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The Early
Twentieth Century
(page 1) |
| Introduction |
On 31 May 1910, the unification
of South Africa brought to an end the old colonial certainties. Previously Cape
Town stood as an Imperial Capital of The Cape Colony. That colony was now
simply a Province of the new Union of South Africa. The
grand parliament buildings in Cape Town became the legislative capital of the
new state, but Pretoria was made the administrative capital.
It was soon clear that real power and influence would no longer
lie in Cape Town but in the Transvaal, the old Afrikaans republics that
included the economic centre of the Rand (the gold seam at Johannesburg) and
the political capital at Pretoria. Furthermore, Durban's port was proving more
profitable than Cape Town's due to its easy access to the Transvaal.
Losing economic and political influence, Cape Town promoted
itself as a cultural centre and worked to define South African identity in
terms of its Cape Town roots - the arrival of van Riebeeck and the Imperial
era.
Divisions in Cape Town society became very plain during
World War 1 and were compounded by a
depression in the 1920s. In the new era Cape Town was increasingly subject to
the hardline, racially-minded politics of the Transvaal, and racist attitudes
hardened.
Although not as swiftly as Johannesburg, Cape Town became an
industrial city as the port expanded and motor cars, electricity and cinema
arrived. Electricity reached people's homes in the 1930s and the Table Bay
power station was built in 1936 bringing a significant increase to Cape Town's
revenues.
Images of the city in the early twentieth century are
characterised by the pier built in 1925. But demands for improved city
infrastructure and new docks led to the demolishing of the pier in 1940 to make
way for a massive land reclamation scheme which extended the city, created land
for freeways and wharfs for the modern port.
In the process concrete replaced the old seafront and these
developments marked a new, disconnected and imposing era. Capetonians came to
associate the pier with a pre-apartheid Cape Town when social relations were
more easy going, the pace of life slower and the town was by the
sea.
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Heritage Sections
· Culture ·
· Environment
·
History
· Society
Personalities ·
Areas
In this period of Cape History:
Overview
Introduction
Mother
City
Division
Growth and
Control
Conclusion
Bibliography &
Contacts
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