More Stories from East Africa's past for you to enjoy
Salama Fikira Derby – April 12, 2015 – #SFkenyaderby2015
The Third Annual Salama Fikira Kenya Derby 2015. For the third consecutive year, Salama Fikira will be sponsoring the Kenya Derby on Sunday 12th April 2015 at the Ngong Racecourse in Nairobi, Kenya. The Kenya Derby is the biggest event of its kind in East Africa’s horseracing circuit. This year will mark the 110th anniversary of horse racing in Kenya…
Donald Garvie and the First Cinema in Kenya
Who were the Garvies and why did they come to the Uasin Gishu Plateau? The first white residents on the Plateau were the van Breda brothers – Bon, Dirk and Piet, who arrived in 1902. In the same year two more families arrived – Donald Garvie, a Scotsman, and his wife Cornelia (Nellie) Gertrude Steyn, and her youngest brother Stephen Steyn. The Steyns were a Boer family resident in Orange Free State…
Banker J C Shaw Encourages Eldoret to Develop
In 1912 Eldoret did not even have a name. It consisted of a few dukas (small shops), a bar, the District Commissioner’s house and a post office. It was called ‘Sixty-four’ by the few Boers and Britons who farmed in the area because such was the number on the map of the block of land it occupied. The post office gave as its address Eldore River, a watercourse which merged with another river named the Sosiani…
Hamat – Just Another Refugee
In the world today there are over 50 million refugees – people who have left their homes under catastrophic conditions and are struggling to survive in limbo without place or country. It is difficult for us to get our minds around the magnitude of this many suffering people. So let me tell the story of a single refugee – my friend Hamat…
Syrup of Figs…
This advert was in featured in the Globe Trotter newspaper published in Nairobi in 1906.
Cecil Hoey and Hoey’s Bridge (now Moi’s Bridge)
One of the first white residents in the Trans-Nzoia region was Arthur Cecil Hoey. Who was Hoey? He was born in Wimbledon in 1883 and baptised on 12 October that year, the son of John Hoey and his wife Matilda Jane, née Tront, who came from Dublin. In 1891 the family was living in Knaphill near Woking and Arthur Cecil had an older brother John and a younger brother William Henry. There was also an…
Briton vs Boer: Educational Tensions in Trans-Nzoia
After the Second World War, the British Government encouraged white settlers to go to the Trans-Nzoia area and Uganda. Of course this increased the number of children to be educated. As Eldoret was the largest town, it was sensible to place the schools there, especially as it was easily reached from Uganda by rail. The Central School was built there, but as the number of Afrikaner children attending rose, so the…
Poison of the Arrow by Iain MacDonald
The world is changing. Kigusu the magnificent elephant whose great tusks and cunning have become whispered legend around the smoky fires of the African bush knows this; the walls are closing in on his once expansive empire. He carries musket scars from Arab slave traders, arrowheads hurled by wily African hunters and bullet wounds from pale hunters from across the seas. He has defeated and…
Early white settlers from Britain in Trans-Nzoia
Early White Settlers from Britain in Trans-Nzoia Mrs Gladys Hoey reached the plateau in 1913, arriving with her father in an ox wagon. Her future husband, Cecil, later a breeder of racehorses, had reached the Nzoia river in 1904 when on a hunting expedition....
World War I Battlefield Tour – Maktau Cemetery
World War I Battlefield Tour Taita Taveta August 2014 Part two Maktau Railway Station and Cemetery In August 2014 I travelled with my daughter Malindi and a group of Old Africa readers on a tour of World War I battlefield sites. James Willson acted as our guide. After...
The Founding of Kitale
There is a map of the Trans Nzoia area in 1908, which showed numerous potential farms delineated by metal beacons stuck in the ground. A survey had been done to encourage white settlers to come to the area. Kitale appeared as a rectangle three miles by two, but in...
Book Launch! Culture Clash by Rupert Watson
New review on The Red Pelican
Jon Arensen's book is not only a good read; it is engaging and provocative, telling the heart-warming story of a man who has dedicated his entire life to God. The man's name is Dick Lyth. And his story reveals that he was truly blessed with a servant's heart. His...
Endless Horizons, now available in Paperback!
Alone in the Desert
Our safari company tried out a new route from the southeastern end of Lake Turkana to Marsabit National Park through the Koroli Desert. We were halfway across the 30 mile sandy stretch of the Koroli Desert, and the driver had not seen another vehicle all morning and...
J.H.Patterson, author of The Man-Eaters of Tsavo
Many of you will have heard of John Henry Patterson, the man who shot the man-eating lions threatening the workers on the Mombasa-Lake Victoria railway line. He was in charge of building the railway bridge across the Tsavo River when the lions went on their murderous...
Locating a Lion
My mother Shelina Popat worked in the Maasai Mara in tourism as a 22-year-old. One day a VIP guest, a middle-aged woman, arrived from England. She was very eager to see a lion. After her first game drive, the woman went to Shelina and explained that she really wanted...
The Rarest Thing on the Coast
As a child, our family often spent holidays at the Mnarani Club in Kilifi. One vacation in the 1960s the Club, managed in this days by Monty and Peggy Hayes, organised a scavenger hunt for all of us children. As we raced around collecting things for our list, we...