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Interview with David Phillips 1960

  • ZA ZAR STDS 202000760
  • Item
  • 2012

Interview with David Phillips – 1960
David lived in Hyde Park and started at St David’s in grade 1 in 1948. Hyde Park was very
agricultural in those days and only underwent development from about 1954. He was a day boy
and used to cycle to school on the dirt roads.
David skipped grade 2 but then failed standard 9. He was absolutely devastated to fail but in
retrospect there was good reason for that as there were family problems at the time which he
could not handle.
He recalls Mrs Kempster in standard 4, she was an institution in herself and one didn’t mess
around with her. From then on school became a bit more serious and he remembers the strap
was used in punishment. The brother he remembers as being his favourite was Br.
Bonaventure. He saw Br Anthony at a function at the school about 30 years after he, David had
left and was so impressed that Br Anthony remembered him by name.
If there was any advantage to being a day boy he recalled that the boarders always seemed to
be hungry and were always around when the sandwiches were taken out. He enjoyed being
able to go and talk to the brothers about anything and everything. Coming from a home with an
older father who was 67 when he was born the age gap came into play and he related more to
the brothers especially with matters such as career guidance.
He hated homework with a passion. There was only one negative experience that he could
recall and that was when he was about 13, 14 drinking from one of the water fountains when a
Bulgarian pupil (Thomas Munnick) pushed his head down and he broke his two front teeth with
which he has had problems to this day.
He was an athlete and very much into running and came second in the mile. He has been a
runner ever since until about 2 years ago when his knees started to give him problems. He also
played rugby for the 3rd XV.
He was very happy at school and only cried on the first and last day. The school was a haven to
him, he had no worries and thought that the brothers were really good guys and that had all
come to an end. He then went to Wits to study a BA but ended up studying for an LLB and
became a lawyer specialising in litigation and property. He began his articles in 1964 and retired
in March 2011. When he has the time his hobbies are fishing and hunting and looks forward to
spending quality time with his grandchildren.
He was involved with a class reunion in October 2009. Harry Rosmarin is the one who keeps
them all in touch. He sees Tony McLaughlin who is sadly not interested in the old boys. He is a
member of MOBS and would be willing to participate in any pledges or donations towards the
publication of the history of St David’s.
JE January 2012

Egenrieder, Julie

Interview with Grant Napier 1960

  • ZA ZAR STDS 202000794
  • Item
  • 2011

Interview with Grant Napier – 1960
Grant initially attended Parkview Junior School but was a boarder at St David’s in standard 2
when Brother Edwin was principal in 1952. He came together with his brother who was younger.
He was in the classroom near the chapel. Mrs King was a good teacher and is now friendly with
his son.
Discipline was strict in those days and one was expelled for any misdemeanour. Brother Edwin
did inspections of the boarders, nails, hair, shoes etc and he rewarded some of the boys as an
incentive to be neat and tidy. The boys would get caned on the hand or behind, corporal
punishment was the norm. He recalls that when he was in standard 3, he returned a ball at
tennis practise which hit the coach, Mrs Owen in the eye. He was sent to Brother Edwin and
received two cuts on the behind.
He remembers the big old farm and how everyone thought it would be part of the school one
day. It was often very cold and there was a line of pine trees demarcating the boundary of the
school next to the dormitories, the wind used to whistle through them. There was ice on the
swimming pool one very cold winter.
The food was good and they also had tuck and Mrs Batten, standard 3, used to make the day
boys bring extra sandwiches for the boarders. She lived at Tara. At supper there were 6 boys
around a table and only at night, one square of butter which was divided equally amongst them.
There were movies every Saturday evening in the dining room and in matric in the study hall.
Sometimes the Brothers would let them go to town to the Coliseum where he saw “South
Pacific”. Sunday was special as they used to get cool drinks with lunch and roast chicken was
the order of the day. They used to walk to the old boys club on Louis Botha past the old
Balalaika Hotel. In the field where the tennis courts are now, they used to play soccer and
cricket and, on the embankment all the boys from standard 3 upwards had claims mining for
fool’s gold.
In 1954 he had Mrs Kempster as a teacher and he remembers writing reasonably well and has
styled his writing on that of Mrs Kempster’s. In the second term his family moved to PE and he
went to the junior school in Bird Street and the principal was Brother Anthony. In standard 5 he
went to Marist Brothers Walmer, quite a distance away.
He returned to St David’s in standard 10, 1960 when his family moved back to Johannesburg.
Brother Anthony was then in his first year as principal. He says that they had no TV,
newspapers, or radio in the dorm at night and were completely out of touch with the outside
world and were not aware of Sharpville. However on sundays there were allowed to listen to the
LM hit parade!
There were 28 boys in his matric class and all the teachers were Brothers. There was one class
to each standard. He was made a prefect but only through Brother Anthony.
The top rugby side was Obs and the school was known as Marist Inanda not St David’s. Grant
played 1st team rugby,it was an average team and they never got beaten too badly. Coaching
and training was very different in those days. They went on a rugby tour together with Obs by
train down to St Charles, Natal. They used “Gertie” the old school bus to get to other schools.
He was also in the soccer and tennis teams, participated in athletics, swimming which he did a
lot of. He got his colours whilst in PE but had to give it up as he had bad sinus and was unable
to swim in chlorinated water. However he was able to swim in the sea and became a life saver.
His house was “The Bishops” and he wore a yellow rosette.
Academically he did OK and achieved a second class JMB matric with university entrance. He
wrote 7 subjects including Latin, English, Afrikaans, Physical Science, Maths, History and
Geography. There was no major send off and most of the class just met for an after school
party. There was no matric dance or matric holiday and it was a fairly nonchalant ending.
When Grant left, as he enjoyed Maths and Science, he went to Wits to do civil engineering.
Fortunately he didn’t have to do national service but was quite disappointed as it sounded such
fun. At Wits every couple of weeks, engineers would come in and talk about their job and show
them what they would be doing once qualified. It wasn’t his cup of tea and after one term he
decided to leave and ended up in the insurance industry joining a company for 20 years, 1961
until 1982 – the South British Insurance Company which, in spite of its name was a New
Zealand company. He and another colleague then started an insurance broking business of
which he is still a director.
He has a son and daughter, the son born in 1967. Very few of the matric class kept in touch and
St David’s no longer had a boarding facility when his son started school, so he didn’t come to St
David’s. He also has 4 grandchildren, all boys living in Johannesburg.
He enjoyed his time at St David’s and is still in touch with some of his former classmates, Harry
Rosmarin, Norman Schwab and Michael Lakofsky. They had a get together 2 years ago and 4
years ago Brother Anthony joined them for lunch. He also remembers a black tie dinner in the
Champganat hall about 7 or 8 years ago, there were 10 of them and they noticed that there was
no photo of the 1960 Matric class. He came to Brother Anthony’s funeral. Les Berman who was
in his class became a doctor, went to Canada and sadly committed suicide
****Derek Witte Vermeulen was with Grant and had an older brother, Carl. He would have been
one of the early matriculants and was a partner at Werksmans.
JE October 2011

