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Interview with Dave Lyons – 1965
Dave was a boarder and his headmaster was Brother Anthony. Brother Aidan, the only South
African brother was the bursar and 50% of the teachers were lay teachers. Dave came from a
farming community in White River with Middleburg High being the only high school in the area.
He initially went to a primary school in White River and then came to Marist Inanda. His father
had been a pupil at Observatory and his grandfather, Koch Street.
There was only one other local boy, John Davis and he was aged 12 when he became a
boarder. He arrived not quite knowing what to expect of boarding school, he was confronted by
city boys who were street-wise and the discipline was quite extraordinary and extreme. In his
first year, Std 6, Brother Conrad was a very good teacher and empathic man but most of the
other brothers were quite hard and mean. He had Brother Vincent the following year,he recalls
Brother Liam and Brother Andrew was his boarding housemaster and Geography teacher. All
the brothers carried canes, some were quite vindictive and could victimise a pupil, and
remembers being caned in his pyjamas holding onto some taps. The biggest thing you could get
caught for was smoking a texan by the change rooms, aids, drugs were not around. There was
alcohol but none of them were really interested, the boarders made their own entertainment and
fun.
The study routine was very heavy and the programme was as follows: up at 6.00am; study 6.30
– 8.00; breakfast 8.00 – 8.30 followed by school and sport and then more study.
All the boarders used to latch onto day boys for sandwiches at break time and Peter Foden had
particularly nice sandwiches! Boarding school food was the norm and it was great to go home
for some good home cooking. There were 80 – 90 senior boarders and some juniors. They used
to sit 6 - 8 per table for army style food. A big thing was the pat of fresh butter in the mornings
and each boy took it in turn to cut it into equal amounts. The one who cut the butter was last in
line so he didn’t cheat. There was rice pudding and bread and butter pudding and on special
occasions (sports day, rugby match) they had a “beano” with roast beef, roast spuds and cool
drinks.
He participated in rugby but due to chronic back problems he had to stop and then played
cricket, hockey and squash. He joined the debating society which he eventually headed up.
Naturally they chose only to debate against girl’s schools such as St Mary’s and Rosebank
Convent.
A highlight in Std 8 was M’Frau Pretorius who was very well endowed and, needless to say he
loved Afrikaans and a glimpse of a genuine female figure. They had lay teachers for most
subjects but the boarding masters were all brothers, 13 – 14 of them and they all lived on site.
He recalls that the school had taken ownership of the property next door the year he left and
Dennis Tomacelli, head boy lived in a house with a swimming pool on the school boundary.
Dave failed matric but passed Latin, Geography and English, he was not an academic. He has
an indifferent memory of Brother Anthony although he thought he managed the school with a
vision.
He has no fond memories of the school and regards those years as an episode in his life which
he got through quite well. It was a type of schooling he didn’t respond well to, it was too
disciplined and regimental and the only real benefit was being taught to be self-disciplined.
Being at boarding school, meant that you grew away from home and were forced to become
independent. He finished his matric and moved on and is not involved with the school at all. He
was a small chap when he left but grew after leaving school.
Dave didn’t qualify for university and there were no jobs in White River or on the farm. He did
military training after school in 1966 and was a member of the Citizen Force until 1976, serving
in Angola where he became an officer and eventually finished in 1980 as a major. A
contemporary of his from St David’s,Fred Klippen servbd in the same regiment. They used to do
3 months camps and 3 months development training and he only started to become aware of
politics after P.W. Botha once came and addressed the troops and was unaware of apartheid
until in business in the 80’s.
He sold Callguard Security 10 years ago and is now known as Group 4. In the final years Rand
Merchant Bank had 20% stake in the company and only two people had degrees in the entire
company, being the financial director and the HR director. He employed 6000 staff and all his
managers and directors benefited from the sale of the company. He is now involved with Lupo
Bakery providing specialist bread to companies such as Mugg & Bean, Spur, Spar and Burger
King. He found in the mid 2000’s that he had a very quick and easy adaption to business, and
still enjoys sharing and mentoring staff believing that you should empower people on every
level. Recognition,respect and reward being his motto. Although Dave and his wife Janet are
not involved in any charity they do actively support a number of child orientated charities such
as the St Joseph’s Home and SOS Village. He and his wife travel extensively and his most
recent trip was motoring through Europe with his E-type Jaguar. His passion is motor sport and
he probably has one of the biggest specialist car collections in the world.
JLE October 2011

Interview with Norman Lazarus 1944 - 1952
Norman’s parents lived in the Free State so he was sent as a boarder to St David’s in 1944 in
grade 2. Mrs Litson was his first teacher.The boarders had very little to do with the day scholars
except when they were given sandwiches which supplemented the boarding school food. When
Norman started at St David’s the war was still on and he can remember listening to the
announcement of the death of general Pienaar on the wireless with his family.
When he arrived at the school in 1944, the school was still in its infancy. The bus ran as far as
Rosebank and the school was in the ‘country’ surrounded by small holdings. The Polliack Estate
was situated to the West. South of the school the field was in two tiers and at the Northern
boundary was a farm and the rumor went around the that the lady who owned the farm would
bequeath it to the school (this was partly true as the school bought the farm at a good price in
the 1960’s).
Norman did not enjoy his school days as he likened the school to an aloe – the nearer you got
the more you were pricked. The school was run by brothers – that word usually means loving
and within a family- the brothers showed no love for the boys and were punitive in the
punishment. There were 4 dormitories- A to D. There were very strict rules – talking after lights
out and untidy lockers- were very serious offences. Prefects were in charge and they were very
cruel. They had to write home every Sunday and were allowed to listen to LM radio, to the hit
parade – he can remember Frankie Laine being at the top of the charts.
The boarders showered in the evening.There were only 2 baths.They were woken at 6am and
the Catholics went to mass. While he was at St David’s there were mostly Catholics with 2 or 3
Jewish children of which he was one. While the Catholics went to mass the non Catholics had
study period. Breakfast after mass was in the present college library where they sat at round
tables of 6. There was no shortage of food but the helpings were small and the meals were
rotated so you knew what you were having each week. Sago pudding was often served.
There were 2 breaks in the school day where they played hopscotch, marbles and bok-bok.
There was an infirmary and he enjoyed his time there when he had chicken pox as it was a very
caring place. Sport was compulsory and he played hockey, soccer, cricket and rugby – at this
stage there were no tennis courts. He played for the 1st fifteen in rugby and the team travelled
down to Durban by train to play against St Henry’s. The train journey was eventful and the boys
suffered defeat the next day after a sleepless night!
Punishment was metered out before dinner in front of the whole school. You had the whole day
to think about the impending punishment and the caning took place in front of everyone.
Norman’s experience was that the longer one was at school the less you were punished
because you became more adept. Boys were expelled for talking to girls over the fence and for
stealing fruit from the nearby orchards.
The brothers decided that the boys should learn how to dance and a dancing instructor from
Arthur Murray Studios came to school. They were taught without partners so, when in the end
girls from Parktown Convent (accompanied by the nuns) were selected to be their partners it
proved to be very unsuccessful as the boys just weren’t used to the girls and they didn’t know
what to say to each other!
The brothers took the boys to the nearest cinema on the corner of Tyrwhitt Ave and Jan Smuts.
The boys walked in a crocodile.This, however, did not last long as shopkeepers, who had fruit
displayed on the pavements, complained that there was no fruit left once the boys had walked
past!
Norman was a day scholar in his matric year (1952). He got into trouble because the bus route
ended in Dunkeld and he and another boy accepted a lift from a motorist. The brothers got to
hear of this and it was said that they had brought the school into disrepute for ‘hitch hiking’. His
merit badge was taken away but this was reinstated after the brothers asked his fellow pupils to
vote on whether his badge should be handed back to him.
Norman did not find the teachers to be caring but in some cases quite eccentric. Mr Hoare
taught the non Catholics Scripture and he was always teaching them about George Elliott. He
also made them learn the psalms off by heart. The cleverest boys were always made to sit in
the front and the less bright ones at the back.
On obtaining a first class matric, Norman studied medicine at the University of the
Witwatersrand where he joined up with his school friend Peter Leigh, son of the school doctor.
Norman left South Africa for America after Sharpville and Peter emigrated to Australia.
Interview: Monday 1 February 2010

Interview with Kevin Ryan – 1970
Kevin joined St David’s in 1961 and was a boarder. He enjoyed the boarding as there was good
camaraderie amongst the boarders and less time was spent travelling however the downside
was not spending as much time with family.
The teachers who made a lasting impression were Mrs Kemspter, Mr Summers and Br Bosco,
He also enjoyed photography with Br Bernard.
He enjoyed the sport and participated in swimming, water polo and 3rd team rugby.
His friends were Peter Daniels, Ken Sprenger, Peter Scott and Peter Elliott who he occasionally
sees and Peter Daniels is overseas.
The worst moments at school were when someone didn’t own up and he didn’t enjoy cadets.
He enjoyed the matric dance and remembers the boys skipping with their ties in the road in front
of the office on their last day.
On leaving St David’s he studied BSc Eng (Elec) and MSc Eng (Elec) at Wits University and an
MBL at Unisa.
His son William was also a pupil at St David’s and Kevin has visited the school for the fireworks
display and also played water polo at the school 2010

Interview with Thabo Hermanus – 1992
When Thabo matriculated from St David’s, Paul Davies was headmaster, he had come from St
Albans. He remembers that he didn’t resonate with him and his parents only picked this up after
a while. People were pulling out of the school and a lot of black pupils left during Thabo’s high
school years. From standard 7 until his final year he was the only black boy in his class with
another joining in his matric year. One could see the degradation in the high school’s reputation
and what an impact a head has on a school and its teaching staff.
Thabo started school in Alexandra, passed top of the class in each year. When he completed
standard 2 at M.C. Weiller, instead of going to standard 3 remaining in Alexandra, he started at
St David’s going backwards to standard 1 and did marginally well. While at the time this was
difficult for him as he thought he would get left behind by his peers from Alexandra, over time
and, looking back he realised that most of the boys he was at school with in Alex didn’t even
make it to matric. It was a real sacrifice for his parents but it was so far sighted of them. His
mother was a teacher in Alex and his brothers also started at St David’s, although they
completed their matric at Wendywood High. His mother had said to him that if he failed one year
he would be out of St David’s. He worked hard and came third in standard 1 during his first year.
He felt being older helped with his confidence considering the jump in the standard of education
he had to contend with and he mentioned Gladwell’s: The Outliers in this context.. After a year
he had got used to the school and it exposed him to a whole new world. He wasn’t envious or
jealous of the lifestyle he saw that the white children had but it created ambition in terms of
defining what success was, the picture was bigger now and it was no longer necessarily out of
reach.
On his first day he was very nervous, he remembers his cap and thinking that all the boys
looked the same. Miss Keating was his teacher.
There were the odd incidents of naive questions and observations. His father drove an old
beetle and he recalls visiting Mark Pardini’s home and Mark’s little brother asking him why his
father drove a beetle. It was not malicious, just a boy who could not have been older than seven
years old being curious and noticing differences in material wealth. Bullying was normal and
part of the package. On one occasion he went to the tuck shop and bought a toasted sandwich,
another boy told him to give him a bite; he was a large boy, rugby type. Thabo broke a piece off,
gave him the smaller piece. The boy insisted on having the bigger piece and instinctively Thabo
stuffed the bigger piece into his own mouth. The boy punched Thabo for the “offence” which
Thabo could do nothing about given the David and Goliath scenario. He remembers thinking,
“Wait until I get to be your size”.
Even canings hurt but was what they all knew, so it was acceptable. Words can scar a lot more
as far as Thabo is concerned. The worst caning that Thabo remembers was with Mr Webster
and he knew rather to stand at the front of the queue and get it over and done with.
One of the most memorable classroom incidents he remembers involved seeing current in
action. There was a funny incident in the Science lab. Stuart Dickey had a pen set and he stuck
a pen in one plug and then the pencil, mistakenly creating a current, there was a loud bang,
Stuart got the fright of his life and his pen and pencil were welded together. Thabo chirped that
the bang made him feel at home coming from Alex and everyone packed up laughing which
calmed the air a bit from the shock.
He played rugby, basketball and was in the athletics squad in the high school while in the prep
he played soccer. He gained half colours for rugby and basketball.
He is still in touch with Justin van Linden, Yoav van der Heyden, Jeetesh Kathawaroo, Rowan
Brewer to name a few from his year and has contact with pupils from below and above and
recently got in touch with Mike von Guillaeume (2 -3 years behind him).
The teachers he remembers are Willy Castle – “Mr Fruitcake”. In the last soccer season in
standard 5, in a good team playing against a school who went on to win the championship that
year, they lost 1.0 by a silly mistake by Jeffrey Tsatsane. They played defence together and he
can still remember Willy Castle mumbling his disapproval calling out “Tsatsane”. In the high
school he recalled Mr Girdwood – an awesome English teacher, Mr Howarth – History, Mr
Finlayson – Sport and house master and Miss Von Guillaeume whom he is still in touch with
today. There wasn’t a teacher he disliked and he was taught how to think and not just
regurgitate answers, especially by Mr Howarth who spoke to them about the other side of the
story, not written in the matric History books.
He recalled a significant teacher in the prep, Mrs Hurley and a high impact moment whilst in her
class when she had a “throwing her toys” moment with him. He had got 60% for a spot History
test but she still kept him behind after school with boys who had failed. He was supposed to
have read something the day before but hadn’t and it showed. She reprimanded him in front of
his father, saying that his parents were spending all this money on him and he wasn’t working.
He never messed around after that, it was a turning point for him.
Academically he did well, receiving prizes in the prep school. It was a bit different in the high
school. In standard 5 Mr Kotze was the disciplinarian. In standard 6 he messed around a bit and
then in standard 7 he started working hard again.
He feels that a sense of worth helps but most of this comes from the home and parents should
not abdicate responsibility. He believes that boys coming from St David’s are more grounded,
humble.
His last day at school he remembers as being crazy, with everyone signing shirts and letting off
water balloons.
He struggled to get a bursary as he wanted to go to university away from Johannesburg. Justin
van Linden’s father was MD of Customs Plastics, a division of Nampak, had kept an eye on him
through the years unbeknown to him and offered him a bursary. He then went on to UCT, did a
BCom majoring in Accountancy and Economics. He planned to be a CA but hated auditing,
however he went to Nampak where he was a Management Accountant, helped his brothers
through school and university in terms of paying tuition. They are now both CA’s. He left
Nampak and went to Experiaen SA, primarily know as a credit bureau but he wanted to get into
the services industry. In 2008 he was co-founder of Nimble Collection Services and after setting
up the company they sold it. He has been in Cape Town for 4 years now and subsequent to
Nimble, together with his partner Suzanne Capper set up Find Inspired Talent (F.I.T.
Recruitment). Thabo is good with numbers but that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s what he
enjoys doing the most. People development and leadership are his strengths.
He is the father of two daughters aged 10 and 7, who attend the Waldorf School in Constantia,
he is on the school board and is also involved in setting up a trust to enable young black girls to
attend varsity (funding young girls from previously disadvantaged backgrounds).
He would like to keep in touch and would pledge or make a donation to the book. He would love
to participate in any celebration for the 75th. He owes a lot to his experience at the school.
JE October 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

