I don't think a lot of people know that the South End Museum Heritage Trail exists. The trail starts at the South End Museum and can be done self-guided with the help of a guide book available from the museum or on a guided walk along with one of the museum's tourist guides. The trail takes in a some of the historic sites that are linked to old South End with the St Peter's Church ruins in my mind being the…
One of the most prominent features in the South End Museum is a map of what South End in Port Elizabeth looked like before the Apartheid government demolished most of the buildings and subsequently also a lot of the streets in the area. The map shows street names as well as where a lot of the prominent buildings like schools, churches, hotels and shops.
I took a couple of my colleagues on a walk around the South End Museum Heritage Trail with stops at some of the main heritage sites along the trail. After looking around the St Peter's Church ruins this was the view as we were heading down the street towards Walmer Boulevard. I kinda wish I lived this close to the beachfront.
When Fort Frederick (top left) was built overlooking the Baakens River Mouth and coastline in 1799 things looked a little bit different than today. The river flowed into a fresh water lagoon and the beach was a lot closer than it is today. These days there is no more lagoon and the river flows along a narrow canal while there are businesses on the river's flood plain. Since the building of the Port Elizabeth harbour the Fort is also much further from…
This narrow guage railway bridge (if I can call is that), crosses one of the old unused South End Roads below Beach Road close to the Humewood Station. I was just curious to see it from up close and ventured down to it. It made for a nice window towards the harbour.
The South End Wild Fig Tree stands about 100 meters from the South End Museum. The tree stands next to the then Chase Street. In the days of the old South End before the Groups Areas Act meant the removal of the people from the area the kids used to climb the tree while the older people sat in it's shade. When the people were removed and the buildings in the area demolished, the fear was that the tree would…
Standing at the bottom of Walmer Boulavard is one of two mosques that survived the demolition of old South End. In the early 1890's Imam Jalaludien Abrahams, together with his trustees, set about the task of having a mosque built as this was much needed in the area then. In 1893 the land was transferred to the Trust and the Mosque of Righteousness was completed in 1894.
In the days of old South End before most of it was demolished and the people forcibly removed from the area, Walmer Road was the main road running through South End towards the suburb of Walmer. In those days the main hotels and businesses of the area was found along this road. Today only a small section of this old road is still visible at the top of Pier Street. It leads through an open piece of land and is…
Today is Friday the 13th, so I decided to post something haunting. One of the reminisces of old South End are what is know as the Black Steps. The steps lead up from the Baakens Valley into South End and passes the back of the historic St Mary's Cemetery. The people using the steps have always believed that they were haunted because of its close proximity to the cemetery.
Driving down Brickmakers Kloof (and over the new bridge), the historic St Mary's Cemetery is situated on the right hand side across the road from the old bus sheds. Very few people notice that between the road and the St Mary's Cemetery there is a number of graves. They seem to be Muslim graves, so I popped into the South End Museum to see if they had more information. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a lot of info available…