Talks
GUY BUTLER (1918-2001) – South African poet, academic and playwright
David Butler, Headmaster of Greenwood Bay College in Plettenberg Bay
speaks about his father Professor Guy Butler.
The following is a transcript of David's talk and is largely unedited.
“I am fully aware that a lot of you may have known my father either as students or colleagues and you might...
FEAST AND FAMINE’ - The Fishing Industry of Plettenberg Bay
“A failed experiment” The Silkworm Industry of Gouna
Speaker: Rayno Sciocattis
In 1881 Rayno Sciocatti's Italian ancestors were brought out by the Cape Government to start a silk industry in Gouna – about 14 miles north west of Knysna and over 900 meters above sea level. The immigrants were farming people of substance from the Mountainous...
François Le Vaillant - Journey into the Interior of Africa
François Le Vaillant: Journey into the Interior of Africa
Summary of a talk given by D.J. Culpin
to the
Plettenberg Bay Historical Society on 14 May 2017
The French traveller and ornithologist, François Le Vaillant, wrote one of the most important eighteenth-century accounts of a visit to...
Philip Caveney talks on The Woodcutter Settlements of the Southern Cape
Introduction
This is a short account of the woodcutter settlements in the southern Cape and the efforts made by the Cape authorities to improve the living standards of the woodcutters by settling them at selected locations on clearings abutting the indigenous forests. The now extinct Knysna...
Brenda Sheperd talks on The 100th Anniversary of the Sinking of the SS Mendi
It was a volatile time in South Africa at the outbreak of the First World War. Only 12 years had passed since the end of the Anglo Boer War which had bitterly divided the nation. Those South Africans of British descent and Afrikaners loyal to General Botha automatically regarded themselves...
Sophy Gray
SPEAKER: NATIE DE SWART
Sophy or Sophia Gray was a multi-faceted person who happened to be a woman. It would be easy to talk about her and her achievements for a long time.
What I would like to do is to talk about the person and to put her in the context of the time in which she lived and...
Rosalind Ballingall
Speaker: Paul Scheepers
In 1969 When I was a student at UCT there were other students who shared our cafeteria. There was one striking girl. Six foot tall, slim very pretty with red hair and wore a hippy dress down to the ground
This was Rosalind Ballingall, studying for BA drama, second...
The glory and demise of the Kingdom of the two Sicilies.
Speaker: Dr Giovanni Coci
I was born in Naples, Southern Italy and I am quite passionate about the culture and the history of this beautiful part of the world. The purpose of my talk is to share with you some facts about the history of Southern Italy which may not be well known.
Let’ s...
The De Poort Murders of 1802
A United Front of Khoikhoin Gounaqua & Amagqunukhwebe
SPEAKER: Mike Kantey
Events leading up to the 19th Century
The first major driver behind the dispossession and fateful resistance of the indigenous and migrant African tribes of what became South Africa was the colonisation of the Southern...
