May 19, 2006
By Lucille Davie
THE cord for the drill was passed through the window and the epoxy glue was mixed and applied quickly before it dried. Three holes were drilled into the tiles and the historical plaque was neatly pushed into place.
The ceramic plaque has been placed on the 120-year-old Langlaagte stamp battery in Main Street, a machine brought to the Witwatersrand in 1886 and used to crush gold-bearing rock extracted from the earth.
The plaque being positioned on the tiles below the stamp battery
Placed in Main Street in 2004, the battery was moved from George Harrison Park in Langlaagte, where it was damaged in a fire in 2003. The park marks the site of where the first outcrop of gold was found by Harrison, considered by many to be the person who discovered gold on the reef.
Main Street, dominated by the city's mining houses, has been revamped in the last few years, with trees, street furniture in the form of mining artefacts and attractive lighting, and flower beds transforming it into a quiet, clean haven for city workers. The private sector has put guards on the street, in all spending R13-million on the upgrade, together with the City's R2-million.
The battery has an interesting history. Brought to the Reef by oxwagon in the 1880s by the Langlaagte Estates Gold Mining Company, it was buried in one of the dumps south of Johannesburg in 1912. This strange decision was taken by Sir Joseph Robinson, one of the town's mining magnates.
"It was to be buried in the deepest slimes dump on the property, and Sir Joseph was present to see that his wishes were carried out," says Harry Zeederberg in Down Memory Lane.
Recovering the battery
When Robinson died in 1929 it was decided to recover the battery - but there was a major problem. The only senior official involved in its burial had also died. The black workers involved in the operation were also not available: they had been transferred to other mines, or had returned to their rural homes. And indeed, their names were unknown.
The resident engineer, Jackie Lowes, was given the task of tracing anyone who could help to locate the battery. He and his team interviewed thousands of workers over the next six years, says Zeederberg.
At last, in 1935, he traced a worker who was brought back to Langlaagte and, despite the many changes in the area, he pointed out the dump that he thought held the battery.
Many shafts were sunk and eventually one struck the battery. "It was only with great difficulty, however, that it was salvaged, cleaned, and restored to its original appearance," Zeederberg says.
In 1935 it was positioned at the entrance to the Chamber of Mines pavilion at the Empire Exhibition. After this the city council asked The Johannesburg Consolidated Investment Company to donate the battery to the people of the city and it was erected in the park in Langlaagte.
"It is the city's most valuable historical link with the past," Zeederberg concludes.
More plaques
Eric Itzkin, the deputy director of immovable heritage in the City's arts, culture and heritage department, says he is working on other plaques to be placed on significant places or buildings in the coming year.
A plaque is to be placed on or near the Westdene Dam wall, where in March 1985 42 schoolchildren drowned in the dam after their double-decker bus plunged into the water.
Another plaque is to be put on the house in Albermarle Street in Troyeville where Mahatma Gandhi lived in the early 1900s. An Art Deco residential block in Yeoville, Beacon Royal, is to receive a plaque too.
St Alban's Church in Ferreirasdorp, in the south-western corner of the CBD, one of the original Anglican churches in the city, is also to be recognised with a plaque. It was used by the local coloured community who lived in the immediate area, and at one time Archbishop Desmond Tutu preached from its pulpit.
The bronze Miners' Monument, at the top of Rissik Street in Braamfontein - given to the city by the Chamber of Mines in 1964, and sculpted by artist David MacGregor - will also receive a plaque.
Other developments
Other developments in Main Street include storyboards along the street, indicating the history of street names and the buildings, several of which are Art Deco buildings dating back to the 1930s and 1940s. The building on the corner of Main and Sauer streets is the city's fourth stock exchange building.
A mining museum is being conceptualised, which will contain a history of gold mining in Johannesburg and including artefacts supplied by the mining industry.
A large replica of the gold rhino of Mapungubwe in Limpopo - the original is housed in a museum on the University of Pretoria campus - is to be positioned on the top of the plinth opposite the stamp mill. It is an attempt to bring to the city an awareness of the history of the country's first gold explorers, says John Dewar, the director of the Johannesburg Land Company, the organiser behind these developments.
In addition, a huge steel headgear, brought from a mine in Rustenburg in North West, is being erected on the corner of Sauer and Main streets. The headgear is the surface section of a large lift that is used to take miners and equipment down into a mine.
The impressive piece of equipment will be 23m high, weigh 40 tons and contain more than 2 000 nuts and bolts. It was originally erected in 1950.
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