Matjiesfontein | |
---|---|
Coordinates: 33°13′59″S20°34′58″E / 33.23306°S 20.58278°E | |
Country | South Africa |
Province | Western Cape |
District | Central Karoo |
Municipality | Laingsburg |
Government | |
• Councillor | Aletta Theron [1] (DA) |
Area | |
• Total | 1.22 km2 (0.47 sq mi) |
Population (2011) [2] | |
• Total | 422 |
• Density | 350/km2 (900/sq mi) |
Racial makeup (2011) | |
• Black African | 1.2% |
• Coloured | 97.6% |
• White | 0.7% |
• Other | 0.5% |
First languages (2011) | |
• Afrikaans | 97.4% |
• Tswana | 1.2% |
• Other | 1.4% |
Time zone | UTC+2 (SAST) |
PO box | 6901 |
Area code | 023 |
Matjiesfontein is a settlement in Central Karoo District Municipality in the Western Cape province of South Africa.
The original inhabitants of the region were the Khoikhoi herders and the San hunter gatherers. Following the arrival of the early European colonists, the area was settled by Afrikaner Trekboers and Griqua people.
The town itself owes its existence to the Cape Government Railways, and to the route that their founder, Cape Prime Minister John Molteno, chose for a railway line that would connect Cape Town's port to the diamond fields of Kimberley. The Royal Commonwealth Society (1898) records that in a meeting with his consulting engineers, the Prime Minister called for a map of Southern Africa to be brought to him and, taking a ruler, drew his pen along it from Cape Town all the way inland. He then handed the map to the engineers, telling them to build the railway accordingly. [3] [4]
The line rapidly extended inland, and a station was built on 1 February 1878, that was named "Matjiesfontein". The name was derived from a type of sedge, Cyperus textilis , used by Khoekhoen to make mats (matjies) employed in the construction of their huts. [5]
Originally, Matjiesfontein was only a small depot and farm, however a Scotsman by the name of James Douglas Logan, who was superintendent of this stretch of railway, bought land at Matjiesfontein, moved there because of his weak chest, and opened a refreshment station for the passing trains. This was so successful that the business soon formed the nucleus of a growing village. Logan was unintentionally very influential in South African history as he had secured the catering contract for the railways through his friend in parliament, James Sivewright, and discovery of the corruption involved led to the fall of the first government of Prime Minister Cecil Rhodes in 1893. [6] [7] Logan was also considered to be one of the founding fathers of South African cricket. [8]
A town was laid out in the 1880s, and formally purchased in 1968 to be preserved for its Victorian charm. The whole town was declared a National Monument on 12 September 1975, [9] the railway station on 15 December 1989 and the cemetery on 23 September 1994. [10] [11] The cemetery houses the graves of British Army Major-General Andrew Wauchope (1846–1899) and English cricketer George Lohmann (1865–1901). In 2022, a new ground station for NASA's lunar exploration program was announced to be under construction in Matjiesfontein, scheduled to come online in 2025. [12] [13]
The town of Matjiesfontein is located 27 km west of Laingsburg and 54 km east of Touwsrivier on the N1 national route. The surrounding Karoo region is a flat, sparsely populated semi-desert. Matjiesfontein has a healthy climate for people with lung complaints, and was once home to a Victorian spa and health resort. [14]
Fynbos is a small belt of natural shrubland or heathland vegetation located in the Western Cape and Eastern Cape provinces of South Africa. This area is predominantly coastal and mountainous, with a Mediterranean climate and rainy winters. The fynbos ecoregion is within the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub biome. In fields related to biogeography, fynbos is known for its exceptional degree of biodiversity and endemism, consisting of about 80% species of the Cape floral kingdom, where nearly 6,000 of them are endemic. This land continues to face severe human-caused threats, but due to the many economic uses of the fynbos, conservation efforts are being made to help restore it.
