Interview with Tim Marneweck Tim had two sons at St David’s in the 70’s, Peter John and Paul. Peter John was originally a sportsman on leaving school. He was a good cricketer, swimmer and rugby player and was the first MOB to play professional cricket. He went into the army for the first 5 years then became a provincial cricketer playing for the Transvaal cricket union in the 1980’s. After working in a sport shop, then for McCullough and Bothwell, he eventually joined Liberty Life in 2000 and now has his own franchise. Paul, the younger son left school in the early 1980’s when Mr Murphy was headmaster. He went into the army and was trained in guidance missiles and became a lecturer in the subject. He then went to work for First National Bank for 19 years and is now sales manager for Old Mutual in the financial services department. Tim was on the St David’s school council (this was initially formed as an advisory council in 1970) until 1976 and then on the board of governors until 1983 with Kevin Brewer joining the Board in 1984. Tim continued to work with the brothers behind the scenes and was a member of the Diocesan committee and Bishop’s committee for close on 40 years, knew Br Jude well and thought of him as a “Walking Saint”. There was a lot of controversy over the sale of the land on which the “Inandas” now stand. The land and property belonged to the brothers and Tim is bound not to discuss this but acknowledges that the brothers were satisfied with the result and Tim was given a certified document from the Marist Brothers of South Africa Province in gratitude of generous devotedness towards the interests of the brothers. He took a lot of flack and had promised not to talk about it at the time. He was also presented with a relic of Marcellin Champagnat, something very special At the time of the sale there was a lot of politics and tax involved. The brothers couldn’t be seen to be dealing in property and the brothers did get a share of the profits as the monies came in. Other MOBS that Tim mentioned were John Mills and said it was amazing what he did for the Diocese, turning it around and getting all the churches to play their part. Others involved in this were Charles Rowlinson and David Lawrence. JLE May 2015
Interview with Willem Van Der Merwe – 1981 – 2012 Staff Willem joined St David’s as estate manager in 1981 at the time when Br Timothy, the then headmaster left followed by the first lay headmaster Mr Murphy in 1982. Willem supervised a staff of 20 including, ground, kitchen and cleaning staff all living on the property. Currently only 10 members of the ground staff live on the property. His foreman was Julius and George Ndlovu. It was the beginning of the mission in Kuruman and Willem found that helping Br Anthony was very special in the early 80’s. They couldn’t get tradesman in that part of the country and Willem did most of the plumbing. Br Anthony was one of the best men he had ever met in his life and was very approachable. Paul Edey came in 1995 as college headmaster and got the school going again together with the new development plan which saw many changes in the building and development of the school. When Willem first arrived at the school there was no fence around the property allowing access to all and therefore there was a problem with theft so Willem started to fence the property in. He also constructed the roof over the terraces of the swimming pool. The PTA funded it and Willem completed it at a far lower cost than had been quoted by outside companies. Willem was also very much involved with the school fetes, twenty-twenty cricket and the fireworks with this year being the best controlled event so far. Already a paddler and, at the request of Paul Edey, in 1995 Willem initiated canoeing as an extra-mural activity at the school. Willem has trained seven or so SA paddlers during that time. They competed all over the country with the Duzi, Fish River in Craddock, Cape Town, the Breede Marathon, just about every river race there was. The SA Schools was held in a different province each year and Willem encouraged some of the weaker boys and saw the boys grow. Alex Roberts was one of the best paddlers and the best team he ever produced was with Adrian Gebers who was the first ever St David’s paddler to make a B final overseas in the sprints. Willem is grateful that through St David’s he was able to give his sons Vaughan and Matthew a good education. Vaughan, the eldest studied for a BSc Hons Anthropolgy at Wits University and was the first person to go as a Gap student to Campeltown in Australia and now runs his own recruiting business after trying various other options beforehand. He also has a carwash business and was married last year. Matthew was awarded a scholarship at Varsity College but he is now at the Design School in Greenside and doing well. JLE November 2012