Kimberley, South Africa
News 3
Dear Kimberley Ex-Pats
Letter No 3
June 2014
It’s been a while since I wrote to you (mid October 2013). However it has not been idle time.
First of all let me thank all those of you who responded and sent encouragement as well as information about their families and Kimberley thoughts.
As you know, it has always been my concern as to how to capture and make this information permanently available and how to communicate it with others round the world – in other words how to make a website for the Kimberley community.
Well I believe that if you wish for something strongly enough – it will surely come to pass. And so it has! There now is a site for the Kimberley Jewish Community! I will give you the details at the end of this letter of how to connect to it – and how you can help to fill it with your own stories.
It came into being not by someone from Kimberley – but from the skill and enthusiasm of one marvellous and dedicated person, Eli Rabinowitz, who is an ex-South African now living in the far Antipodes – in Perth Australia! Eli loves documenting communities and has done several South African communities including Witbank and Muizenberg. He contacted me via Saul Issroff who works with the Jewish Genealogical Society. And so Kimberley SA has become one of their world wide community links – which gives it a proper home and status.
Eli has made a beautiful and welcoming site. It was wonderful that he passed through London recently and stayed with me and we were able to sit down together and create the navigational structure and framework. We are very lucky that Eli is so enthusiastic to spend time with the Kimberley Kehilla. We are also very fortunate to have been given wonderful galleries of pictures of the synagogue and other sites by two ex Kimberley guys; Shawn Benjamin, now a professional photographer in Cape Town and David Jawno who now lives in Perth, Australia. So grateful thanks to Eli as well as Shawn and David.
We have created sections for the Synagogue and for the Cemeteries. We were amazed to find marvellous picture galleries on the net of every grave in both the old Pioneer and the new West End (Green Street) Cemeteries. They have been photographed by one Jono David - a British-American living in Japan who has a mission to photograph Jewish sites across the world! He was in Kimberley earlier this year. We have put links on our site (with Jono’s permission) to those cemetery picture galleries.
There is a section for History and Geography and you can look on the Google maps even for street views of your own house. (Do you remember pink flamingos nesting at Kamfersdam in your youth? I don’t! I would love to have seen that. I remember there being no water there). The Google maps say Carrington ‘Way’ and Milner ‘Road’, but I am not aware the names have changed from Road and Street are you?
There are sections for Kimberley Pioneers and Families. Pioneers are quite easy as we can find wiki bios and references for them. But when it comes to families – this is where you come in. First of all, may we have your permission to put the information you have already given me about you and your family on the web? Please send an email to say ‘yes’ or you can of course amend or extend the information you want on the site. You can also send us pictures of your family, a family tree and pictures of your house or place of work. If you can identify the number of the grave picture in Jono’s gallery we can put that number on your family page. (To have individual pictures from him, we would have to pay).
There is a section on ‘Articles’ and there we have links to the 110th celebration – to the 4 Barmitzvahs and other Kimberley related events. The ‘News’ Section will have the latest on the site and these newsletters when we build that page.
So now –have a look at this site and please let us know your feedback. Tell is what you think should be included in this permanent and structured depository of Kimberley Jewish Community. There is a page under ‘contact’ where you can fill in the questionnaire about you and your family and you can email me with anything and I will pass it on to Eli.
Barney Horwitz has told me that there is a FaceBook site for Kimberley Shul - Griqualand West Hebrew Congregation – however this is a closed site. I have asked Barney if he would like to invite Ex-Pats to join. This is a great adjunct – but does not to my mind take the place of a good website. We bring you greetings from Barney and Arnold Rauff.
One last suggestion. Can you write an interesting story about your family and life in Kimberley. I attach a story that involves my family. It was actually sent to me by Trevor Toube as I was not aware of it myself. Maybe some of you know about it? It’s called the Great Kimberley Diamond Robbery and involves my father, my uncle, the Rabbi and some diamond thieves. I hope you enjoy reading this? (Your story does not have to be so dramatic – but refer to some incident in Kimberley.)
So now – Taraah - I reveal the address of the site http://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/kimberley Enjoy!
Best wishes
Geraldine
Geraldine Auerbach MBE
T: 020 8907 1905 M: 07971 818 262