Interview with James Harrewyn – 1971
Jame’s father came to SA from Antwerp in 1956. He knew a priest here who encouraged
him to come and start a new life here. His sons followed two years later in 1958 aged 5 and
7 and could not speak English, their languages being French and Flemish. James started at
St David’s in grade 1 until matric. He was a boarder from standard 6 for 4 years. He regards
himself as being a naughty boy but never with malicious intent. For his final matric year he
chose to be a day boy. His brother also attended St David’s and died in 2003His friends at
the time were Willy Castle, John Williams, Dimitri Constantinides, Vic Taueber; Kim Small
(rugby player), Alex Chemaly, Rupert Von Johnstone and he is still in contact with Alex
Chemaly, Johnny Stavro and Gavin Jansen. He feels that he can never find or replace the
friends he made whilst at high school.
He remembers his first days as being hard as he was discriminated against because of his
lack of English and was bullied initially, but stood his ground.
His last day – he worked hard for his matric and went to get his results from Br Timothy. He
was older than most of the boys, aged 18 as he stayed back a couple of years. He
remembers Br Timothy saying “You need to look happy!” He received a university pass and
his father took him to the Balalaika to celebrate!
He recalls Mrs Janusch, the Latin teacher, a sweet lady. Her classroom was on the second
floor, and James played a trick on her by climbing out of the window, down the gutter and
returned, knocking on the door. She was thoroughly confused as he did this several times
during a lesson, much to the amusement of the other boys. Brothers Anthony, Andrew
“Drac”, Timothy, Bosco “Boing” were at the school during his time. Many of the Brothers
smoked and when the boys smoked in the playground it was easier not to get caught by
those Brothers that did smoke as the smell was cancelled out. The boys used to raid the
fridge at night because the food was so awful. James also used to bunk out and see
girlfriends together with Gavin Jansen, but never got caught. He played in the marching
band which was sponsored by the Moni family. He was keen on athletics and was very
popular, but another boy always came first until one memorable sports day when James
beat him, coming first in front of all the girls! He also played 1st team rugby for 3 years, was a
member of the swimming team and played hockey. His academics were ok and the school
had a very good infrastructure with academics and sport.
The school was always cold and, in the morning ablutions he and other boys would linger
dangling their hands in the warm water to get warm. The boys were often punished by
having to “stand out” by the showers, bare foot, arms raised and it was very cold. Br Andrew
had a whistle on a chain with which he would hit the boys on the back of their legs. In Willy’s
office there is a cane which used to be used but was withdrawn in favour of the paddle, as it
used to draw blood. James however loved the school and feels that schooling was better
than it is now. His happiest moments were when he and his friends were naughty and didn’t
get caught. He remembers Br Anthony who was well respected by the boys, as he was fair,
and was called “Orange” because of his pronunciation of the word oranges and his red hair.
When he left school he served an apprenticeship with his father at first and then went to
Belgium to a culinary school. He then spent 5 years in Canada in hotels and then came back
to SA to help in the family business in Sandton. Sadly, the business initially did well but
because of sanctions and politics it failed. He then went to Houston, the Four Seasons Hotel
and eventually taught at a cooking school in Vermont and, 15 years ago, opened his own
business and 80 seat Café and Bistro. He and his wife, Pamela supply cakes, pastries,
wedding cakes and cater for private parties. In July 2011 he opened another restaurant and
is grateful to be in the right state where people enjoy the quality service and he is priced right
for the market. Vermont has survived the recession as most people don’t live above their
means but still enjoy their life.
He was back in SA as he was invited to an award dinner by Billy Gallagher. In 1984 and
1988 he was part of the national cooking team which went to Germany for the World
Cooking Olympics. They were very low key and rather under-cover because of apartheid,
however the team did quite well. For the award dinner the original members of the team:
Heinz Brunner, George Germann, Peter Klngman, Ryan MacMann, Martin Maphonga
created menus from the 80’s for 150 people. His sons Brent and Ashton, both
cinematographer majors specializing in film and photo, made a documentary of the occasion
and James received his Springbok blazer.
Jame’s wife’s family live in Cape Town and whilst he was here in January he had a reunion
with 25 boys from his time at St David’s.
JE August 2011

Interview with Richard Kelly – 2004
Richard has good memories of his time at St David’s and the ethics and good manners taught.
There was a huge bond between the boys in their matric year. He wasn’t an academic, an
average student and was quite lazy. He played rugby until the opens, B team soccer and would
have preferred to play soccer, and backed out when he was not allowed to play unless he
attended rugby practise, as rugby was compulsory. He remembers Graeme McMillan hauling
him off the field for Gauteng trials, as he hadn’t attended rugby training. He was a member of
the choir in primary school but dropped out in the high school as it was rather frowned upon in
those days and virtually non-existent.
He remembers the East London soccer tour when he was in the prep school. They went by train
and stayed a week with Willy Castle. Mr Spencer punished the boys by making them eat a raw
onion.
He went from the prep to the high school with a break of one year in standard 6 when he left
and went to Sandown High but returned to St David’s in standard 7. On his first day in high
school he met new boys with whom he is still in contact – Nick Rasenti (Espresso), Chris
Phillips now in the US, Scot Grant, Matt Rose, David Schneider, Ricky Forleo whose father
owns a restaurant in Parkview. Jean Mark Du Casse is operations manager for Primi Piatti in
Cape Town, Johnathan Meyer and Chris Smith (who is now in London) went to the International
Hotel School. Craig Roman – head prefect runs an environmentally friendly company called
“Bugs Away”.
Richard coached soccer at St David’s working together with Willy Castle.
The last day at school was the best day of his life and it seems like a lifetime ago running into
different classes. Paul Edey became the executive head. He received the Eiletsen Trophy for
Computer Science which was a joke as there were only two boys doing the subject. He loved
Champagnat day with the soccer, inter-house athletics and thought the Guy Fawkes functions
were great. He participated in the first Shavathon at Nedcor and the first one held at St David’s.
He was involved with SMILE and really enjoyed that. He used to help out at the SPCA when he
was in the prep school. The prefects used to rule the high school but that hierarchy all fell away
by the time he got to matric
He remembers the Formula 1 event held in Sandton City, when he and some other boys ducked
and went in Richard’s car, with Malcolm Williams in hot pursuit.
Many of the teachers were fantastic – Julie Roman, Belinda Marais, Janet Skeen, Coleen
Kennedy, Sylvia Crichton, and of course Willy Castle. Father Brewer was amazing, kind hearted
and helpful.
Greg Royce, was a very good head of the prep school, always approachable and helpful.
His worst memories were any form of public speaking with Teresa Voorendyck, he hated cross
country.
When he left school he took a gap year and did some waitering, he then went on to study at the
Hotel School and graduated from there. He did his prac.at Full Stop Café and from junior
manager was promoted to senior manager. He is in the process of buying the restaurant and
paying it off. He is absolutely passionate about the job.
Richard enquired whether there was any preferential treatment for sons of old boys regarding
their admittance to the school.
JE September 2011

Interview with Daniel Shepherd – 2005
Daniel came to St David’s from Craighall primary and admits to finding it quite scary at first,
seeing all the new faces and finding himself in a much larger better equipped school
environment. He came together with Kelsey Stewart and Ryan King so wasn’t entirely alone. He
really enjoyed the Glenmore orientation camp in grade 8 led by Rod Smith and made new
friends.
Daniel recalled that his class of 22 pupils was quite extraordinary and they gained 88 out of 112
distinctions in their matric year.
He enjoyed sport and played hockey for which he received half colours, played tennis and did
some recreational swimming. Daniel believes that his life was much richer for the experience of
meeting different people, through the sport which was compulsory he was forced to mix with
people he otherwise would never have known giving him a different perspective of life.
Daniel enjoyed assisting with the Science programme tutoring pupils from Alex high school and
also participated in the Smile programme.
He just missed being awarded an honours blazer for academics but was awarded half colours
for hockey and service.
The teachers he remembers are Reyno Reichert who really motivated all the boys to do well in
Maths and in fact many of them eventually took 3 Maths subjects. Deanne King also helped him
to do well in matric.
He achieved 5 distinctions in matric, writing 8 subjects and then went on to Wits Medical School.
He is currently doing a two year internship at Baragwanath Hospital. It’s hard work and very
long hours but he is gaining experience in many disciplines which is invaluable. There are other
St David’s boys with him such as Jonty Kourie, Matthew Barendse and Warren Meir. Kelsey
Stewart (deputy head boy for 2005) is doing his internship in Pietermaritzburg.
Daniel’s brother Michael is currently in grade 10 at St David’s. Daniel believes that if he has a
son he would send him to St David’s or another Marist school.
JE August 2012