The Karoo is a semi-desert natural region of South Africa. No exact definition of what constitutes the Karoo is available, so its extent is also not precisely defined. The Karoo is partly defined by its topography, geology and climate, and above all, its low rainfall, arid air, cloudless skies, and extremes of heat and cold. The Karoo also hosted a well-preserved ecosystem hundreds of million years ago which is now represented by many fossils.
The Central Karoo District Municipality is a district municipality located in the Western Cape province of South Africa. Its municipality code is DC5.
Laingsburg Municipality is a local municipality located in the Western Cape province of South Africa. As of 2022, the population is 11,366. Its municipality code is WC051.
The following lists events that happened during 1981 in South Africa.
The Swartberg mountains are a mountain range in the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is composed of two main mountain chains running roughly east–west along the northern edge of the semi-arid Little Karoo. To the north of the range lies the other large semi-arid area in South Africa, the Great Karoo. Most of the Swartberg Mountains are above 2000 m high, making them the tallest mountains in the Western Cape. It is also one of the longest, spanning some 230 km from south of Laingsburg in the west to between Willowmore and Uniondale in the east. Geologically, these mountains are part of the Cape Fold Belt.
Laingsburg is a town located in the Western Cape province in South Africa. It is a relatively large agricultural town in the semi-arid Great Karoo; its economy is based on farming goats, sheep, fruits, and vegetable. The town is served by two main roads, namely the N1 and the R323.
The Karoo Supergroup is the most widespread stratigraphic unit in Africa south of the Kalahari Desert. The supergroup consists of a sequence of units, mostly of nonmarine origin, deposited between the Late Carboniferous and Early Jurassic, a period of about 120 million years.
Cape Town railway station is the main railway station of the city of Cape Town, South Africa. It is located along Adderley and Strand Streets in the city's central business district.
The CP Nel Museum is a museum in Oudtshoorn, South Africa, which houses exhibits depicting the role of the ostrich trade in the town's history, as well as the cultural history and lifestyle of the people of the Little Karoo region, as it was during the Victorian era and early 20th century.
The Near Earth Network provides orbital communications support for near-Earth orbiting customer platforms via various ground stations, operated by NASA and other space agencies. It uses a number of different dishes scattered around the globe. The antennas must be able to move fast for tracking of objects in low Earth orbit (LEO). The NEN and Space Network (SN) combined were previously referred to as the Spaceflight Tracking and Data Network (STDN).
Richmond is a town in the central Karoo region of the Northern Cape Province, South Africa. It is situated on the main N1 route.
Thomas Charles John Bain was a South African road engineer. As a prolific road building pioneer, Bain was responsible for the planning and construction of more than 900 km of roads and mountain passes, many of them still in use today, over a career spanning from 1848 until 1888. These passes through the mountain ranges between the thin coastal plain and the interior of the former Cape Colony in South Africa, played a major role in opening up the vast hinterland of South Africa.
Molteno is a town in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa.
The Cape Government Railways (CGR) was the government-owned railway operator in the Cape Colony from 1874 until the creation of the South African Railways (SAR) in 1910.
Touws River is a small railway town of 8,126 people in the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is located on the river of the same name, about 160 kilometres (100 mi) north-east of Cape Town. The Touwsrivier CPV Solar Project is located just outside of the town and supplies 50 MW to the national electrical grid.
Leeu-Gamka is a small town in the Western Cape province of South Africa, located 355 kilometres (221 mi) north-east of Cape Town in the Karoo.
Prince Albert Road is a village located in Laingsburg Local Municipality, Western Cape.
James Douglas Logan was a Scottish-born South African cricket patron, who was one of the founding fathers of cricket in South Africa.
The Roggeveld Wind Power Station is an operational 147 MW (197,000 hp) wind power plant in South Africa. The power station, which began commercial operations in March 2022, was developed and is owned by Building Energy. The energy generated at this wind farm is sold to the South African national electricity utility company Eskom, under a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA).