{"id":139159,"date":"2016-10-05T19:04:59","date_gmt":"2016-10-05T17:04:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=139159"},"modified":"2016-10-05T17:11:57","modified_gmt":"2016-10-05T15:11:57","slug":"joburg-is-130-years-old-this-is-what-it-looked-like-back-then","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/lifestyle\/139159\/joburg-is-130-years-old-this-is-what-it-looked-like-back-then\/","title":{"rendered":"Joburg is 130 years old – this is what it looked like back then"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Africa’s biggest city is celebrating its 130th birthday this month, and has come a long way from a handful of farms digging for gold back in 1886.<\/p>\n

Johannesburg was formally established by the Boer government in 1886, after gold was discovered along the Witwatersrand reef.<\/p>\n

By the time the Anglo-Boer war kicked off, the city had already grown significantly, with a working railway system, horse-drawn trams and the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) in full operation.<\/p>\n

In its earliest days, Joburg was a small grouping of around 9 farms that had acquired claims to dig for gold. The area, known as Ferreirasdorp today, is the oldest suburbs of Joburg.<\/p>\n

\"ferreirasdorp-today\"<\/a>

Ferreirasdorp today<\/p><\/div>\n

\"ferreiras-gold-mine-1886\"<\/a>

First digging in Ferreirasdorp in 1886<\/p><\/div>\n

\"ferreiras-camp-1886\"<\/a>

Ferreira’s Camp 1886<\/p><\/div>\n

The digging camps were set up by former Boer adventurer, Ignatius Ferreira, who established the region, and his land became the spot for many firsts for the city.<\/p>\n

Historians are not certain how Johannesburg got its name beyond knowing that it was named after someone called Johann. Unfortunately, Johann is a common Dutch name, and the records of which Johann in particular got the honour, was blown away on a stormy night<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The most likely candidate is Johann Rissik, who served as the first clerk in the office of the surveyor general, who was left to declare the new city’s name in a hurry.<\/p>\n

Today, Joburg has grown to cover over 2,300 square kilometres – a space larger than Sydney, London and New York. It is home to over 4.6 million people, and is one of the world’s richest heritage sites.<\/p>\n

Here are some images of Johannesburg in its earlier days – more can be seen here<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

\"Joburg<\/a>

Joburg Market Square circa 1900<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Joburg<\/a>

Joburg City Centre in 1896<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Joburg<\/a>

Joburg circa 1900<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Joburg<\/a>

Joburg government buildings circa 1900<\/p><\/div>\n

Image sources: Wikipedia Commons<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

More on Joburg<\/h3>\n

Why Joburg is a better city to live and work in than Cape Town<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Holiday in Cape Town, but come work in Johannesburg<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

How much the average tourist spends in South Africa\u2019s biggest cities<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa’s biggest city is celebrating its 130th birthday this month, and has come a long way from farms digging for gold in 1886.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":65856,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9876],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-139159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139159"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139159\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139181,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139159\/revisions\/139181"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}