Facts you didn’t know about Pretoria

Here are interesting facts you didn’t know about Pretoria:

“Church” street is a very long street

Pretoria’s main street, Church Street (which sections have been renamed to Stanza Bopape, Helen Joseph, WF Nkomo and Elias  Motswaledi Streets) is the longest urban street in South Africa and one of the longest straight streets in the world.

See: Pretoria’s New Street Names

Pretoria’s embassies and consulates

There are an estimate of 101 embassies / consulates in Pretoria. The embassies for the People’s Republic of China and the USA take up a whole blocks in Arcadia and are quite a sight.

See: Pretoria Embassies and Consulates

Former British prime minister, Winston Churchill was a “resident” of Pretoria

Winston Churchill was imprisoned at the Staats Model School in Pretoria during the Anglo Boer War period (1899-1902) but escaped from captivity and fled to Mozambique. He went on to become the British Prime Minister from 1940 to 1945 and from 1951 to 1955.

Pierneef Street

The duplex flats next to Picasso’s pub in Pierneef Street is where the world famous artist Pierneef’s house stood. The city council didn’t know it was his house and gave permission for the house to be demolished. The street and the primary school down the road are named after him. Pierneef left a bunch of paintings in his will to the school. To this day whenever the school needs money they auction off a painting.

Pretoria almost had a different name

“Pretoriusdorp”, “Pretorium”, “Pretoriusstad” were all considered as names by Marthinus Pretorius (the founder of the city, whose father Andries Pretorius). MW Pretorius bought two farms to start a new town. The first church congregation was named Pretoria Philadeplhia (Pretoria Friendship) in honor of Pretorius’ father. Later the town took on the shortened name of Pretoria. (Thanks for correcting me Andrew Buitendach).

See: Timeline of Pretoria’s History

Pretoria has a lot of Jacaranda trees

Pretoria is also known as the “Jacaranda City” because of the over 50,000 Jacaranda trees that lines her streets and carpet the city in purple for three weeks in October. The first Jacaranda trees were imported from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1888 by a Pretoria resident.

Contrary to popular belief, there are actually less Jacaranda trees in Pretoria than in Johannesburg (the world’s biggest man-made forest with over 10 million trees).

See: The Jacaranda City

Moreleta Park’s name origins

Moreleta Park is named after Aletta Erasmus (daughter of Daniel Elardus Erasmus) from the farm Doornkloof (modern day Waterkloof / Erasmusrand / Elarduspark / Moreleta Park). Aletta washed her clothers in the river in the morning and then people greeted her in the morning from across the stream with “More Aletta” (“Morning Aletta”). A part of the Erasmus farm was sold to Alois Nellmapius. He renamed it to Irene Estate (after his daughter Irene Nellmapius). She got her name from the Greek goddess of peace, Eirene.

Tom Jenkins drive has an interesting history…

The 1.88 km long Tom Jenkins Drive road (which connects Rietondale with Brenturion / Arcadia – the area close to the Union Buildings) was built by Italian Prisoners of War during the Second World War. It’s named after a former mayor of Pretoria. Jenkins also went on to become the mayor of Margate (in Kwazulu Natal).

Madiba made a speech in Church Square in 1964…

The Rivonia Trial (where former SA president Nelson Mandela and other ANC leaders were sentenced to life-long imprisonment) took place in the Palace of Justice (on Pretoria’s Church Square). This is also where Madiba made his “I’m prepared to die” speech on the 20th of April 1964.

Fort Schanskop also has a rich history…

Fort Schanskop (one of four forts in the Pretoria area) was completed in 1897 and is located in the Voortrekker Monument Nature Reserve on the highest hill in the Pretoria area. The garrison was initially armed with one officer and 30 men but it was reduced to 17 men (by 1899) and eventually to 1 person without guns (by June 1900).

No shots were fired at this location during the Anglo Boer War. Nowadays Fort Schanskop gets used for Park Acoustics (a monthly live music event in the capital city featuring great SA artists).

Also see: Fort Schanskop

The Union Buildings took 4 years to construct…

The Union Buildings (which were designed by Sir Herbert Baker) was constructed between 1909 and 1913. It took approximately 1265 artisans, workmen and labourers to construct, using 14 million bricks for the interior office walls, half a million cubic feet of freestone, 74,000 cubic yards of concrete, 40,000 bags of cement and 20,000 cubic feet of granite.

At the time of completion it was the largest building in the country and possibly the largest building work undertaken in the Southern Hemisphere at that time. The 9m tall statue of Nelson Mandela (which was errected in December 2013) cost R8 million and weighs 3.5 tons.

Also see: The Union Buildings: Pretoria’s favourite landmark

The area where Loftus Versfeld is located has been used as a sport field for more than 100 years

The area was first used as a sports field in 1906. In 1914 the fields got initiated as Eastern Sportsgrounds. In 1923 the first concrete structure was erected with seating for 2000 spectators. Changing rooms and toilets were added in 1928. Mr Loftus Versfeld died and the stadium was renamed to Loftus Versfeld in 1932.

In 1948 improvements were made to the stadium. Between 1972 and 1984 various pavilions were added and in 1989 the main stand pavilion was renovated to what it resembles today. The Eastern pavilion was renovated in 1995. It was renovated again for the FIFA World Cup in 2008.

Also see: Loftus Versfeld – more than just a rugby field

Source; Running Wolf’s Rant