Interview with Mike von Guilleaume – 1995
Mike followed in his father’s footsteps beginning his career at St David’s in grade 0 and his
brother Terence was also a pupil finishing in 1990. Mike’s father matriculated in 1954. Mike’s
father’s parents moved to South Africa from Germany and his father matriculated in 1954. As
his mother was a staunch catholic Mike was enrolled as a pupil at St David’s, however when he
reached high school his father took him to Hilton as he wanted to anglicise him. On the second
day he ran away spending two nights in the forest and eventually phoned his parents and
refused to divulge his whereabouts until they promised him he could go back to St David’s.
Mike’s mother was in charge of the catering at the school until 2001. Mike’s father was heavily
involved with MOBS which meant that Mike spent a great deal of time at St David’s socialising
with Marist boys such as Doug Wickins, Alec Quail, Darko Vidas and Vito Rugani.
Mike first teacher was Mrs Kerstofen and his class is where the after care is now. Mike recalls
that the soccer clinics in the primary school were legendary with Willy Castle in charge showing
an 8mm movie at the end of the festivals. Mike remembered playing soccer in Germiston, where
the boys lost badly as they were all too busy watching the planes flying overhead. Willy
organised a soccer tour for the standard 5’s travelling to Belgium and Mike’s brother was lucky
enough to be part of the team.
George the tractor driver used to give the boys lifts and Mr Freilich gave them super C’s when
they went to his office. The boys all watched Mrs Carlisle, their grade 1 teacher on TV when she
crossed the finishing line completing the Comrades marathon. In grade 2 Mrs Schaafsma had
a punishment mat and administered hidings with her wooden ruler. Mike also remembered
teachers such as Glenda Anderson; Debby Hurley; Mrs Orford who gave recorder lessons, Bev
Geldenhuys and Mrs Morkel, standard 5.
Mike’s first holy communion was held in the old hall followed by a meal. He remembers going to
the Bunny Park, to the Good Shepherd camp at Hartbeespoort. There were Malawian twins who
attended the school Lester and Bester, sadly their mother died after stepping on a garden rake
and the wound became septic.
In standard 7 Mike together with Michael Ward and Richard Pin went on a cricket tour to
Zimbabwe organised by Father Brewer and Cedric Finlayson. They played against Plumtree,
Falcon House, and CBC Bulawayo drawing 4 of the matches which were played against teams
consisting of some members of the Zimbabwe rugby team. The boys took cricket gear with them
for the boys there and some of the boys suffered from food poisoning after eating the dormitory
food.
In high school, one of the boys, David Salmon put his scissors in a plug socket in the science
lab and caused a mighty bang but fortunately didn’t kill himself.
At the beginning of standard 9, in abstentia, Mike was voted in as chairman of the MDC - matric
dance committee. Mike played in various age group teams and was at one time captain of the
rugby and cricket teams.
Mike was involved in a number of high school pranks and from standard 8, whilst his mother ran
the tuck shop, Mike managed to sell beers from her catering stock. Mike participated in the
rugby tour to Australia in 1995 and as head boy was part of the disciplinary committee together
with the tour captain and staff. Mike and the tour captain were caught breaking curfew and were
hauled in front of the disciplinary committee and then told to design their own punishment. They
decided not to have any more social rights for the remainder of the tour and offered to sign in
the other boys relieving Graeme McMillan, Greg Lambe and Andrew Brownlee the coaching
staff. Their proposal was accepted and Father Brewer checked up on them for the first two
nights but over the remaining 14 nights they went out after curfew without getting caught. He
remembers how naive they were walking into gay bars and strip clubs. The black guys got most
of the attention from the girls being so rare. One of the boys, Merryman was particularly naughty
and nearly missed the flight back home.
Matric was challenging as Mike was in a position of authority but he was fortunate in having
Paul Edey as headmaster, He was a great leader, not at all autocratic and worked together with
the boys. There were 44 boys in the matric class that year. The school had a strong rugby team
losing one game out of 26 so it was easy to generate a good spirit amongst the boys and it
wasn’t difficult to get the school to get things done. Mike had a good relationship with the
teachers, helping with sports practices thereby taking some pressure off the teaching staff.
The staff Mike remembers are Richard Girdwood who taught matric English but never once
spoke about the set work as the boys were very adept at encouraging him to stray off the
subject. He taught them about life and used a sawn off hockey stick “Jemma” to discipline them.
Gary Norton used to make the boys do push ups. Cedric Finlayson was the sports coach with a
temper. There were the ground staffs at the time Julius, Enoch and Victor. Mike Midgley swotted
him with a cricket bat for being cheeky.
Mike enjoyed school, had fun and got involved with school plays doing the sets. He and Jeremy
Wickens had been together since grade 1 and he remembered that Jeremy was awarded a
Marist provincial blazer. Anthony Bayne came to St David’s from Jan Cilliers and found it to be
quite a culture shock. It must also have been quite an adjustment for Sidney Ngwenya who was
the Lubner’s maid’s son. Together with the co-workers Mike went on a trip to Slough and was
also involve with the SMILE programme.
Mike achieved a very average matric as his focus was on getting the most out of life but he
enjoyed History with Simon Fry. After leaving St David’s, Mike went to Pamona College in
Claremont, California. Pamona was a liberal arts college built on the Oxford/Cambridge model,
it was small and very academic. He studied PPE - politics, philosophy and economics majoring
in economics and lived in the States for 4 years. He then worked in management consulting and
is now in the media industry working for Random House/Struik.
Mike joined MOBS in 2004 and is always grateful that he received an old boy’s bursary in 1978.
Mike is still in touch with many of his class mates even though many of them no longer live in
South Africa.
Warren Mandy – warren.mandey@bytes.co.uk
Anthony Bayne – Anthony_bayne@ml.com
John Tilley – jonjontilley@yahoo.com
Korabo Denalane – 084 777 5122
Brad Latilla Campbell is Mike’s nephew, his sister Celeste’s son. Callum Latilla-Campbell is now
at St Albans. Jack Latilla-Campbell, is in Gr 0
Warren Yoko is also a nephew
Greg Lambe taught at St David’s
Antoinette Lambe, Mike’s sister also taught at St David’s and sons Tristan is in Gr 00 and
Keegan now in Gr 3
Mike’s brother Terence is living in the States with 2 sons and also has another sister living there
with 2 daughters and 1 son.
JLE May 2012

Interview with Jerome Kourie – 1977
Jerome attended St David’s at the time it was going through a bad patch. Br Anthony was the
headmaster until 1975 when Br Timothy took over. The boarding which was the backbone of the
school was closed at the end of 1972 which had a great impact on the ethos, camaraderie and
not least the sport. After Br Timothy left in 1981 there followed a series of headmasters until
Paul Edey took up the post in 1995.
Jerome began his school career in grade 2, having moved from St Paul’s, Maryvale. He was
part of the new intake of the first grade 1’s and 2’s. Prior to this the school had started with
standard 1. The head of the primary school was Mrs Kempster, and Mrs Marsay taught grade 1.
He remembers Mrs Kenezovitch- standard 5 who was legendary and a great teacher.
At the time the bottom field was basic veldt and Aggie Simaan did all the landscaping of the
school including the new rugby fields and cricket pitch. The main oval was opened in 1970.He
lived in Chislehurston, a small suburb adjoining the north east border of the school and used to
walk across those fields and see her driving the blue tractor down to where the Inandas are
now. There were no fences around the school and everything was completely open. He recalls
that he and a group of boys who lived nearby used to play on the fields after school and made a
clubhouse in a cave in the ground where it had eroded. Some of the boys were Nigel Harding,
James Duthey, Colin Tomaselli – Chislehurston was originally a farm owned by the Tomaselli
family and was eventually sub-divided around 1973.
Standard 2 and 3 were taught in the “House Block” which was the magnificent old Herbert Baker
building overlooking the main cricket oval. The classrooms were huge with wonderful pressed
ceilings, wooden floors and fireplaces which were lit in winter. Across from the house block
where the current grades block is situated were the stables with Br Ronald in charge of horse
riding at the school.
On his first day at school he remembers his good friend Raymond John as their fathers were
good friends. Many of the parents were running around with 8mm cameras recording the big
day, a major event with the opening of the new grades. Where the fountain still stands is where
the grades block was originally located.
In standard 5, 1972, the Science block was built and many parents had raised funds for the
stained glass windows. The Science labs were the best in the country and were the pride and
joy of Br Bosco (Mario). Br Bosco was an absolute genius and had a strong but healthy rivalry
with the Science teacher at Observatory who also had a new laboratory.
Champagne Day was a big event in the school diary and all the boys went in buses to the
Cathedral, he remembers the hymn “Great Man of God” and all the school singing with zeal and
fervour. During the late seventies the school celebrated Champagne Day at the Rosebank
Catholic Church and the boys were given donuts and a cool drink.
The first SA school to allow black pupils was Rosebank Convent followed by St David’s a year
or two later.
The Christian life group (CLG) was formed by Br Mario who organised trips for the boys
involved. They went into Soweto in 1972/3 to a school which was quite an eye-opener and
which was quite daunting for young children who had been brainwashed into believing that
Soweto was a hostile environment. They raised funds for the school and later in 1975 or 76, Br
Mario said he would get a guest speaker for the boys. A black minister came to the school and
addressed them, he spoke about the plight of blacks and talked about things that the boys were
quite unaware of and what was actually going on in the townships. He remembers vividly him
saying that South Africans were living in a pressure cooker and when the lid burst there would
be mayhem, tragedy and bloodshed in SA. He pleaded and prayed with the boys to help change
the course of history. Many parents were very unhappy about this and felt it scared their sons.
The black minister was Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
Any sporting event against Observatory was a derby day and taken quite seriously. The rugby
team in 1972 was the best the school ever had, coached by Nassey Simaan. George Nichas
who was a brilliant player unfortunately missed an easy penalty in the dying minutes of the
game that year and the school lost to KES by 2 points but won every other game. Nassey
started coaching abd moved up with the same group of players until they were in matric (1972).
Nassey was an unbelievable asset to the school’s rugby programme and brought in Cas De
Bruin who was an international referee teaching at Fakkelle Hoerskool. The opening practise
game for every rugby season for many years was the one against Fakkelle Hoerskool. Nassey
was absolutely passionate about the rugby and ran along the touch line during team matches
often running faster than the wings in spite of being a heavy smoker. He instituted a star grading
system after each match and then put the grading up on the school notice board every Monday
rating each player with stars and comments.
There was fierce rivalry between Marist Inanda and Observatory and often there would be
between 2 and 4 000 people watching the 1st team rugby game between the two schools. At
one match Inanda ran onto the field in their black and gold colours and Obs in red, a hearse
was driven onto the pitch and the back door opened to reveal a coffin in which was a dummy
dressed in the Inanda colours. On another occasion at a swimming gala Obs again had a
dummy dressed in an Inanda swimming costume hanging by a noose around its neck from the
diving board. In spite of this it was a healthy rivalry and many of the boys were friends outside of
school. There was also rivalry between the Marist Brothers of both schools.
Jerome played 1st team rugby in standard 9 and 10, was the tennis captain and played 1st team
tennis from standard 6 until matric. In athletics he threw the discus and shot put. He was a
member of 1st cricket team, became a prefect and awarded his honours blazer.
Photograph not transfered.
The photograph above shows all the Kourie brothers wearing their honours blazers on the day
that their youngest brother (Dr Jeffrey Kourie) was awarded his honours blazer. L – R
Lawrence, Joel, Jerome, Jeffrey, Leslie Kourie
There were a lot of big families present at the school – Marsay, Kenezsovitch, Deeb,
Schoombie, Saad, Simaan - a percentage of the fees was reduced with every child and the 5th
brother paid no fees. There were many Italian, Greek, Lebanese and Portuguese boys at the
school mainly because of the boarding facility.
When Jerome’s son Daniel went to grade 00 there were 3 or 4 boys in the class whose fathers
had been pupils in the same class nearly 20 years earlier at St David’s at the

same time Anthony Rowlingson, Sabatino Mienucchi and Jerome Kourie -
Both Jerome’s sons studied at St David’s until matric attaining their honours blazers and 7
distinctions each in matric. Jonathan graduated from Wits as a Medical Doctor in 2011 and
Daniel is in his 3rd year Accounting Science.
Jerome doesn’t remember much about his last day other than it was a bit of an anticlimax. His
class got up to some mischief, some boys got fire hoses and flooded some classrooms and
some even painted statues which didn’t go down too well at all.
Academically Jerome was awarded his studies scroll and on leaving school studied 1 year of
dentistry, changed to finance and studied towards a BCom at Wits University. This was followed
by 2 years military service leaving as a captain and then he went into Acacia Finance where he
has been employed for 30 years.
Jerome still feels very passionate about the school. He has a good relationship with St David’s
sister school St Teresa’s and has been on the board since it’s inception. He is a trustee of
Catholic Education Trust. He isn’t currently a member of MOBS but receives the newsletter. He
regularly visits the school to watch the 1st rugby team matches. He receives the school
magazine and always reads through it keeping in touch with the community.
JE February 2012

Interview – Peter Habberton – Staff 1975 - 80
Peter grew up in Benoni, son of an Anglican minister who was forced to leave South Africa in

1967. As a consequence, Peter finished his schooling and university education in England
      returning to South Africa in 1974. As a member of the Wanderers cricket club at the time he
      learnt that Peter Stringer the current St David’s cricket coach was leaving. He went to see
      Brother Timothy and was subsequently employed as cricket coach and P.E. teacher in
      October 1975.
      Br Timothy gave Peter and his new wife Jackie 3 rooms upstairs overlooking the cricket fields
      in what is now the CEO’s house. Their daughter was born there in 1978. Peter had a dog
      called Shane who went with him everywhere and tracked down his son, aged 2 when he once
      went missing walking out through the school grounds to a nearby shopping centre.
      Peter taught Physical Education from the prep through to the high school having a PE degree
      from the UK. He then started to teach English and became part of the school’s management
      team together with Trudy Elliott, the then head of English. Peter coached the 1st team cricket
      and 1st team rugby and was in charge of athletics. Later on Peter started the Art department
      also painting the scenery and sets for the annual matric dance.
      There were still many brothers teaching including Br Timothy, Br Mario, Br Bernard, a keen
      photographer and artist, Br Aidan the bursar. Br Jude was the Brother Provincial. Br Anthony
      was no longer around but popped in occasionally. Other teachers were Ken Lipschitz, Maths;
      Tom Macfadden, History; John Vahey, Geography ; Heather Joseph taught in the prep school
      together with Willy Castle and Terry O’Mahoney both of whom joined as students whilst
      studying at JCE. Willy eventually took over the prep soccer. Terrry O’Mahoney, coming from a
      strong Marist family was a fellow student who went on to St John’s. In 1980 Peter Swanson
      was the assistant coach for rugby. Mrs Gilroy, Br Timothy’s secretary, ruled the roost in the
      admin block.
      In those days the school had fewer pupils and not many resources but managed to climb up to
      the A league and become competitive especially in the Catholic schools league. Peter
      remembered an occasion when Walter Cronje was victim of a dirty player on the Observatory
      side. The player had been sent off, was allowed to return to the field again and immediately
      homed in on Walter tackling him and rupturing his spleen in the process.
      The land was sold off where the Inandas now stand but it was believed that the money was
      used not only for St David’s but other Marist schools. However, there was a good spirit in the
      school with a very supportive parent community. There were on average 27 boys in a class
      and Br Timothy was a firm but understanding headmaster.
      Some of the boys he remembers are Mike Peel, a brilliant cricketer now living in the Nelspruit
      area who is now an environmental scientist. He was the first of Peter’s charges to get into the
      Transvaal Nuffield cricket team. Sasha Martinengo who now presents motor racing on Super
      Sport was in the prep school in those days
      JE October 2012

