UPDATED: 09/05/2024
9 May 1890, The first camera club in SA is established in Kimberley with eighteen members.
9 May 1962, De Beers Sea Scout Brian Freeman awarded Boy Scout Association Meritorious Award for rescuing a woman in distress in the Dutoit’s Pan.
First camera club in South Africa
Taking pictures as a hobby was popularised by the introduction of dry-plates and small hand-held cameras in the 1880s. Enthusiastic amateur photographers,
including women, formed camera clubs, creating a forum for the exchange of information, advice and aesthetic ideas which they gained from the increasing number and range of photographic journals published. In sub-Sahara Africa, the first camera club 
meeting was held in Kimberley, South Africa, in 1890, and contacts with the club movement in Britain were formed.
Sir Benjamin Stone (1838-1914), President of the Birmingham Photographic Society addressed the Cape Town Photographic Society in 1894. C Ray Woods, a member of the Cape Town club, was the first person in South Africa to join the Royal Photographic Society, having joined in 1882. The clubs acquired premises with studio and dark-room facilities, exchanged prints and lantern slides, organized outings and participated in competitions. From 1896 a national salon organized by the Cape Town Society became an annual event. By 1895 there were in total eleven photographic societies in South Africa and just two elsewhere in the continent, at Constantine and Oran, Algeria.
(Encyclopedia of Nineteenth Century Photography by John Hannavy).
Pictured are three types of cameras used by 1890.
UPDATED: 09/05/2017
9 May 1962, De Beers Sea Scout Brian Freeman awarded Boy Scout Association Meritorious Award for rescuing a woman in distress in the Dutoit’s Pan.
DID YOU KNOW
That membership of the Kimberley Club (pictured) in 1881 was limited to 250 members, while among the many members over the 130 years have been at least four prime ministers, Cecil Rhodes, Dr Jameson, John X. Merriman and Sir Charles Metcalfe. The Oppenheimer family have been, or are all members of the Club. So too were JB Currey, Barney Barnato, Alfred Beit, JH Taylor, JB Robinson, Lionel Phillips, Sir David Harris, Charles Rudd, all truly large names in this country’s history. The President’s Board in the hallway reads like a Who’s Who of South African history, while the Chairman’s Board is a Who’s Who of Kimberley. When one leans on the bar counter, it is humbling to remember that the famous once stood in the very same spot. There are not many Clubs in the world that can give that experience.
UPDATED: 09/05/2016
9 May 1962, De Beers Sea Scout Brian Freeman awarded Boy Scout Association Meritorious Award for rescuing a woman in distress in the Dutoit’s Pan.
DID YOU KNOW
Sport, particularly cricket, had been played on the famous Kimberley Athletic Club sports ground ever since diamonds were discovered in the nearby De Beers mine. Cecil Rhodes’ first home in the town was “near” the Natal Cricket Grounds (as it was then named, because the first cricket game was organized by diggers originally from Natal), and in 1887 the ground was granted by the Vooruitzicht Estate to the Kimberley Town Council for sporting purposes. The Kimberley Athletic Club used it for a variety of sports, while the Kimberley Cricket Club erected a pavilion and utilized it as their home ground. Many inter-provincial matches between Griqualand West and various opponents were played here (both cricket and rugby), and most derby rugby games on Wednesdays between CBC and Kimberley Boys’ High were packed with spectators. International sides also competed on this ground, which was used as a circus ground in the 1970s and 1980s before becoming a Diamond Cutting factory in 1989.
From Kimberley Calls and Recalls on Facebook By Steve Lunderstedt
Shortlink for this post: https://www.kimberley.org.za/?p=8941
