Crossing the borders of power: The memoirs of Colin Eglin, by Colin Eglin

Crossing the borders of power: The memoirs of Colin Eglin, by Colin Eglin.

This is an extract from the memoirs of Colin Eglin, Crossing the borders of power, and from the chapter Early years: Pinelands and OFS 1925-1935.

Colin Eglin  

I had just turned nine when my father died in July 1934. He had been ill for a long time, but had been strengthened by a deep and abiding Christian faith - and by the love and care (and equally deep faith) of his wife, Elsie. The curtains were drawn across the bedroom windows of our thatched Pinelands home on that wintry Cape morning. And yet despite my father s long and painful illness - and the death from meningitis of Rona, their first child and daughter, aged a mere 20 months - my parents' life in the small, newly established Cape Town village had been idyllically happy. Now, the cold winds were matched by an economic depression to be faced by my mother without the companionship of the man she loved; and her primary responsibility was to look after her young son and six-year-old daughter, Lorna. I was born on 14 April 1925; Lorna on 13 July 1927. Carl and Elsie Eglin moved into their newly-built home in Pinelands in 1923, soon after the first few houses had been completed. The house itself was a single-storey cottage with a steeply pitched thatched roof, a tall red-brick chimney, off-white painted walls, and small pane windows tucked under low overhanging eaves. It had been designed as a wedding present by Garth Baker, a friend of my mother and an aspiring Cape Town architect. It was designated No. 10 Meadway, later named 'Carone' after Carl, Rona and Elsie; and was our family home until my father's death. Through the windows you looked under a canopy of pines to an open grassed park called 'The Mead'. Behind the house was a large informal garden where my father built a wooden summerhouse and a toolshed, and planted a dozen or so fruit trees.

And beyond this was a part of Uitvlugt forest - a glade of tall pines that whistled in the south-east wind and provided a shady playground for schoolboys such as me and my cousins Stan, Doug and Ron Wells, who grew up next door in 'Wellesley', No. 12 Meadway. The forest, with its soft spongy carpet of pine needles, was also an excellent place for collecting denneballs (pine cones) from which we prised the pips (pine nuts). These were eaten there and then or formed a tasty and essential ingredient of 'temmeleitjie - a tacky toffee-like sweet we used to make in my mother s biscuit pans.
Pinelands, or Pinelands Garden City, was a fresh and exciting concept in housing and community development.

The driving force behind the venture was Richard Stuttaford, Minister of Housing in the cabinet of General JC Smuts, and a Cape Town businessman and director of the prestigious department store that bore his family name. Since his return to South Africa from England in 1898, Richard had taken a keen interest in housing. He was impressed by the writings and work of Ebenezer Howard, founder of the Garden City movement in England and the author of the book Garden Cities of Tomorrow; he followed the progress made in Welwyn and Letchworth, new garden cities in southern England.

The ravages of the great flu epidemic that swept through the country at the end of the Great War shocked Stuttaford and intensified his vision of devising better housing and community facilities. On 28 January 1919 he wrote to FS Malan, acting prime minister in the absence of General Smuts, then in Europe taking part in the postwar discussions that led to the Versailles peace treaty. He wished to put before him a proposal on the matter, which he was prepared to support with my own money, as I feel certain it will materially help towards the physical and moral improvement of our people. He requested 15 minutes to outline his ideas, and reassured Malan that he did not propose to ask for financial help from the government.

Malan granted the interview and it went well. On 19 June 1919, the Senate of the Union of South Africa formally approved a grant of 365 morgen of the Uitvlugt Forest Reserve, on the fringes of the sandy Cape Flats, some five-and-a-half miles from Cape Town by rail, for the purpose of establishing Pinelands, the country's first garden city. Stuttaford backed the initiative with his own money, and donated £10 000 to furnish an enabling trust with its initial working capital. By August 1921 the first houses were being built. On 5 May 1923 Smuts laid a commemoration stone at the foot of Central Avenue, and South Africa's first garden city was truly under way.

My parents were active in the life of the youthful Pinelands community. The residents in general, despite unhelpful sandy soil, were dedicated gardeners: Arbor Day was the major community festival. In the morning schoolchildren planted trees, and in the afternoon decamped with their parents to the local sports fields where young and old participated in various competitions. While my parents shared in many civic activities, it was in the religious life of Pinelands that they became increasingly involved. At first, the new Civic Hall was the venue for inter-denominational church services - the children's church' on Sunday mornings and services for the adults in the evening.

In 1926 the foundation stone of the Anglican St Stephen's church was laid; but my parents, both ardent Methodists, or Wesleyans as they were more commonly called, yearned to share in the spiritual intensity and lusty singing that characterised Methodist services. With a few friends they formed the Pinelands Methodist Church - with my father as the treasurer, my mother the organist, and our home the venue for regular Sunday evening services. Often, my father or one of his friends would lead the small band of worshippers. (...)

This is an extract from the book: Crossing the borders of power. The memoirs of Colin Eglin, by Colin Eglin.

Book title: Crossing the borders of power
Subtitle: The memoirs of Colin Eglin
Author: Colin Eglin
Publisher: Jonathan Ball
Cape Town, South Africa 2007
ISBN 978-1-86842-253-1
Softcover, 17x24 cm, 374 pages, several b/w photos