The gold is all gone...
A capture of one of the many abandoned goldmine shaft structures in Johannesburg.
Mining in South Africa has been the main driving force behind the history and development of Africa's most advanced and richest economy. Large scale and profitable mining started with the discovery of a diamond on the banks of the Orange River in 1867 by Erasmus Jacobs and the subsequent discovery and exploitation of the Kimberley pipes a few years later. Gold rushes to Pilgrim's Rest and Barberton were precursors to the biggest discovery of all, the Main Reef/Main Reef Leader on Gerhardus Oosthuizen's farm Langlaagte, Portion C, in 1886, the Witwatersrand Gold Rush and the subsequent rapid development of the gold field there, the biggest of them all.
The Witwatersrand is in Gauteng Province, South Africa. Gauteng Province is the roughly the southern portion of what was previously the Transvaal, formerly an independent state settled by the Boers after the Great Trek. J. H. Davis, an Englishman, was reported to have found gold "in considerable quantities" in July 1852 at Paardekraal near Krugersdorp, which was the earliest discovery on the Rand. Davis had sold £600 worth of gold (£457,000 in 2010 Pounds to the Transvaal Treasury and had shortly thereafter been ordered out of the country in accordance with the prevailing policy of secrecy. In October 1853 Pieter Jacob Marais, born in Cape Town on 31 July 1826, discovered gold on the banks of the Jukskei River, this find too was hushed up. The first mining concern (the Nil Desperandum Co-operative Gold Company) was formed at Blaauwbank in 1874.
Gold was mined at various places on the Rand up to 1886, when the discovery of the Witwatersrand Main Reef set off the historic Witwatersrand Gold Rush.
Gold was discovered in the area known as Witwatersrand, triggering what would become the Witwatersrand Gold Rush of 1886. Like the diamond discoveries before, the gold rush caused thousands of foreign expatriates to prospect and mine the region. This heightened political tensions in the area, ultimately contributing to the Second Boer War in 1899. Ownership of the diamond and gold mines became concentrated in the hands of a few entrepreneurs, largely of European origin, known as the Randlords.
Cecil Rhodes founded Gold Fields of South Africa (GFSA) in 1887. Rand Mines (now Randgold), Johannesburg Consolidated Investments, General Mining and Union Corporation were quickly in place, all backed by men who had started in diamonds. Only Sir Ernest Oppenheimer's Anglo American was formed rather later, in 1917, while AngloVaal was founded in 1933. These seven houses provided the foundations of the South African gold industry which was always described as the 'flywheel' of the country's expansion.
The gold is all gone...
A capture of one of the many abandoned goldmine shaft structures in Johannesburg.
Mining in South Africa has been the main driving force behind the history and development of Africa's most advanced and richest economy. Large scale and profitable mining started with the discovery of a diamond on the banks of the Orange River in 1867 by Erasmus Jacobs and the subsequent discovery and exploitation of the Kimberley pipes a few years later. Gold rushes to Pilgrim's Rest and Barberton were precursors to the biggest discovery of all, the Main Reef/Main Reef Leader on Gerhardus Oosthuizen's farm Langlaagte, Portion C, in 1886, the Witwatersrand Gold Rush and the subsequent rapid development of the gold field there, the biggest of them all.
The Witwatersrand is in Gauteng Province, South Africa. Gauteng Province is the roughly the southern portion of what was previously the Transvaal, formerly an independent state settled by the Boers after the Great Trek. J. H. Davis, an Englishman, was reported to have found gold "in considerable quantities" in July 1852 at Paardekraal near Krugersdorp, which was the earliest discovery on the Rand. Davis had sold £600 worth of gold (£457,000 in 2010 Pounds to the Transvaal Treasury and had shortly thereafter been ordered out of the country in accordance with the prevailing policy of secrecy. In October 1853 Pieter Jacob Marais, born in Cape Town on 31 July 1826, discovered gold on the banks of the Jukskei River, this find too was hushed up. The first mining concern (the Nil Desperandum Co-operative Gold Company) was formed at Blaauwbank in 1874.
Gold was mined at various places on the Rand up to 1886, when the discovery of the Witwatersrand Main Reef set off the historic Witwatersrand Gold Rush.
Gold was discovered in the area known as Witwatersrand, triggering what would become the Witwatersrand Gold Rush of 1886. Like the diamond discoveries before, the gold rush caused thousands of foreign expatriates to prospect and mine the region. This heightened political tensions in the area, ultimately contributing to the Second Boer War in 1899. Ownership of the diamond and gold mines became concentrated in the hands of a few entrepreneurs, largely of European origin, known as the Randlords.
Cecil Rhodes founded Gold Fields of South Africa (GFSA) in 1887. Rand Mines (now Randgold), Johannesburg Consolidated Investments, General Mining and Union Corporation were quickly in place, all backed by men who had started in diamonds. Only Sir Ernest Oppenheimer's Anglo American was formed rather later, in 1917, while AngloVaal was founded in 1933. These seven houses provided the foundations of the South African gold industry which was always described as the 'flywheel' of the country's expansion.