#journeyto100years #williamhills #centenary #10september
Train passengers who had been to Johannesburg before, pointed out landmarks to Benoni City Times founder William Hills as he neared “the golden city” for the first time.
“We passed a rocky kopjie and far in the distance on the crest of a hill were a few smokestacks and some dumps of rock – the gold mines.”
The train ran into Elandsfontein Station, which served what was then the little mining township of Germiston and which later became known as Germiston Station.
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“Rough-looking men slouched up and down the dirty platforms and then to our surprise the train started to go back in the direction from which we had come. But not for long.
“Great piles of rock, clanging headgears, big smock stacks, and then at Jeppes the beginnings of a town.”
They were almost there, Hills was told, and firmly grasping his belongings, he got ready to disembark at Park Station, where a motley crowd waited on the platform to greet the train, “for everyone who could greet a train greeted it in the early days.
“As a matter of fact, our journey up was a series of greetings, for the passing of the train was the event of the day to the small dorps along the line, everyone turning out for the one excitement of the 24 hours.
“By the time we reached Johannesburg, we had seen a whole cross-section of the life of South Africa.
“At the stations, ox wagons and Cape carts lined up near the track; Boer farmers, oumas wearing black sun bonnets, bright-faced and buxom young Dutch girls in more coquettish light print versions of ouma’s clothing … and at most of the stations apparently all the dogs of the town who had come up to share in the excitement and pass the time of day with other dogs.”
With a two-hour wait for the train to Krugersdorp, Hills set off to gain a first impression of Johannesburg, walking as far as Johannesburg Market Square before returning to the station.
Next time: The journey to Krugersdorp
Article: Carol Stier.
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