The Helderburger

History of the Helderberg

A Bicycle, a Dog and the Freedom of the Open Road

STORY 107 Before the internet. Before the PlayStation. Before parents organised playdates and supervised every moment of their children’s lives in the anxious, scheduled way that became standard in later decades. Before all of that, ...read more
History of the Helderberg

Die Kalfies: A Thing Made in 1833

STORY 106 Featured Image: Die Kalfies – 1833 There is an object in the family that was made by hand in 1833. Not printed. Not manufactured. Made, stitch by stitch and brushstroke by brushstroke, by ...read more
History of the Helderberg

The Girl on the Stage: Sonja Herholdt, Somerset West, 1974

STORY 105 It was a weekday afternoon in 1974. School had not yet ended for the day or perhaps it had just ended, which amounts to the same thing, because the boy in question was ...read more
History of the Helderberg

The Voice in the Shower: Manuel Escórcio and Helderberg College

STORY 104 The story of how Manuel Escórcio became one of South Africa’s most celebrated tenors begins in a hostel shower in Somerset West, sometime in the late 1960s, when a teenage boy from Mozambique ...read more
History of the Helderberg

The Poet of the Sea: Ingrid Jonker and Gordon’s Bay

STORY 102 Featured image: Ingrid Jonker memorial There is a memorial on the Gordon’s Bay beachfront. It is modest, a child’s tricycle set in a round arch on a marble stone, with words from a ...read more