Interview with Ted Barale – 1984 (Std 9)
Although Ted eventually matriculated at Damelin College he was a pupil at St David’s from
grade 1 until 1984. Ted’s family lived in Krugersdorp which entailed Ted and his brother
Anthony catching a train at 4.30am from Krugersdorp to Park Street and then taking 2 buses to
get to school, repeating the process on the way home. He was a day boy but had lunch at
school and most Fridays the brothers used to go and have dinner with his parents at their
hotel,the Lewisham Hotel. Ted got a lift there and back with the brothers so he was ready for
rugby on Saturday.
Ted remembers Brother Anthony, and Mr Manolios, Brothers Andrew, Bernard, Aquinias and
Timothy. He remembers that Br Anthony used to allow the boys to choose their cane for
punishment.Br Anthony was popular with the boys and parents. He recalled an occasion when
one of the brothers was writing on the board and one of the boys flicked his fountain pen and
the ink went down the brothers back. The following day he came in facing the class and
eventually the culprit owned up and was sent summarily to Br Anthony’s office
The Herbert Baker house consisted of classrooms and stables were where the present grade 00
block is.
Ted loved the sport, playing hooker in rugby and made the cricket B team but did not do well
academically and battled with English and reading but enjoyed Biology and the Art classes. Ted
hated exams and the English lessons.Ted was the rebel and his brother Anthony, who became
a doctor and is now living in Canada was the clever one. Ted’s father was Italian and his mother
Afrikaans which didn’t help. His mother was chairlady of the ladies committee together with
Moni’s mother.
When Ted left school he went into the family business and has always been in catering and now
runs his own restaurant Picolinos in Fourways.
Ted still sees some of friends from school and some of them visit him at his restaurant. Paul
Moni, Nicholas Erleigh, Kevin Peel, Sean Davidson, Mike Stanley.
JE July 2012

Interview with Br Sean Quinn – 1963 – 1968
Br Sean first came to St David’s in 1963 and initially taught a primary school class. He thinks that Patrick
Quarmby was in that class, also Ivan Bensimon and Ian Skinner who is now married to Patrick’s sister.
Other names were R Adair, Clive Schoombie, N Jarvis, T Tribe.
Through his involvement with sport coaching many other names came to mind: Terry Rosenberg; Terry
Lavery; Errol MaCauley; Lee McGregor; G. Simaan. The latter’s father Mr Nassey Simaan helped with
coaching rugby and Sean learnt a lot from him and became a fanatic of rugby. He also said that Br Jude
taught him a lot in Maritzburg too. It was a game Sean never played in Ireland where G
gaelic football and hurling were the sports. He took cricket teams and umpired, and took students out on
Saturdays and Sundays with the “Cycling Club”. He never managed to lose anybody, thank God, but when
he thinks of it now, it frightens him. They used to go a long way sometimes and once through the city to the
southern suburbs and beyond, unknown territory.
Sean thought that we would know that some of the names mentioned went on to play at a high level ; Terry
Lavery represented the Springboks and Sean met him briefly at White City athletics stadium in London. Lee
McGregor was a Springbok swimmer whose parents were good people who helped Sean in his transition to
“civvy life’.
Remembering the brothers was easier for Sean in many ways – Br Anthony, Br Aidan, Br Lewis, Br Neil, Br
Andrew.
Br Neil was the nephew of the Br Provincial, family name McGurk. He and Sean once cycled to Pretoria
and back, very tired and thirsty at the end as one could imagine.
Br Ignatius, Br Aidan Burns and Br Sean once walked to Post Shepstone from Hibberdene along the
railway line. They got a few rand from the bursar to buy some food and drinks which they lost on their way
to Port Shepstone. They went back down to the beach and retraced their steps to the shop and eventually
found the money on the ground next to the door. Lucky! They then hitched a lift back to Hibberdene and
two men in the car took them right up to the door. Lucky again!
Br Sean liked distance running, having run up World’ s View in Maritzburg many times but Br Ignatius (aka
Paddy Collins) took it to another level later running the Comrades many times and he is still running full
and half marathons in Ireland now about 74 – 75 years old!
Br Sean stopped playing rugby at 40 and took up running – he completed 2 marathons and numerous half
marathons, but not in the same league as Br Iggy! It might say something about their lives with the Marist
brothers, but what it says, he is not exactly sure.
Another person that Sean remembers with great affection was a Zulu man. Piet, a big man who was in
charge of the kitchen, he was always cheerful and tried to teach Sean a little of the Zulu language and
talked proudly of Dingaan, Cetswayo and Shaka. Sean looked him up many years later on Google. When
Sean went to the kitchen for coffee, Piet would always address him as nKhosaan and Sean regrets not
talking to him more.
One funny incident Sean recalled was when they tried to hear a world title fight from America on the radio.
They tried to get it by rigging up the aerial on the tennis court net at some ridiculous hour in the morning
and by the time they got the broadcast the fight was finished. He couldn’t quite remember who was fighting,
maybe Joe Louis or Floyd Patterson. There were, of course no replays in those days!
On a more personal level, Sean taught Geography in the secondary school from 1964. He can remember
threatening his students that he would cane them if they failed. He now thinks that was a stupid thing to do
but he had seen this in Ireland as par for the course. He had to cane about 4 or 5 students and was sick of
himself by the time he had done two. One student, Gabriel Simaan cried and was still crying when they
went to Ellis Park for an inter-school tennis match. Sean thought that Gabriel liked him as a teacher and
was friendly with Gabriel’s family and was disgusted with himself and his stupidity. He never used the cane
again in all his teaching life of over 30 years. They were a very good family and Sean still has regrets.
Sean finished his degree whilst working on a mine in Rhodesia and later did his HED again at UNISA. He
went down to Johannesburg to do some teaching practice for exam purposes and did it at St David’s in
familiar surroundings and all that went with it.
Sean has some fond memories and some questions he would like answers too, but the past is the past and
he thinks it is not good to dwell on it too much.
After Sean’s wife died in 1996, he was at a loss and very disorientated. He quit his teaching job in a Jesuit
school in the north of England where he had taught English and Geography to “A” level for 10 years. He
went to Southern Ethiopia with the VSO for 2 years to work as a teacher trainer. He then had work at the
University in Newcastle upon Tyne after which he took off with a backpack to SE Asia, Australia and New
Zealand - a bit old for it at 60 but he didn’t care. Sean loved Thailand, the people, the weather and food so
went back and stayed. Sean had a TESOL diploma and an MA in Linguistics from Leeds, studying whilst
working. He developed an interest in the English language but all he did was work doing seminars for
teachers helping them with their methodology and English.
Sean’s son (who was born in Rhodesia) and 3 grandchildren live in Melbourne, Australia and Sean visits
them fairly regularly.
Sean currently lives in Thailand and has done so for the past 11 years, about 350kms NE of Bangkok in a
very rural area with a good wife who looks after him very well. He did some voluntary work teaching for 3
years but then had enough and now reads, works on his wife’s small farm, cycles a bit and relaxes. I gave Sean Gabriel Simaan’s email address and he got in touch with him. Gabriel had no recollection of
the incident and said he was caned on several occasions but it certainly didn’t do him any harm. (JLE)
JLE November 2013

Interview with Paul Gerrard – 1992
Paul remembered his first day as he arrived a bit late two weeks into the first term of grade 1.
He sat next to Jaffrey Tsaksani and Ryan Lamberts, his teacher was Mrs Scaafsma who used
her ruler quite liberally on the boys hands.
As it was compulsory Paul played rugby and cricket and made all the matches unless he was
show jumping which took up a lot of his time. Due to his commitment to horse riding he didn’t
make the 1st teams. He enjoyed the team sports and felt that it really helps in understanding
people and it is good to work together. The camaraderie was great but not all the boys were
accepted and Paul felt that the boys who played hockey rather than rugby missed out. The
camps were amazing and the camaraderie and hierarchy of who sat where on the bus trips.
Paul participated in cross country usually coming 2nd or 3rd but didn’t put in too much effort and
was often caned for missing a run. He was strong in the distance events in athletics, 800m and
the high jump. Through his horse riding Paul became stronger as a person and very fit.
Paul didn’t enjoy being caned but believed that it was necessary. He recalled Mr Girdwood,
English teacher who got very angry about something and smacked him very hard at the back of
his head – at the recent reunion the boys remembered that incident well.
Of his teachers he remembered Lesley Henning an excellent Maths teacher who converted him
from average to being good in the subject. Finlayson was the cricket and rugby coach and Grant
Webster, Biology, had a bat called “Justice” which he wielded once if you admitted not doing
your homework and twice if you lied. There was a small, cheeky, Muslim boy called Mohammed
Ahmed who Webster grabbed by the ankles and held over the railings on the top floor.
He recalled being kicked out of a matric prize giving held at the pool. Together with some other
boys and girls that were around he was messing about creating a noise, a teacher came and
found them and told them to leave.
In the prep most of his best friends were black but in high school groups formed, and the black
pupils usually had their own group. The fact that the school was non-racial changed Paul’s
attitude. His uncle, Francis Gerrard and aunt were activists and in the late 70’s visited Mandela
in prison and Mbeki in exile. Paul’s friends who went to government schools had an entirely
different, prejudiced attitude to blacks. Paul was one of a group of boys who visited Alex
township taking food and clothing collected at St David’s.
Boys he remembers, the naughty crowd, are Garth Ramsay, a cattle farmer in the Midlands who
was a rebel rouser, Bobby French, Andreas Zanella, Jason Harmsen, Justin van Linden, Jason
Hallett’90 and Peter Batisch. From 1993 there were Andrew Harris, Andrew Botha and
Lawrence Azar.
There were initiation rituals where the younger boys had to blow up condoms and other silly
things, nothing too serious but good for one’s development. Paul, together with 3 other boys
opted out of becoming a prefect by walking out of a meeting.
At the recent reunion it was noticeable how many of the “cool guys” attended coming from the
UK and Cape Town but a number currently living in Johannesburg did not make the effort.
After matriculating, Paul studied through Unisa and Midrand Campus for a BComm Honours
which he completed in 5 years. In his final year of honours he was working as a property broker
letting industrial space south of Johannesburg. However interest rates climbed to 20 – 25% and
he lost out on a major deal which prompted his decision to go overseas .He had spent some
time coaching cricket at St David’s and played cricket after leaving school. He spent some time
mainly in the UK, France and the US as a professional ski bum and cricket coach and worked
for a season in the UK as a cricketer .The time away gave him a new perspective on life. He
had many jobs one as a security guard for various shows and events, ending up together with
his wife in the computer industry in the UK. Then in 2003 Flanagan & Gerrard asked him to join
them in South Africa. The company is involved in commercial property development specialising
in shopping centres. They organise christmas carols every year supporting various schools in
Rustenburg, children’s and old age homes.
Paul’s eldest son attends Redhill School as St David’s would not accommodate Adrian in grade
0.
Paul’s father Peter donated a cricket scholarship to the school in 2008.
JLE January 2013

Interview with Dave Clark – 1980
Dave first came to St David’s in 1968 and then left in standard 2 for Montrose and then, aged eleven to go
to Treverton, a boarding school in Natal. He returned to St David’s in 1978 as his parents did not like the
idea of him boarding at what was to become a co-educational school.
He remembers Mrs Schaafsma and her strict discipline and use of a ruler. Otherwise the teachers were all
ok and no-one in particular stands out. He passed his matric but considered himself average academically.
On his return to St David’s, Dave had no problem settling in again and met up with the boys he knew from
grade 1. He used to see them when he came home on holiday so it was pretty easy to integrate again and
he is still friends with them forty years later. Brent Alcock, Grant Catthrall, Michael Nicholas and Wayne
Alcock, Alfonso De Chaud, Deon Joubert who now owns the Mugg and Bean in Durbanville and Fotis
Rionos, now living in Greece. Facebook also helps in keeping the friendships going.
Dave enjoyed school, loved the sport and was a member of 1st team rugby, 1st team cricket in standard 9
and matric.
Dave recalled an occasion when he nearly got expelled when Br Timothy kept him, Brent, Grant and
Michael in after school for not tying their ties correctly. Dave and Brent walked as their choice was to write
out the log book or leave, Brent and Dave chose the latter. Dave and Brent drove across the cricket pitch
on Dave’s motorbike with Br Timothy chasing them. They came back to school the next day and didn’t get
expelled. The four of them still have a very close relationship and are as close as they were in grade 1,
even on a business level supporting each other where they can.
After matriculating, Dave worked for Standard Bank for six months and then completed two years army
service still being paid by the bank. He continued to work for the bank for another two years and then joined
Xerox for two years. Then he and his brother went to London and returned to South Africa in 1981. After
various jobs in the copier industry, he joined Minolta in April 1991. Dave transferred to Cape Town in
August 1994 and returned to Johannesburg in May 2011 to take up the position as MD of Oce Sa, also a
Bidvest company.
On returning to Johannesburg , Dave and family visited St David’s to take up the Guy Fawkes night
together with Mike and Grant. He also came to St David’s for the 2013 old boys reunion weekend to watch
the rugby. Dave also sponsored one of the T20 team last year.
Dave is married with two children, a daughter of fifteen and a son, twelve who attend Maragon private
school in Ruimsig.
Dave’s company together with Konica Minolta is involved in assisting with the Rhino campaign, food
parcels for various charities as well as their copying needs.
JLE November 2013

