Five of the Most Famous People from Germiston

From Springbok mobile pros to professional sportsmen, politicians and activists, Germiston can take credit for sending a large number of successful people into the world.

Dr. Sydney Brenner

Not only was Dr. Sydney Brenner born in Germiston, but when he was 15, the town council, moved by his teachers’ advocacy on his behalf, secured the money needed for the boy from a poor immigrant family to go to medical school at the University of Witwatersrand.

When Brenner graduated he was not allowed to practice medicine because of his young age.  To fill his time, he started learning about cell biology and from there on forward, focused his efforts on research. He became fascinated with the work on DNA that Watson and Crick were doing and eventually concentrated his efforts on the emerging discipline of evolutionary genomics.

Brenner’s research into the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans led to his discoveries in developmental biology and genetics where he recorded the fundamental steps in how cells use DNA to make the proteins that enable life. This was the work that led to his Nobel prize in Physiology of Medicine.

Arlene Dickinson

Arlene Dickinson was born in Germiston but grew up in Canada.  She is best known as the CEO of Venture Communications and has appeared on the CBC TV show “Dragons’ Den” where she was one of the multi-millionaires who listened to would-be entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to see who would get funded. She also appears on another Dragon’s Den-like show, “The Big Decision.”

Since 1998 Dickinson has been the sole owner of Venture Communications. Since taking ownership she has made the company into one of Canada’s biggest marketing and communications firms.

Dickinson launched Arlene Dickinson Enterprises in 2012 to target and fund Canada’s entrepreneurs. Her YouInc.com is presently a social website but the intention is for it to include, in the future a radio show, apps, a magazine and television formats. YouInc is designed to celebrate the “entrepreneurial lifestyle.” Dickinson wrote an autobiography, Persuasion, which tells the story of her rise to prominence and business stardom. The book hit the bestseller lists after publication.

Albert Johanneson

Albert Johanneson was the first black footballer to play in the FA Cup.  He got his start after a Germiston schoolteacher recommended him to Leeds United where he made history as the first black person to feature in the final of the Football Association Challenge Cup, the F.A. Cup Final which was played at Wembley Stadium in 1965.

Johanneson endured blatant discrimination and abuse from spectators who shouted monkey chants and threw bananas at him from the stands. George Best, a footballer who was a contemporary of Johanneson, said of him, “Albert was quite a brave man to actually go on the pitch in the first place, wasn’t he? And he went out and did it. He had a lot of skill. A nice man as well … which is, I suppose, the more important thing, isn’t it? More important than anything.”

In January 2019 the Leeds Civic Trust and Leeds United commemorated Johanneson’s contribution to the City of Leeds and to football with a ceremony that honored him for paving the way for black and South African black footballers.

Johanneson’s experiences are chronicled in Kester Aspden’s book “The Hounding of David Oluwale.” The book is an account of the life of Nigerian immigrant David Oluwale who lived in Leeds during the ‘50s and the ‘60s. Johanneson has also been featured in the Out of Africa Campaign, a touring exhibition that is a UK Heritage Lottery-funded, multimedia project which focuses on  African footballers and the contribution that they have made to transforming professional football in Britain.

Neville Colman

Neville Colman is best known for his discoveries regarding folate and nutrition.  He was a hematologist and a forensic DNA expert whose research contributed greatly to today’s medical understanding of the importance of folic acid in human diet.

Colman finished school in Germiston and attended the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg where he studied medicine, pathology and nuclear medicine. He is the first researcher to identify how anemia can be caused by a folate deficiency.  That research eventually led to folic acid being added to food products to fortify them – a practice endorsed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the World Health Organization.

Colman is also credited with developing a technique for delivering supplementary vitamin B-12 to Crohn’s disease patients via a nasal gel.

Colman was an early pioneer in the use of DNA as a forensic tool and testified in numerous criminal cases regarding the veracity of DNA fingerprinting and quality control in criminology laboratories.

Helen Suzman

The name Helen Suzman is as intricately linked to the anti-apartheid movement as that of Nelson Mandala. Suzman was born in Gemiston and studied at University in Johannesburg. During WWII she worked for the government as a statistician and afterwards she was employed by the  South African Institute of Race Relations where she was responsible for preparing evidence for the Fagan Commission’s inquiry into the system of migrant labor and laws applying to Africans in urban areas. That work raised her awareness of the difficulties and hardships of Africans seeking to work in urban areas.

She became involved in activism to end apartheid and was a founding member of the ANC – African National Congress. For many years Suzman was the sole parliamentarian who opposed  apartheid and she endured a great deal of abuse from fellow parliamentarians as well as from apartheid-supporters in the public.

Suzman was known as a fighter for those in prison who were enduring horrific conditions. Her efforts resulted in easing of the conditions of imprisonment of Nelson Mandela and other black activists. She was also a frequent visitor to resettlement areas, townships and squatter camps where she gave assistance and collected information about the deplorable conditions under which the people were living.

On her 85^th birthday, Nelson Mandala wrote to her, “Your courage, integrity and principled commitment to justice have marked you as one of the outstanding figures in the history of public life in South Africa. On your 85^th birthday we can but pay tribute to you, thank you and let you know how fortunate our country feels for having had you as part of its public life and politics.”