Page 24 - Dainfern Precinct_Issue 4_2022

BOOK REVIEW

IT'S THE

PEOPLE WHO

MAKE A TOWN

BY JAMES CLARKE

Main Road, Steytlerville

think I’ve been to Steytlerville. A little while ago, a long row of masts They began interviewing the families
In fact, I must have, for I’ve been were erected down the length of of which a few had family crests and
through the Eastern Cape Karoo the central island of the main road. one or two clans possessed coats
a few times. But, in those days, Hanging from each mast there is a of arms. For those who had neither,
I suppose it was one of those pair of large vinyl banners bearing Linda’s group delved into their
I places of which Dorothy Parker the crests and even coats of arms histories and, with the help of the
would have said, “when you get there, reflecting the past of many of the anthropology department of the Albany
there is no there there”. families and clans who live among Museum in nearby Grahamstown
Steytlerville’s 4 000 people, of whom (now Makhanda), set about designing
I have now vowed that when I am 70% are Coloured. individual family crests and coats of
in that area again, I will stop at arms. This is why the banners bear
Steytlerville and I will walk down its The road was, until recently, some unusual armorial symbols:
main road and, at the end, have a cup a dusty, littered avenue. The cooking pots, items such as kudu
of coffee at Lizzy’s Khaya which is, in municipality had long given up horns, cotton reels, brown hands
fact, part of her house. watering the 250 bougainvillea clasping black and white hands,
shrubs along the central island - shields, spears, sheep, goats, Karoo
The town gets a chapter to itself shrubs that were planted years windmills and other items reflecting
in a very entertaining new book, before by a much-loved resident Steytlerville’s two centuries of history,
Karoo Road II – more tales from the gardener. It had also stopped including a crest depicting a local
heartland by Julienne du Toit and cleaning the streets. store owner’s heritage – a symbolic
Chris Marais.
Linda Henderson, a local shopping trolley.
The main road through the town is an entrepreneur, and her friends who Local farmer, Rikus Bezuidenhout,
extraordinarily wide road. To the far conceived the idea of the banners, upset by the neglect of the
south, there’s Baviaanskloof. Beyond decided to uplift their town. As Linda bougainvillea shrubs along the island,
that is Humansdorp and St Francis put it, “En dis mense wat jou ‘n dorp mounted a water tank on his bakkie,
Bay. All around, it’s sheep and Angora gee” - it’s the people who make a collected grey water from the town’s
goat country. town. sewage plant and resuscitated the

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