Interview with Richard Hartdegen – 1961
Richard came to St David’s as a boarder in standard 2 in the July. He had previously attended a
boarding school in Natal, Kings College, Nottingham Road in a group of only 32 children. His
mother had died in the early 50’s and his father worked for the Chamber of Mines in
Johannesburg. His sister visited St David’s coming to mass and met Brother Edwin and after
that it was decided that Richard should be a boarder there..
Of his teachers he remembers Mrs Batten, a tough Afrikaans teacher who took no nonsense
and much to the boys amusement lived on the property at Tara. Mrs Kempster taught him in
standard 4. She was well known for her pupils getting the most prizes each year. From standard
6 the brothers such as Bonaventurte and Timothy taught the boys. One of the brothers was
obsessed with wasting water and used to time the length of time the boys were in the shower.
Richard recalled that absolutely everyone had to play rugby unless they were unfit to play. The
school began to play open rugby with the matrics but couldn’t beat Observatory. In 1958, the
best rugby team of that time nearly beat Jeppe at a home game 9-8 but it was in 1959 that the
St David’s rugby team were the first to beat Observatory at Obs 8-6. In 1960 the team lost again
but redeemed themselves once more in 1961. Darko Vidas “The Bull” was a member of the
rugby team and once on a rainy day during a session of weight lifting in the dining room, strolled
in and coolly lifted some weights with total ease just to show how it should be done.
Richard didn’t play cricket or swim but he did take part in athletics. There were twins, the
McGurks one of whom was a good bowler and the other a good batsman which used to
thoroughly confuse the opposing teams. There was great competition to assist with the cricket
scoring at the Bric scoreboard on the weekends as the boys would then be invited to the lunch
which was always rather good. The food generally wasn’t too bad.
Richard recalled that, in standard 7 or 8 all the boarders crowded into the swimming pool area.
One of the boys upended a load of phosphorous into the pool from the diving board. There was
the most amazing bang and everyone scarpered. On another occasion a few boys were playing
with magnesium in the Science lab, there was a loud bang which was heard by Br Anthony who
was at the pool. He took off in a rush to see if anyone was injured and was not impressed.
Money was disappearing from the tuck shop and the culprit was eventually caught when, during
his return climb over the roof, down a drainpipe and into the tuckshop, he slipped and fell putting
his leg through a glass window.
Every morning all the Catholic boys went to mass and the non-Catholic’s went to study. Priests
came from Rosebank, one of whom was quick with the mass and the other slow which meant
that the boys used to miss out on the morning coffee and rusks.
Richard was head of the debating society. In standard 9 all the Marist schools wrote the same
exams country wide. Richard came 3rd in Maths and 3rd overall. Many of the St David’s boys
received medals and Richard still has his.
Richard thought it was an excellent idea that Brother Anthony took the view that if the boys were
doing well in their matric year they did not have to attend classes in the subjects in which they
excelled but could rather work alone in the study room. They still had to write the weekly and
termly exams and the teachers also had to agree to this. One of these boys, Hawkins was very
good at Maths, became a statistician and eventually was appointed to a professorship in the
US.
Dudley Mandy was the head boy, Emil Iglauer the deputy. In his matric year Dudley announced
that he wanted to become a priest and halfway through the year was sent to Pietermaritzburg,
however after he matriculated he changed his mind and eventually went to work for Gary Player
at his stables.
Richard did well in his matric year was a prefect, was awarded an honours blazer the Brother
Edwin Bursary and achieved 4 distinctions in the JMB Matric..
Richard studied at Wits University and is now a dermatologist and Mohs surgeon specialising in
of the treatment skin cancer. He has two sons who went to Redhill and Bryanston as he and his
wife decided that a co-ed education would be more suitable for their sons as they didn’t have a
daughter.
Richard keeps in touch with Dennis Adams but does not have any contact with any other of his
contemporaries. Richard would be very interested in the 75th anniversary in 2016.
JLE February 2013

Interview with Reg Titcombe – 1954
Reg came to St David’s in 1952 as a boarder. He attended Marist Brothers from grade 1 through to matric.
Firstly to Koch Street for 8 years until standard 6, then Observatory for a year.
He recalls being very impressed with his new school and enjoyed being a boarder as it was safe, he made
a lot of friends in pleasant surroundings with regulated study periods although he did miss home cooking,
the friends he grew up with and the freedom to do as he pleased.
He thought the teachers were great and he made some good friends. All the brothers who taught him were
very good teachers and he remembers them all, just not their names! The names he did recall in no special
order were Vidal, Phillip, Aquinas, Benedict, Ephrem, Bartholomew, Celestine and Edwin. Phillip a New
Zealander was a great influence in his life. He was inspirational teaching him how to organise his notes and
how to study. Celestine taught him Latin, which in turn taught him how to analyze problems. Br Ephrem
taught him Physics and Chemistry with great passion. These were the men who equipped him for the two
career paths he followed in his working years......Chemistry and Business.
About 10 days before the end of his matric year, Reg gave four of his classmates crew cuts for half-acrown
each. He needed the money, and they needed to look good the school dance was just around the
corner. Br Edwin walked into class, took one look at the four standouts, and screamed, “who did this?”. Reg
immediately put up his hand thinking he wanted to compliment him. He didn’t, he grabbed him by the scruff
of his neck, yanked him outside and thrashed him so many times, Reg eventually lost count. He also gated
Reg for the remainder of the school year. The incident was neither funny or amusing at the time, for Reg
anyway, but over the next few days, when everyone in the school was talking about it, he was able to see
the amusing side of the incident and he did not really want to go to the school dance and hockey pick up..
Reag played cricket, rugby, tennis, soccer and hockey. He was not particularly good at rugby or cricket but
did play U15A rugby and 2nd team cricket. He was very good at hockey and played for Natal University, but
hockey in 1954 was not a team sport at St David’s.
The only four boys he has seen since leaving St David’s were Jake de Lancey, David Reeves, Jimmy
Walker and John Livingstone. He has had n news of his other classmates but he did know that Ronnie
Columbic was a mercenary in the Congo, and was killed there in 1955. Jacques Kerwyn de Meeandre
committed suicide in the Belgian Congo in 1955, and he had heard but could not confirm, that Billy Hapker
fell off a tram and was killed in Brussels in 1955. John Livingstone who he saw in 1974 before he departed
for New York passed away a couple of years ago.
Thanks to the dedicated and unselfish brothers he was able to obtain, with ease, a BSc in Chemistry and
Geology and a BSC (Hons) in Chemistry from Natal University in Durban; and, after being transferred from
Cape Town to New York by Caltex in 1974, he went on to obtain an MBA from the University of Connecticut
in Stamford. Reg had an interesting and successful working life, thanks in large measure to the teachings
of three gifted brothers to whom he will always be grateful. He retired in 1999, and spent the last 5 years of
his working career based in Mexico City as vice president of business development, Fina Mexicana, S.A de
C.V. a subsidiary of Dallas, Texas based Petrofina Oil & Chemical Company, now Total Petrochemicals in
Houston, Texas. He and his wife Lynn now live at Lakewood Ranch just east of Sarasota, Florida.
Reg’s eldest son Michael was only 5 years old when he was transferred to New York in 1974 and his
youngest son Matthew was born in Stamford, Connecticut in 1978.
His two sons Michael and Matthew are attorneys in San Diego, California. Michael is a retired Commander
in the US Navy. He did four tours of duty to the Gulf. He and his wife Lisa had a little girl Rachel in 2000.
Mattehw is still a batchelor.
The last time he visited St David’s, was in 1985 or thereabouts, on a business\pleasure trip to South Africa.
He stopped off in Randburg for a dinner meeting with some executives from Sasol. The next day on his
way to the airport and had the cab driver drop him off at St David’s and he visited with Br Ephrem for an
hour or so. He really enjoyed seeing Br Ephrem again and the school looked very much as he had
remembered it.
JE September 2013

Interview with Sven Arp – 1980
Sven joined St David’s in 1978 going into standard 8. As his parents had divorced, Sven left St Albans as a
boarder to spend time with his mother and attend school as a day boy. He found the St David’s to be a
breath of fresh air, less regimented and the environment was more relaxed from a teacher pupil
perspective.
Brother Timothy was the headmaster, he was tough but ok. Headmasters are never popular individuals.
Sven recalls that he did something “silly” and Br Timothy told him to “think about the consequences of what
he did in life” which has somehow stuck with him ever since.
Sven played 1st team rugby, was a B team swimmer with an occasional visit to the A team but he didn’t
ever play cricket. Overall Sven enjoyed his time at St David’s with rugby matches always being auspicious
occasions; the boys were under a lot of pressure especially playing centre. Tackles were not! to be missed.
Sven considered himself a decent sportsman but no superstar.
He recalled having a blind date for the matric dance he attended in standard 9, the night did not go that well
date wise. He is vague on his standard 10 matric dance but did have a regular girlfriend at the time.
Although St David’s was and still is a great school the boys learnt to be humble and not to expect to win all
the time, even today. He feels that intense pressure amongst schools to win (which seems even worse
today) is not entirely healthy.
Of the teachers, he remembers Mrs Natrass who came right at the end, she totally lacked self confidence
but could teach amazingly well. If you took the trouble to do past papers she would get them back to you
the next day, marked with full explanatory comments. Trudie Elliott taught English and was a character in
her own right. Mr Neft, Afrikaans also a character. As a non-Catholic, Sven received separate religious
instruction from the Catholic pupils.
Academically Sven did well and was in the top 5 most of the time. He was awarded an academic tie,
honours blazer, became a prefect and won a trophy for the Maths prize.
His Grade 11 results got him into Onderstepoort, Faculty of Veterinary Science, University of Pretoria
which was fortunate as his appendix burst midway during the matric exams and he had to write supps for 4
subjects. He eventually achieved 2 A’s but would have hoped for more.
After spending 5 half years qualifying at Onderstepoort, Sven went into the army and was based in
Kangwani, Badplaas in the Eastern Transvaal. He married whilst he was in the army and on completing his
army service went into small animal veterinary work and, in 1990 started at Olivedale clinic which now
operates with a compliment of 4 vets.
Sven has two sons Reinhardt who matriculated from St David’s in 2009 and Ronan who is currently in
grade 6 at St David’s. Although it’s quite a trip every day to and from the family home in Olivedale Sven
believes it is worth it for his son to be a St David’s boy and they spend some quality time on the drive to
and from the school.
Sven does a lot of pro bono work with feral cats in the area and for the Animals in Distress organisation.
Vets are also involved in the development of individual community clinics in the Eastern Cape which is
spreading. He has no direct involvement in those but feels they are a great initiative.
Sven hosted a MOBS event at his home earlier this year (2013) The “boys” had all just turned 50 or were
about to do so, nostalgia prevailed. Brian Muller and Trevor Christie-Taylor were visiting from Australia.
Fifteen of them got together with their wives and children including George Daras (head boy) and Alphonso
de Chaud (vice head boy) who together with Gavi McLaughlin made it all the way up from Cape Town. It
was a truly special day to catch up with mates some of whom had not seen each other since the last day of
school. School friendships are of the best.
JLE October 2013

Interview with Peter Gerard – 1966
Peter Gerard joined Marist Inanda in 1955 and his brother Francis in 1952 The school was then
quite small and didn’t have the reputation it has today, with a mixed bag of pupils from all walks
of life.
Peter and his family lived at 58 First Avenue, Inanda on the boundary of the school, Rudd Road
was then a dirt road and was only tarred up to where the Toyota garage now stands in the late
50’s.
Peter was a rebel, a non-conformist and didn’t get along too well with Br Anthony who wanted
all the boys to conform and recalled Peter Tuffen who won a Maths olympiad and was a
favourite of Br Anthony. However Br Andrew tolerated his lack of conformity and also that of
Roger Phillimore and Olof Winkler.
He remembers teachers such as the young Heather Joseph who was a favourite with the boys
with her beehive hairdo. Mrs Brick who taught there in the 40’s and 50’s; Mrs Scaafsma used
her ruler to rap knuckles; Br Andrew used cuts with the cane to discipline the boys, during a
Science lesson something blew up into Br Mario’s face. There was one incident where a brother
was teaching and turned to write on the board and one of the boys threw a dart at his back,
needless to say they were all caned. An older pupil, Roy Hutton was a phenomenal swimmer
but rather conceited and became the target for some of the boys with pellet guns. Once again
they were severely reprimanded. The discipline was hard but the boys coped with it and were
generally outspoken and not intimidated when they did not agree with the brothers.
In matric 20 boys, including Peter were arrested and landed up in jail due to a
misunderstanding. They had been walking from the Kelvin Grove Hotel in Rosebank where a
bust up had occurred. The police thought they had been involved and arrested them.
Fortunately one of the boys Jannie Steyn, spoke Afrikaans and managed to convince the police
that they were innocent.
Peter recalled a controversy over the sale of the land where the Inandas now stand. Initially, the
owner of the farm “Three Trees” didn’t want to sell to Catholics but eventually his widow sold the
land to the school in 1963. In the late 1970’s The brothers apparently missed out on another
possible land purchase as Tony and Peter Wilson owned the land from the bottom playing fields
as far as the Inanda Club and would have been willing to sell it to the school. Possibly the
finances were a bit tight at this time.
Peter and some of the other boys planted all the grass on the fields during Br Anthony’s Maths
lessons.
Peter was expelled during his second last year because of an incident at a 1st team rugby
match. Roland Walker or Br Anthony was exhorting the boys to shout “Come on St David’s” and
Peter shouted “Come on Marist Brothers Inanda” which didn’t go down too well as did his retort
to Roland Walker. In order to be reinstated,he had to apologise to Br Edwin who was the
Brother Provincial residing at Obs, Br Anthony and the head of the PTA, Mr Roland Walker
before he was allowed back at school. Ironically Peter ended up working for him when he was
offered a job by Alastair Barclay and was introduced to a senior partner – Roland Walker! He
recalled that he achieved honours in studies, swimming, athletics and rugby and that Br
Anthony did not particularly enjoy presenting him with his honours blazer.
Peter enjoyed the sport and played 1st team rugby, 2nd team cricket, tennis in the prep together
with Jannie Steyn and Terry Rosenberg. Willy Castle was 2 – 3 years behind him.
Peter thoroughly enjoyed his years at St David’s in spite of his rebelliousness. There were 48
boys in his matric year and between 4 and 500 pupils at the school. In 2006 there was a 40 year
reunion at the Michelangelo and 35 of the old boys got together many travelling from various
countries around the world. He recalled Charlie Platt, who had always been quite large
commenting on the fact that Gilroy who was always rather slim was now rather “fat”!
After matriculating Peter went on to Wits University where he studied for a BComm for four
years and then went into the property business although initially he was hoping for a career in
merchant banking. He is now involved in shopping centre development and investment.
Peter’s son Paul attended St David’s and his wife became very involved running the tuckshop
for 10 years. Peter donated a cricket scholarship to the school in 2008.
JLE January 2013