Egenrieder, Julie

Interview with Harry Rosmarin 1960

  • ZA ZAR STDS 202000801
  • Item
  • 2012

Interview with Harry Rosmarin – 1960
Harry’s family attended Marist Brothers from 1912 until 1964 when his cousin left, both Harry,
his brother and cousin John were all at Inanda. He remembers Piet the cook who also cooked
for his father at Marist Brothers, Koch Street.
Harry started at St David’s in 1952 as a boarder. There were 44 boys in the dormitories; it was
an open house with absolutely no privacy. There was great discipline and lights were out by
9.00pm each evening. Being a boarder was quite an adventure at times, if you needed to go to
the doctor or dentist or to go into town, you first had to walk to Oxford Road or Corlett Drive and
get a bus to get into town. Transport to sporting events was on the back of the school truck and
all the boys got soaked when it rained.
He enjoyed it, found it to be great fun and is still in contact a number of old boys from that time –
Dave Phillips, Chris Bischoff who now lives in London and is the Ruperts financial advisor, Mike
Lakovsky. All the boys in the matric photo of that year have done well individually.There is no
photo on display in the hall as with all the other matric classes as they didn’t have an official
photo. There were 26 boys in matric and 180 boarders. There were no vacancies and there
were waiting lists for the school, 40% of which were boarders.
In 1957, Harry’s father’s farm in Standerton went downhill and the family had to move to
Johannesburg. Parents didn’t discuss such issues with their children and Harry only found out
when he and his father had an appointment with Br Edwin. Harry was surprised to hear that the
family farm was in liquidation and that his father could no longer afford to keep him at Marist
Brothers. Br Edwin’s response to this was that the farm was Mr Rosmarin’s business but Harry
was his and therefore Harry would continue as a pupil at St David’s.
Harry was involved with sport, played cricket continuing until he was 50. In matric he captained
the cricket team, he also played 1st team tennis, 1st team rugby and started a hockey section.
He used to play tennis on fridays at Ellis Park and a pupil from King David’s asked why they
didn’t play hockey which is how it all started. The Marist Cricket week began whilst he was at
Inanda. He remembers the boarders were often taken out over a weekend, sometimes to
Wanderers to watch rugby and cricket at the old Maristonian Club which was in the Eastgate
area of Wynberg.
Harry did well academically in the high school, was in the debating team, gained top spot in his
matric year and was the dux for 1960 narrowly beating Les Berman. There were seven Jewish
boys in matric that year, the only contenders for head boy being two Jewish boys. Harry was
eventually appointed head boy.
He recalled the matric dance, all the boys were in uniform and it was held in the dining room.
His date was Carol Dakes who’s brother Basil matriculated in 1959. He is still in touch with her
today.
Brother Anthony was a teacher at Inanda in 1958, left for PE and returned as principal in 1960.
He saw him again at the memorial service for Robert Amato.
Br Dennis was the best English and History teacher, he was young and outstanding; Br
Benedict was a disciplinarian; Br Lawrence his standard 6 class teacher and he had a great
respect for Br Edwin.
Robert Bailey matriculated in 1961 and he believes he became a priest.
Harry thought that his school years were the best of his life although he was sometimes a bit
homesick but he was always happy to be back at school and made life-long friends with a group
that gets together regularly. At one of their get-togethers in 1999 he managed to get Br Anthony
to join them, unaware that it was an informal reunion. They lunched at La Rustica and he joked
with Br Anthony saying that he seemed to work in places so dry that the dogs ran after the
trees. Br Anthony was an absolute gentleman with a wicked sense of humour which failed him
sometimes.
Late one morning when everyone was tired and sleepy, Norman Schwab was holding a fire
cracker which accidentally exploded in his hand, entirely an accident, none the less Br Anthony
was furious and from then on Norman became the scapegoat.
On leaving school, the final day being tinged with sadness with a party at David Butler’s home,
he went on to Wits to study accountancy. At university he joined Highlands North Old Boys
playing cricket and hockey as Marist old boys ceased to exist. He is a CA by profession but only
practised for a year after qualifying and then went into the family steel business.
He didn’t send his two sons to St David’s, society was different and they went to Highlands
North. He also has a daughter, a doctor working in London.
Currently semi-retired Harry has a business together with his eldest son selling food hampers,
corporate gifts, and clothing.
JE January 2012

