Skeerpooort – the thriving community of early Harties
When driving through Skeerpoort, an area south of Hartbeespoort dam on the R560, it is hard to believe that this was once a thriving farming community at a time when Hartbeespoort itself was just farmland.
From 1836 parties of Boers started leaving the Cape Colony and trekking north, and just 50 years later in the early 1880s, in testimony to the agricultural development in the area, the large Scrooby barn, which consisted of three adjoining buildings with 600 mm firewalls in between, wooden floors and a corrugated iron roof, was built. The iron was imported from England via Maputo.
The wooden floors were there to keep the grain, oats or tobacco dry and the walls were high enough to make room for a spacious attic. On the outside there were dove-cots below the roof and hatches through which additional access could be gained to the attics.
Evidence of the importance of this building is the fact that there is a cornerstone with the date of its construction – 1885.
Because the barn was the biggest construction in the area, church services were held there every Sunday and communion was held every six months before the NG Kerk in Skeerpoort was built.
On the other side of the road, the foundation for the Ou Pastorie was laid in 1884 or 1896. Again the fact that they could afford to build such an “up to date” parsonage is an indication of the thriving community that existed at the time. The relatively large footprint of the house, its well built foundations, wooden floors, ceiling and sash windows testify that this was to be a building of status. Architecturally the “pastorie” was built in what was later identified as the “ZAR Style” with fewer embellishments than the “Victorian Style” – ever popular with English colonialists at the time.
Built as parsonage for the dominee (minister) of the Dutch Reformed Church on the other side of the “bo-voor” (upper furrow), the building was vacated and became a police station in 1938.
As the development of Hartbeespoort and Hartbeesporrt Dam eventually outstripped that of Skeerpoort, the police station was moved to Schoemansville in 1948. The old police station at Skeerpoort reverted to private hands. For a while it was a residential home but now it is used as a guest house and restaurant!
The historic landmarks mentioned in this article, are still standing today, and the Barn and “Ou Pastorie” Restaurant are well worth a visit if you are in the area.