Interview with Terry van Heerden – 1972
Terry started at St David’s as a boarder in standard 5 in 1967. On his first day he remembers his
mother crying, lots of other mothers crying, some boys crying, his father helped him carry his trunk
up to the dormitory, rows and rows of beds with military corners, emptying his trunk into his locker,
everything new and labeled with his name. Thomas Manko, whose locker was next to his, men
wearing dresses, big scary boys telling him what to do and where to go, dinner in the hall, loneliness,
homesick already.
The day boys didn’t get to play as much sport, and have endless opportunities to create mischief as
boarders, not that all the boarders considered that a con. In every other respect Terry would have
preferred to have been a day boy and live with his family, date girls, go to parties, wear cool clothing,
listen to music and so on. Terry also felt that boarding did not prepare you for a normal life and in his
first year at university he likened himself to an untrained dog that had been let off its leash. He
knows that the same thing happened to most of the boarders.
Terry most enjoyed the sport, comraderie, the “Boys Own sort of life” that they led and, in an odd
sort of way, the routine of the life. He also enjoyed learning. The habit has stayed with him all his life
and he owes it to the teaching he received at St David’s.
Terry doesn’t have memories of his last day but he is sure that he would have had mixed feelings;
relief that it was all over, excitement about the future, sadness to be leaving what had become, with
all its warts, home.
However he didn’t enjoy the hours of boredom (especially on visiting weekends when most of his
mates went home and he and other boys whose parents lived so far away were stuck at school with
no one to play with), the constant hunger and being homesick.
He has good memories of every rugby game that he ever played. Rugby was a big thing in his life
and Nassey Simaan had a lot to do with that. He lit the fire. Their loss to KES in 1972 still rankles to
this day. It was the only blemish on the “72 team’s record. Heplayed a lot of sport. Terry was in the
school’s swimming and athletics teams and held many records in both disciplines. And he was
captain of the 1972 1st XV rugby team which was the most successful team the school had had up
to that point. Lawrence Saad and Terry were the only two St David’s boys to have been invited to the
Transvaals schools rugby trials. Terry made it to the final 30 but on Br Anthony’s advice to his
parents he withdrew to concentrate on his studies. He later played a few games for the Western
Province U20 team.
Of the teachers, Brother Timothy was an influence. Like Mr Simaan, he had a passion for rugby and
it rubbed off onto him. He also taught him biology and that’s what he went on to study at university.
Another brother, whose name he won’t mention, brought some sanity into our boarding school lives
by supplying us with the occasional beer and cigarette.
Hunger was always with the boarders, and there was this story about earlier generations of
boarders raiding the kitchen at night. They didn’t know exactly how they did it, but they figured it
must have been by climbing out a dormitory window and crossing the roof, which is what they did,
him and Nichas and a couple of others whose names he’s forgotten. They never got caught. It was a
lot of fun. And while everyone else was losing weight, they started putting it on.
His closest mates were among the boarders: Harry Curtis (who, like him, was a Zambian), and
George Nichas and James Cronin (his equals, if not betters, when it came to getting up to no good).
But through sport and being the school’s vice-head prefect he got to know just about everyone.
Among the day boys he was close to Colin Rezek whose family graciously took him into their home
at weekends. Regrettably, he doesn’t keep in regular touch with anyone.
After matriculating, Terry studied for a BSc at UCT then gained a post graduate diploma from Wits
and an MBA from UCT. He is currently the managing director and major shareholder of a group of
companies in Australia – Salima |Holdings Pty Ltd..
Terry last visited St David’s in 1992 for a 20 years reunion.
JLE July 2013

Interview with Peter Moni – 1967
Peter came to St David’s as a boarder in grade 1 having spent the year before at CBC Kimberly
where he learnt a lot although CBC didn’t have the same facilities as St David’s. Peter thought
that the boarding school structure was good for him. His brothers Adrian ’69, John’ 70 and Paul
’80 were all pupils at St David’s and Peter’s father was also a Marist old boy from Koch Street
and was head boy of Marist Observatory.
Peter remembers teachers such as Mrs Brick, Mrs Green, Mrs Janusch and Mrs Kempster.
Peter enjoyed the prep school coming from a large family and enjoyed playing soccer and swam
but didn’t play cricket. He remembers having supper in the dining room and also playing
volleyball there.
In the high school, Peter participated in athletics, swimming and rugby, playing in 45 1st team
rugby games from standard 8. Peter enjoyed the tours such as the centenary rugby tour to
Cape Town where an open air mass was held at St Joseph’s. The rugby matches against
Observatory were also a phenomenal experience and Peter also ran and swam against Obs
although Inanda was better at cricket and hockey than was Observatory. In those days Jeppe,
Parktown Boys and Observatory were the big rugby schools.
In high school he remembered the Brothers Anthony; Timothy; Andrew (Drac); Liam; Ignatius;
Augustus; Bonaventure; Edmund; Bartholemew; Sean; Vincent; Aidan and McGurk. Br Andrew
was in charge of Peter’s dormitory. Of his classmates, Joe Strevino became a good cricketer,
and he is still in touch with Gabriel Simaan, Terry Lavery, now living in Seattle, Derek
Schoombie and Peter De Kock.
After matric Peter went into the family business, Fatti’s and Moni’s dealing with industrial
relations until it was sold in 1981. He now runs his own tour operations business – Firelight
Tours and often deals with groups of American students from Furman University, South
Carolina who come to South Africa to study aids and the inter-relationships between white and
black people. He enjoys his work and the different aspects of it.
Peter’s son John matriculated from St David’s in 2009 and is currently studying for a BSc Hons
in Finance at UJ. Peter believes that the quality of education at St David’s has improved
enormously over the years.
JLE February 2013

Interview with Jean-Paul Renouprez – 1990
Jean-Paul came to St David’s in 1979 in grade 1 in Mrs Scaafsma’s class. Jean-Paul recalls she was a
combination of a battle axe and enforcer of the law being very strict with a good memory. Jean-Paul’s son
started his career at St David’s in grade 1 in the very same classroom.
As Jean-Paul suffered from bad asthma, he was not that good at sport and it wasn’t a big feature in his life
at that time, He played some soccer, was thrown into the baby pool and learnt to swim. There was he
recalls, a pecking order in the cricket practices which were held where the hockey field is now. He wasn’t
very competitive but remembers participating in the prep standard 5, inter-house general knowledge quiz.
He remembered Willy Castle and playing in an U7 D soccer match under threat. Mr Manolius was the prep
school headmaster, Mr Coetzee his standard 5 teacher who had a big, booming voice, Mrs Hurley taught
Music and organised the nativity plays in which Jean-Paul took part, Heather Joseph taught Art and Mr
Bronkhorst was the sports teacher for the C and D teams who took him under his wing, positioning him as
the goalkeeper.
Jean-Paul has memories of racing down to the tuck shop near the present D & T centre to buy some food
before it sold out.
On entering the high school, Jean-Paul had overcome his problem with asthma and made the 3rd team in
rugby, C and D teams for cricket and was a member of the swimming team.
Mr Olivier was a Maths teacher who made a difference; The Computer Science teacher and class teacher,
Mr Schafer died during his matric year; Mr Webster was the sports master and class master during
standard 6 and 7 and took great delight in holding water-polo practices in the unheated swimming pool
during August. Mr Finlayson was the History teacher and coached 1st team rugby, sport and PE, he was a
former Springbok, Zimbabwean squash player was absolutely feared in the high school and no-one wanted
to be in Benedict house. Jean-Paul enjoyed Religious Instruction which led the Brothers to, at one stage
believe that he may become a Brother. He enjoyed a trip to Slough meeting Br Anthony and used to help
make soup in the kitchen at St David’s .Mr Davies was the headmaster from 1989 until his matric but Mr
Murphy stands out as Jean-Paul was involved in a fund raising drive which entailed licking envelopes and
Mr Murphy told the boys that the resin was made from Camel’s hooves.
Richard Girdwood took over from Trudy Elliot in 1989 and Jean-Paul enjoyed helping with special effects
with various productions such as Hamlet and Julius Caesar and got in a lot of practice setting up lighting
and building sets in the area now occupied by the high school library. He was also involved with some
acting roles and put together a play for Osmond house for the inter-house plays competition. He also took
part in inter-house debating which he enjoyed. Apart from that he really enjoyed the war cries and attending
1st team rugby matches. A memorable and proud moment for Jean-Paul was when his uncle, a former
rugby Springbok and leading businessman, was asked to address the school at the prize giving ceremony.
A month into his matric year, Jean-Paul, together with Denis O’Regan was appointed a prefect and was
awarded a Champagnat Medal at the annual prize giving.
On their last day one of the boys went off in his car and brought back ciders which some of the boys drank
at the back of the pool. Jean-Paul went to the matric dances in standard 11 and in his matric year.
After matriculating Jean-Paul went on to study engineering at Wits University. Working for Altech he made
detonators for the mining industry, was active on the regulatory committee at Wits and in 1999 studied fulltime
for an MBA at UCT. He then spent 4 years with Dimension Data followed by a period in the
pharmaceutical industry and joined South African Breweries in 2007. He has four different roles within
operations and logistics management and is involved with packaging at the Newlands and Rosslyn
Breweries.
Jean-Paul felt that school was a good place, a safe place to be and gave him a special grounding. He
wasn’t particularly good at anything but would repeat his school career again. He is married and has a son
currently in Grade at St David’s, is a member of MOBS and is a member of the MOBS committee.
JLE March 2014

Interview with Allan Wotherspoon – 1980
Allan came to St David’s in the junior school but then left and went to the UK for 4 years and on his return
went into the high school. In principle he was put into the same class as people he would have been with in
junior school such as George Daras who was his closest friend in junior school, but had a different group of
friends by senior school, so Allan joined a new group of friends at senior school. Three of those five friends
now live close enough in Australia that they keep in touch on a regular basis.
Allan lived close enough to the school to be a day boy and saw his close friends out of school on a regular
basis but still had his parents and sisters around him. As he was one of the youngest in his class he had to
play sport with guys from the year below for many years.
He recalled Mr McFadden as he enjoyed History and remembered his favourite quote of “A for away and O
for Go”.
Allan enjoyed the sport, athletics 100, 200, 400 and 800m, physical education and especially games like
gaining ground, the odd game of cricket when he scored 50 runs or took a hat trick for the 2nd 11 team, or
played a good game of rugby. In athletics one year Allan broke a couple of school records and was victor
ludorum of both track and field, ending up with quite a few trophies and his father was asked to donate one
of them. Allan also ran in inter schools competitions.
He didn’t enjoy Afrikaans as he never had a good grasp of the language and struggled to pass the exams.
He disliked the sadistic canings by the headmaster and brothers and the attempts at bullying himself and
his friends.
Some disappointments included not being able to compete in running for athletics and not getting an
athletics scroll or honours blazer. Allan also had an accident which meant that he had to write his matric
exams with the wrong hand.
In standard 9 the boys decorated the hall and he recalled the difficulty and shyness of getting a date. His
matric dance was a great night out, the hall looked good and it was fun dressing up smartly.
On his last day he recalls all of the boys signing their school shirts, sneaking back in the middle of the night
and putting toilet rolls to stream all over the place.
After matriculating, Allan went on to Wits University to study BSc Commerce and completed many courses
throughout his business career. He is currently employed as an IT manager. Allan is still in touch with Lloyd
Wilkins (who he has known for 33 years), Brian Muller and Geoff Slaven, all living in Australia and literally
bumped into Gavin McLauglin who used to live in the same housing estate as his parents and went running
with him on weekends whilst he was temporarily staying in SA.