Egenrieder, Julie

Interview with Peter Loffell 1960

  • ZA ZAR STDS 202000878
  • Item
  • 2012

Interview with Peter Loffell (1960)
Peter first attended St David’s in 1948 in grade 1 as a day boy. He was in a section in the junior
school with four classrooms with two grades within one classroom. This was separate from the
main school which had a series of classrooms in a horse shoe shape facing east, with the
dormitories facing north. The infirmary windows overlooked the swimming pool and McGill
Love’s farm. On the western side was the dining room and on the southern side, downstairs
were the headmaster’s office and about 2 classrooms. Standard 4, 5 and 6 were upstairs and
standard 7, 8, 9 and 10 downstairs. At that time the school had 300 pupils.
Peter used to go to the McGill Love’s place of 50 acres with cows etc after school until his father
came to fetch him until he was old enough to ride his bicycle to school. Mr McGill Love was
Peter’s mother’s uncle and founder of Haggy Rand and African Wire Ropes.
He remembers his first day vividly. His teacher was very strict and used the strap liberally and
Peter to this day still does not understand why she took the strap to him. Happily she didn’t stay
very long and Mrs Vincent took her place. In the first year he skipped a class and went up to
grade 2.
Other members of staff he remembers were Mrs Brophy -standard 1, standard 4 -Mrs Kempster,
standard 5 - Mr Bishop and from standard 6 upwards all the teaching was done by the brothers.
The teachers from the grades up to standard 5 had their own classrooms and taught all subjects
but after standard 6 the brothers taught individual subjects. The brothers he remembers are Br
Benedict, Br Bonaventure who was the rugby coach, Br Walker, Br Ephraim and Br Ralph.
Br Edwin was the headmaster followed by Br Benedict until Peter’s last year when Br Anthony
took his place. He recalls Br Edwin had very bad arthritis and had to take cortisone.
Peter enjoyed sport and played soccer in the junior school followed by rugby and cricket 1st and
2nds in the high school. There were A and B sides from U13, U14, U15 and then the 1st and
2nds. There was great rivalry between St David’s and Observatory who had some very good
players. The year in which he wrote matric St David’s rugby team was soundly beaten by
Observatory who had some great players and athletes in their team.
Peter remembered the tours to other Marist schools and went to Cape Town with the cricket
team in 1959 and in 1960 to St Henry’s and St Charles in Natal.
Culturally, Peter used to attend the debates between other schools but was not a member of the
debating society. A concert was held which he doesn’t remember too much about but he was
involved with two operettas, “HMS Pinafore” and “The Pirates of Penzance” directed by the
Music teacher Mr Drummond Bell.
As his first passion was the sport, Peter didn’t do too well academically and didn’t work very
hard, and although there was no sparing of the rod he wasn’t sufficiently motivated to work.
The matric dance was held in the dining room and he recalls it was agonising to find a girl to
take to the dance, he was only 16 at the time. The boys decorated the dining room themselves
and after the dance went home. In 1959 a party was organised for the end of year exams and
Br Benedict warned them that they wouldn’t be allowed to write the exams if he found them to
be involved in preparations for the party.
After he matriculated, Peter went on to Wits University where he studied for a BSc Engineering
but bombed out and then spent a year in the army after which he joined the Netherlands Bank
which became Nedbank until he retired. Paul Middlewick and Gilbert Pooley were also on the
Nedbank staff.
Peter has a son who after returning to Johannesburg from Natal went to Hyde Park High
School.
Peter attended a school reunion after 25 years and saw one of his contemporaries Clive Nobbs
who became head of Rand Mines and the Chamber of Mines.
JE March 2012

Egenrieder, Julie