisement, 1923. Biography Early Life and Background (1848–1868) Scott Alexander was born in May 1848 on the remote island of St. Helena, into a family that had operated as ship chandlers for the East India Company since the 18th century. His father personally knew Napoleon Bonaparte and was responsible for opening the emperor's coffin in 1840 before its removal to France. An uncle had even supplied the site for Napoleon's original grave on the islan...

Overview The "Three Georges" associated with the 1886 gold discovery at Langlaagte (on the Witwatersrand, which led to the founding of Johannesburg) refer to three prospectors and friends: George Harrison , George Walker , and George Honeyball . They are sometimes collectively called the "Three Georges" in historical accounts of the event, particularly in older South African sources examining the claims and controversies around who truly discovered the Main Reef series of auriferous conglomerates. "I purposely abstain from setting out which of these three claimants was the true discoverer, since even a Government enquiry failed to settle the question." (Rosenthal, 1959) Langlaagte Map based on the original 1886 farm surveys used by the Grays and the Monuments Commission. (Source: Johannesburg 1912) In 1886 the farm Langlaagte (originally surveyed as Portion 224) had been subdivided into four equal portions of approximately 560 morgen each, labelled...

Full name:  George Frederick Thomas Honeyball Lifespan:  c.1857 Worcester - 1949 Johannesburg Family:  His father Henry (c.1828-1902) was an English-born Anglican priest. George married twice and had at least 3 children. Occupation:  blacksmith, carpenter, handyman, transport rider, wagon maker George Honeyball. Painting by W.H. Coetzer (1937). Biography Honeyball was a friend and fellow prospector of Harrison and Walker. Some sources claim he was an "errant nephew" or simply an assistant to a wagon maker who decided to stay on his aunt's farm. He worked as a blacksmith, carpenter, and handyman. He was responsible for the woodwork on the cottages that George Harrison and George Walker were building for the Oosthuizens. Honeyball was already living and working on Langlaagte (Portion D) as a blacksmith when Walker arrived at Confidence Mine and when Harrison started building the house. He never worked alongside them at the Struben operation. "George Honeyball had ...