Interview with Allan Schwarer – 1941 – 45
Allan and his brother Paul attended Saxonwold Primary until Marist Inanda opened in 1941 and
were pupils at the school until they were relocated to Kimberly.
Allan recalled that Br Urban was the headmaster and a Br Pius was the eldest brother and well
liked by the boys. Br Urban came from Australia and Allan’s father helped him with regard to
local regulations etc regarding building work. As far as he can remember the school started with
standard1.
Allan’s family lived next to the Killarney golf course in West Street and he remembers playing in
a lane than ran alongside their property. To get to school they caught a bus as far as Dunkeld
and from there the school provided a taxi. All the roads to the north were dirt roads and Inanda
was very much in the country.
Other boys that he remembers being in his class were Michael Clarke, Steve Muller and Carl
Vermeulen. They used to play marbles in the quad and cricket although there was no soccer.
The school’s chapel was upstairs,
Allan currently undertakes legal work for the Catholic church.
JE July 2012

Interview with Nicholas Haralambous – 2002
Nicholas’s first memory of St David’s was the entrance exam which was held in what was a small theatre
by one of the science labs. He was 13 in grade 7 and had come from Crawford Prep where anything goes.
He had long hair, was shaving and wore civvies. All the other boys taking the exam were straight shooters.
School uniforms all done up and they knew each other. He was the only person from his school applying so
he kept himself to himself, wrote the exam, finished early and left.
When Nick was at S David’s there was no option but, given the choice he would have liked to board and
thought it would have been great. He spent so much time at school that maybe a bed was placed in one of
the classrooms. In any event he also remembered wanting to spend as much of his time messing around at
school as was possible.
Nick enjoyed the people most whilst he was at St David’s. At the time they were the best guys he could
have wanted to know and he enjoyed the well rounded nature of the school.
On the down side, Nick was always looking for more from St David’s in the way of choice – languages, arts,
drama and better coaching. There was always a bit more that could have been done. However it is good to
know that these things have been mostly addressed and that the school now offers a vast amount of
choice.
Nick will never forget the grade 8 camp at Glenmore, that year prefects attended a portion of the camp.
Nick played 1st team rugby in grade 11 and 12.
An occasion which stands out was when Nelson Mandela visited the school in Nick’s matric year. It meant
that he, as head boy had to give a speech to the school, guests and attendees. It was a daunting task at
the age of 18 to have to stand up and introduce an icon like Madiba. It was without doubt the most
memorable day that Nick had at St David’s.
Nick also had the pleasure of sitting close to Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State while he gave a
speech in the school’s amphitheatre and Bobby Skinstad was the guest speaker at the annual ruby dinner.
Nick couldn’t remember any “worst moments” but thought that it’s always rough dealing with school politics
and the most difficult period for him was grade 11 when prefects are announced. There was a lot of
pressure to be someone that you weren’t. Everyone has heard the PFP (pushing for prefect) taunts and for
whatever reason Nick felt a lot of stick for that in his year.
Mr Edey was without doubt the most memorable teaching figure Nick had ever encountered. He really
understood the school, its ethos and all the boys individually. He had it. Nick will never forget his booming
voice in the History classes and the empathetic assembly speeches. The most memorable speech he
recalled Mr Edey giving was in 2000 after a particularly bad week where St David’s boys were singled out
for something stupid. Mr Edey stood in front of the school and reminded the boys , as only he could, that it’s
the 5% of boys that let the other 95% down and they shouldn’t let them define who they were.
The matric dance was an interesting one. The dance Nick’s year threw in grade 11 was epic and was
hosted at the Sandton Sun Towers in Sandton City. They had an amazing Venetian theme and kitted
everything out in incredible style and they expected the same for their matric year but didn’t get it. Nick is
not sure whether the grade 11’s in 2002 were pranking them but the dance was hosted at the Wanderers
Club and the theme was “Aliens”. Nick felt it was cringe- worthy but in the end entirely memorable because
of how bad it was.
On his last day Nick remember being quite relieved to have made it through matric. It was difficult to
imagine a world without the other 90 or so guys in his class. They did what every matric does, the hazing
on their way out, the pranks and the traditional breakfast in the pavilion. Then it was over, just like that.
Nick was a prefect and head boy and was awarded a general honours blazer, the Old Boys Trophy for
Leadership and Promotion of the Marist Spirit and a Champagnat medal.
In Nick’s speech at the annual prize giving he said “Tradition has and will always have a place in our
school”. The single most moving experience of my life was walking down the 1st XV rugby steps in my
tracksuit with 400 boys sitting in front of me and cheering the first team on”.
After matriculating, Nick attended Rhodes University and received an undergraduate degree in journalism
and politics. Nick is currently a consultant and the owner of the men’s fashion brand Nic Harry.
Nick is a member of MOBS and last visited St David’s in 2012.
JE 2014

Interview with Duncan Hunter – 2006
Duncan’s first day at St David’s was in grade 4 and he remembers it as being completely different from his
previous school in that there was a feeling that excellence was important along with discipline. He found it
to be a rather overwhelming experience.
The best part of school for Duncan was having his mates with him most of the time, in class, during breaks
and then playing sport in the afternoons together. Duncan is still in contact with them and even now, almost
ten years later they all miss sitting on their specific bench in the quad during breaks. Other aspects he
enjoyed were all the sport on offer and the fact that his whole year was very much planned in advance by
somebody else. There was a lot less to worry about back then!
As with most boys, Duncan did not enjoy the homework and the studying for exams.
An occasion that stands out was the new boys “initiation” and prefects’ test that they did when they arrived
in the high school. Having to remember all the prefects’ names and various other random facts about the
school was, looking back, quite funny. Another weekly event the boys had when they were in matric was
the prefects’ assembly. Duncan can remember some of what was said being hysterical and probably not
repeatable! Another event which stood out was the time the boys travelled down to Durban for the Westville
gala over the Midmar weekend in 2002. They were quite out-classed at the time, but the schools’ swimming
went from strength to strength after they had seen the level they needed to be at to compete across the
country.
One of the funniest things the boys used to do at break at one stage during high school was to play an
interesting variation of soccer. The person who scored used to have to try to run away from everyone as
the aim was to all “pile on” the scorer. It made no sense then and still doesn’t but most of the grade used to
get involved. They also played various other versions of rugby and soccer throughout their time, most of
which were banned very quickly.
There were many teachers over the years that made lasting impressions. That is one of the qualities of the
staff at St David’s; they take a genuine interest in the boys they are teaching. In the prep school, Mrs
Everson made a lasting impression in terms of her guidance and some of the perspectives she shared. In
high school, Mrs Kennedy taught Duncan’s Maths class for three years and he ended up in her matric
class. She got to know the boys over the years and on top of being an excellent teacher she supported
them and gave them guidance when needed. On a personal level, Duncan was involved in tutoring Maths
classes during university which he felt was due to Mrs Kennedy.
Duncan swam and was in the A team swimming throughout prep and high school. He played water polo for
the 2nd team, rugby for the 2nd team and thought that the annual Midmar trip with the swimming team was
always memorable. The Ken Short Shield under 14 water polo tournament played in East London was also
a great trip. On a provincial level, Duncan was selected for the Gauteng lifesaving team.
Duncan was a prefect and deputy head of College house in 2006 and his twin brother was also prefect, so
two out of twelve wasn’t bad going for the Hunter family. Duncan received specific honours for academics
as well as general honours and also won various academic subject prizes over the years, the last being the
Maths prize in matric. He also received team awards for swimming and water polo.
Duncan remembers the last day of school quite clearly. He and the matrics organised a braai in the
morning in the quad to celebrate. One of the guys ended up bringing a whole bunch of chickens with him
that they let run around during the day. This was a great source of entertainment for all the boys. The same
day his twin brother, Malcolm climbed out of the window of Mrs Kennedy’s 2nd storey Maths classroom and
climbed down the side of the building. Mrs Kennedy got quite a surprise when Malcolm came back up and
knocked on the door asking to be let in!
After matriculating, Duncan went on to study Bachelor of Accounting Science at Wits University and then
completed the requirements for CA (SA) in 2013. He is currently a manager at PWC London in the
assurance practice.
Duncan is a member of MOBS and visits the school when he can.
JLE March 2015

Interview with Rod McLay – 1975
Rod came to St David’s from Marist Brothers in Bird Street, Port Elizabeth in 1966. His mother was a
teacher at the school and his brother Hamish matriculated in 1972. The family was not Catholic and his
father was a Scottish Protestant. Rod appreciates the fact that the religion of catholicism was not pushed
onto the non-Catholics and they didn’t have to attend mass.
He remembers Brothers Mario; Timothy; Andrew (Drac); Michael; Bernard who was a good photographer
but had a mean temper; Aidan, the bursar and Ezekiel who taught Maths. Of the lay teachers he recalled
Mr Lipschitz who taught Maths; Saunders – Afrikaans, Mrs Elliott – English; Mr Maritz and Mrs Kempster.
Rod played 1st team rugby and cricket in the high school and was captain of the athletics team. As far as
academics went he didn’t cover himself in glory and went on after matric to Damelin to repeat Maths and he
enjoyed his time there.
In those days there were only 24 of them in matric including the likes of Grant Ramsey (who was accused
of tax fraud in later years); the Melton twins; Kevin Prudence a biochemist now living in Guernsey; Mark
Meaker; Frank Soul who was a sportsman, placed third in Ironman and became a Springbok cyclist in the
80’s; John Morrison a chemical engineer; Kevin McGurk whose father was big in the printing industry and
head boy was Andre Dugas.
Rod was awarded an honours blazer, scrolls for athletics; rugby; merit became a prefect and was vicecaptain
of Osmond house.
After matriculating, Rod went into the army then to University of the Witwatersrand. He then became a
helicopter pilot in the air force, then the police and now flies for SA Express and is a police reservist.
Rod is married to Janine and has a son Matthew who is currently in grade2.
JLE June 2015

Interview with Darryn Haltman – 2008
Darryn Haltmann came to St David’s in grade 4 and remembers the anxieties and excitement of
walking into the school leaving his mother and meeting his soon to be friends.
The teachers he remembers are Mr Rod Smith, Mrs Glanville, Mr Reichart, Mrs Fleming and
Mrs Marais.
He enjoyed the sport and played 1st team rugby and cricket and was involved with soccer and
athletics.
He was most unhappy when they lost any of their sports fixtures, but thoroughly enjoyed the
rugby tour to New Zealand and Australia.
Darryn participated in the Advanced Maths programme and felt it was especially helpful for both
1st and 2nd year Maths and Stats at university.
He is still in touch with a number of his school friends and they are all members of MOBS.
He is currently studying for a Bachelor of Business Science: finance and accounting at UCT. He
was awarded a faculty scholarship and has appeared on the Dean’s list and received the
Kopano award for academic excellence.
JE May 2013

Interview with Max Leipold - 1959
Max started as a boarder in Std 2 in 1951. His parents lived in Standerton and in Std 9 they
settled in Illovo and then became a day student. He was very unhappy and missed the
camaraderie of the boarding school so went back as a boarder in matric. Brian Nicol was head
boy and the Joint Matriculation Board exam was written.
Max played 1st team rugby and was in the team which beat Obs for the first time despite Obs
having future Springbok Sid Nomis in their team. A tour had been arranged for Obs to visit Port
Elizabeth and play against Marist Walmer in 1958. Due to the very poor season Obs were
experiencing it was decided that Inanda, who were having a good season, should travel in their
stead. Br Bonaventure and the boys travelled by train. The team lost to Victoria Park and Grey
College but beat Walmer 11-3.
Max enjoyed the boarding system and in those days there were two dorms with 44 beds in
each. Max enjoyed collecting the pictures of girls on the back page of the Sunday Times in
those days and made a scrapbook. On this occasion the boys were all sitting round looking at
the pictures when Br Ephrem came ‘gliding’ by. Not wanting to be caught they threw the book
out of the window but it fell near to Br Bonaventure’s window. His parents were called in to see
Br Benedict, the headmaster to discuss this.
Max was born in 1941 and retired at the age of 53 and moved to the house they had built in
Hermanus. He originally worked for IBM but then moved to Ellerman shipping company where
he was a director. Max’s hobby is photography and he and his wife travel extensively in pursuit
of this hobby.
Interview: 12 October 2010

Interview with Eric Ambrosioni -1966 & Rohan Erleigh – 1967
Both Eric and Rohan were boarders. Eric’s two half brothers Edward Barale and Italo Barale
also boarded and Rohan had two brothers follow him. They knew each other through the
boarding and played in the same rugby, cricket and athletics teams. Goodenough, a kitchen
hand could outstrip every athlete and broke the school record running barefoot. The highpoint in
cricket was when professional, English cricketers came to the school, Ken Palmer and Peter
Stringer who lived at the school and Donald Wilson who got married here and lived above the
chapel. On Saturdays if any major cricket team was playing, the boys had to dress up in full
uniform and walk to Wanderers wearing straw bashers..
They recalled an American field scholar, Philp Marsden who could throw a tennis ball higher
than the tennis captain could with his racket. Julio Cesneros’s father was the Spanish
ambassador, who assisted in bringing the Spanish football team, Real Madrid to South Africa.
The Springbok, Ray Bischoff swam against the Dutch and broke a South African record. The
cycling team was started with Deon and Brett Sacks and Rohan remembers his bike breaking
down near Gilooley’s Farm. There was also a model airplane club, all the planes took off and
then crashed! A Tiger Moth was donated.
Cadets were also started in their time and Eric was one of the first five cadet student officers.
There was a Southern Transvaal Schools Drummer competition and the school won the bass
and tenor drums section beating 700 other schools – who weren’t there!!!
The drama society was initiated together with Parktown Convent and was oversubscribed!
There was a debating society with Dave Lyons, Pat Noble and Andrew Lindiker and debates
were always held on a Sunday at the convent. There was also a dark room where some of the
boys developed their photos.
Gertie the 3 ton utility truck used to convey pupils to various sports events and was eventually
sold and replaced with a new school bus that was painted blue and was involved in an accident
after the first three weeks, the driver being Zebron.
Mrs Buckley-Jones was the much loved matron who however made them write tests whilst in
the sick bay. Mr Drummon-Bell was the Music teacher who produced the “Pirates of Penzance”.
Eric remembered a teacher called Mrs Cane, at Marist Borthers Koch Street Johannesburg, (the
primary school to both Marist Brothers and Inanda) who used it (the cane) with gay abandon.
The first lay teachers in the high school were Mrs Buchan – English, very English, unattractive
but kind, Mrs Pretorius – Afrikaans, she was good looking but unfriendly, Mr Ward – Maths, Mr
Hewitson – Art. Eric remembered a pupil from Greece who chatted in class and when Mrs
Pretorius asked him what he had said Eric told him to say “Ek is jou lief”!
There was a Science lab but when they left it was replaced by a newer one and Eric’s two
brothers – Orcellis – donated two glass windows.
For two years during the mid 1960’s, the brothers hired a catering manager and his wife, the
Coopers. They had a corgi which started off thin but ended up as a blimp! The boys used to
regularly raid the kitchen. Flat bed trolleys were used to carry food, boxes etc and the boys used
to pile onto them and ride down the inclines resulting in quite a few stitches.
Eric was designated, together with George Da Matta to act as cinematographers for the film
every Saturday night. Someone had to collect the 16mm films and they were given pocket
money to get the bus, however George’s father would fetch them and take them to his café to
gorge on fish and chips etc and then after to collect the films in the centre of Johannesburg.
They then caught the bus back to Dunkeld and had to lug the box of 16mm films to school.
The first Spur restaurant opened in Rosebank and several boys were caught bunking in the
Spur and in Ken Rosewall’s snooker saloon. They recall that disputes were resolved between
the boys behind the games room next to the tennis courts.
To celebrate the 75th anniversary of Champagnat they made the great trek to Cape Town, all
the buses broke down and all the schools ended up at St Joseph’s.
They remember the land bought by the school and the boys of 1966 planted the grass on the
rugby field and cricket pitch.
There was no real communication then, only the telephone and radio. They had vague
memories of the assassination of Kennedy and the attempted and actual assassination of
Verwoed. They had a day off school due to the “Bay of Pigs”. They did remember the stance
taken by the Catholic schools with regard to admitting black children which wasn’t popular with
the government.
Both Eric and Rohan have been back to St David’s for a 40 year reunion and would be
interested in supporting the publication of the book.
Individual memories of Eric Ambrosioni:
Eric’s mother died then his father and in Standard 8 his step brothers came to an arrangement
with the school to enable him to stay there. He had no bad experiences although Brother
Ignatius would lash you for no treason.
Joe Mulaneu lived at the bottom of the bottom field and Eric lived opposite him. He remembers
fooling around with him and hitting him with a metal rod, subsequently their parents banned
them from seeing each other. They later became good buddies and Joe became a
paediatrician.
After the Saturday cinema one night he raided the kitchen, realising a brother was there he tried
to get rid of the evidence and a paw paw rolled down the hall and he was caught by Brother
Liam.
He also remembers going home in the first term and crying about being bullied. His brother
advised him to put a shoe in his pillowcase and wait until the bully fell asleep and then whack
him with it. The bullying stopped after he tried that out.
When he finished school he wanted to go to varsity but, having no family to support him, he
ended up in a bank and was then balloted into the army in which he stayed for three years. He
then went into the oil industry and was seconded to the UK and his company was bought out by
BP. He was repatriated and offered a package in 2004, bought a pasta machine and became a
pasta maker his wife having bought an Italian deli. He made pasta for the deli and sold to other
delis and shops in the Cape Peninsula. He sold the pasta machine at the beginning of the year
to his nephew, another Marist old boy Ted Barale who owns Piccolino in Fourways. He is
married to Louise and is the father to two daughters.
Eric’s brother Italo (1953) married Myrna Morgan whose brothers went to Inanda, Harold and
Ronny who became a Marist Brother.
Individual Memories of Rohan Erleigh:
His parents lost everything they had in business but insisted he went to a private school. They
had an old car, a 1947 Plymouth and he was so embarrassed he told them to meet him outside.
Rohan was an altar boy.
After finishing school Rohan went gold mining outside Sabi, gold was then at $25 per ounce. He
subsequently went into the navy for his national service and made a naval career. He studied
for a BSc at Stellenbosch, rose to the heights of naval captain becoming a military attaché and
retired in 2000 after a final posting as officer commanding the navy’s training base on the west
coast. He spent time on the maritime border during the war in Angola.
He married a Morgan girl and is father to two sons and a daughter. The Morgan boys all went to
St David’s and Ronnie Morgan became a Brother.
Old Boys they are still in contact with:
Jo Stravino, Dereck Schoombie, Peter Moni, Eddie Assad (orthodontist) Peter Struthers
(maxillofacial surgeon) Michael Ford, Clive Bergman (singer), Tony Walker brother of Jeff
Walker (Master of the John Ross), Strati Malamoglou (Dyna Chem), Steve Taylor (sub-ed
Times ltd), Charlie Platt, Patrick Nobe, Brian Jarvis, Kevin Peel, Terry O’Mahoney, Emilio
Iglauer, Anthony Barale (doctor in Canada).
JE October 2011

Interview with Willy Castle – June 2010
In the original letter requesting the enrolment of Willy as a pupil at St David’s written by his
father, his father said that he wanted any son of his to be a Marist boy. Willy began his
career at St David’s in 1957 beginning as a day boy in grade 1 with Mrs Brick as his first
teacher until grade 5 when, because of sport, Mrs Buckley-Jones recommended that he
become a boarder.
The school hours were 8am until 2.45pm followed by sport. During his first year as a boarder
he was told to go to the chapel, he thought he had done something wrong but, sadly was
told that his father had died.
Eventually, Br Timothy was the only brother teaching at the school. Willy remembers that
Brother Benedict (Beak) was the first headmaster and that Br Bosco changed his name to Br
Mario.
The school was then considered to be out in the sticks, with no fence around it with people
taking short cuts across the school grounds. Willy used to ride his bicycle home on Sunday
with no cars around. He loved the weekends, just played sport and there was always
something on at Wanderers. A burger and a movie was the highlight of the week and it was
26 kms to Little Falls for a day out swimming.
Many boys came from all over Africa and there were 50 boarders allocated to one room –
with four dormitories A, B, C, and D. The food was magnificent with chef Piet, a huge, strong
man. The boarders had 3 meals a day with morning coffee and afternoon tea, and Sunday
roast with cold drinks and ice cream. They had to wear school uniform all the time but,
occasionally were allowed to wear a suit. Br Anthony allowed them access to the pantry but
they had to eat everything there. The boys used to climb out of the dormitories and take food
from the fridge until the brothers padlocked the fridge door, but the boys worked out a way to
lift the door off its hinges helping themselves to food during the night.
The school buildings stopped at the chapel and went down to Rivonia road which was the
Love’s farm. When the owner’s died, the school bought the land right down to the Inandas.
Maryknoll was the original farmhouse and Willy’s house was the family library. The old
workshop was originally the stables.
Because of the boarders, the school had powerful sports teams and the brothers used to
train them hard. The fields were where the current swimming pool and tennis courts are now.
Mrs Kempster, was headmistress of the prep (she retired in 1974). The current high school
library was the dining room and then the hall. The staff room and admin block was formerly a
rose garden.
Marist cricket week, which has since disappeared, was a great event. Rugby matches
against other Marist schools and rugby tours, like the 1967 tour to St Joseph’s when all the
boys were bussed down and back.
Willy recalled some incidents, In 1953 the matric exam papers were stolen, whilst on camp
at Happy Acres, Oliver Green slipped down the river bank and cut himself very badly. Willy
drove him immediately to Sandton Clinic, making the trip in 20 minutes!
There are also some sad stories. Paul Visser and his brother,who was deaf. Paul eventually
shot himself and the other brother got into an argument in a pub, ran outside and was
knocked down and killed.
Another sad event was when Keith Schafer died. Jason Giles, a naughty boy had been
caught smoking and Keith as senior housemaster had to reprimand him and he usually just
whacked the boys. Paul Davies, the then headmaster called Keith to his office and really
dumped on him. Later Keith was marking exams in the staff room and began to shake and
then fell off his chair. Someone ran to get matron who gave him oxygen; the paramedics
came too late as he had died. Keith had a son in grade 0 Andrew Schafer.
Willy also recalled a time when he offered a cash reward to any boys that told him who was
guilty of marking the bathroom tiles with his shoe every day. Willy couldn’t open his office
door because of the number of pieces of paper that had been pushed under it! Hamilton was
the guilty party.
Sean Sandie, grade 9 was walking with his girlfriend by the Braamfontein spruit when
someone grabbed his girlfriend’s handbag and stabbed him. He lost a lot of blood and had
visual damage. It was a miracle that he lived and three years later wrote matric.
Willy matriculated in 1968, came back in 1976 and 1977 as a student teacher and joined the
staff in 1978 for two terms then went off to St Stithians when Murphy was the headmaster. In
2014 Willy was appointed headmaster of the prep achieving a dream. He is currently
chairman of the Marist old boys.
The rest is history!
JE August 2011 – edited 2016

Interview with James Miller – 1955
James Attended Koch Street from 1944 until 1946 and became a boarder at Inanda from 1947.
Brother Urban was the headmaster followed by Brother Edwin – “Jack Bones, The Boss” and
Brother McGurk was a traffic cop. Although he was a non-catholic he made some great
friendships and is still in touch with Derek Stansfield who lives in New Zealand.
He remembers his first day, he was about 8 years old, when he was taken to school by his
mother in a taxi as the school was considered far out in those days. He sat at the gate crying his
heart out. A whistle blew and all the boys queued for their meals outside the dining hall. His two
sisters were in a convent at Boksburg.
He enjoyed being a boarder and went to a Marist school because of Brother Aquinas. The
family were living in Joubert Park, his father was killed during the war and Brother Aquinas was
instrumental into getting him into Koch Street and then Inanda.
He enjoyed sport the most and played U13 soccer, 1st and U14, U15 rugby, from 1954 in
standards 9 and 10 he played 1st team rugby and remembers the great rivalry with Obs –
Observatory. He was in the boxing team in standard 6 (when it was stopped) and in a match
against Observatory, boxed against Alan Zimmerman who was then in standard 9, all the boys
were all soundly beaten. He recalls a yearly athletics tournament against Germiston Boys High
and another school, maybe CBC Boksburg. There were no provincial or national colours for the
boys as all the other schools were Afrikaans we were never selected
He wrote matric but was not great academically. There were 40 in the matric class that year.
He was house captain of College house. Most of the Brothers were good teachers, Brothers
Aquinas, Bartholemew, Ralph (the rugby coach), Ephraim (matric teacher)but there were some
bad moments. Brother Joseph, who was killed in a plane crash, taught Latin and was very
unpleasant and always walked in with a strap and used it at every opportunity. He remembered
Mrs Kempster in standard 4 a very good teacher, then in standard 5 Mr Bishop. The boys used
to ask him questions from the encyclopaedia and he always answered correctly. In standard 6
there was Mr Hoar who was a bit deaf and the boys unkindly mocked him.
Boarding school food was ok but for the weevils in the porridge. New boarders wouldn’t want to
eat it and the other boarders ate it for them until they wised up. He looked forward to Sundays
when they had eggs and bacon. On Sundays they used to walk to St Martins in the Veld. There
were 176 boarders with each dorm having 44 boys in ABCD dorms. The toilets were in the quad
and when the school had a féte, the Brothers used to cover them in sacking and made them into
a temporary ladies cloakroom.
There was an annual dance. The last one they had was at Parktown Convent and, on the way
home, Nicki Tvrdeich asked him if he had a partner for the matric dance and promised to
organise someone for him. On the night of the dance his partner didn’t arrive and he never
forgave Nicki.
**He remembers Robbie Brunton who was head boy in 1955 and also cricket and rugby captain,
Fred Hoppert, Naldo Brocco the father of Renzo, Neville Kirschman and his brother Brian known
as “Kippie”, Dan Robinson now living in Durban North, went to the Northern Rhodesian police
and his father was killed in the war. He later joined the Hong Kong police force for about 20
years. Brian Jeffries living in Uvongo. Vito Rugani – 1954, John Venter 1954, John Livingstone
1954, James Tonetti 1954. Aubrey Chalmers 1955 Graham Talbot 1955 Jack Kamps 1955 Ron
Gbrcic
At the end of his school career he had to spend a couple of days at school writing exams
before they broke up. He remembers all the boys signed a class photo. He can’t remember
where the matric dance was held but Pam Horwitz was his partner, the love of his love at the
time.
After school he did his military service which was compulsory for one year. He then joined the
police force in Zambia (Northern Rhodesian police) then worked on the mines and came back to
South Africa in 1967. He worked in the industrial storage and equipment field for over 30 years.
He met his wife on a blind date when they went to see “The Odd Couple”. He had 3 daughters
and has 5 grandchildren the boys are at Grey College. He spent many years in the Eastern
Cape in E.L. and Port Elizabeth returning to Johannesburg in 1988. He was transferred to Cape
Town in 1997, the company was sold in 1998 and all staff were retrenched. He decided to go it
alone and eventually retired two years ago and now lives in Kommetjie and has a black belt in
Judo. He last visited the school about three years ago and would be interested to stay in touch.
JE October 2011