Ventersdorp
Ventersdorp is located in North West (South African province)
Ventersdorp
Ventersdorp
Ventersdorp is located in South Africa
Ventersdorp
Ventersdorp
Ventersdorp is located in Africa
Ventersdorp
Ventersdorp
Coordinates: 26°19′S 26°49′E / 26.317°S 26.817°E / -26.317; 26.817
CountrySouth Africa
ProvinceNorth West
DistrictDr Kenneth Kaunda
MunicipalityJB Marks
Established1866
Area
[1]
 • Total53.88 km2 (20.80 sq mi)
Population
 (2011)[1]
 • Total4,204
 • Density78/km2 (200/sq mi)
Racial makeup (2011)
[1]
 • Black African51.4%
 • Coloured5.5%
 • Indian/Asian2.3%
 • White40.2%
 • Other0.5%
First languages (2011)
[1]
 • Afrikaans46.6%
 • Tswana40.5%
 • English4.3%
 • Xhosa2.8%
 • Other5.8%
Time zoneUTC+2 (SAST)
Postal code (street)
2710
PO box
2710
Area code018

Ventersdorp is a town of 4,200 in Dr Kenneth Kaunda District Municipality, North West Province, South Africa. It was the seat of the defunct Ventersdorp Local Municipality until 2016.

Ventersdorp is centrally located, making it easier to access more prominent urban towns such as Klerksdorp, Lichtenburg, Potchefstroom and Rustenburg. The township (or Location) of Tshing houses most of the town's blacks and coloureds. Tshing has a diamond mine nearby that was owned by a town councillor in the early 1990s. Tshing Location has one high school: Thuto Boswa High School. The smaller township Toevlug has Coloured residents, some of whom have attend the former whites-only Afrikaans High School after the end of Apartheid since 1995.

History

The town grew around a Dutch Reformed Church that was established in 1866.[2][3] It was named after Johannes Venter who owned the farm Roodepoort and the land the church was built on.[2][4] It was proclaimed as a town in June 1887.[4] The Mill on the town was built by Richrd Carew Wilson in 1866

Racial tensions

Afrikaner nationalist and white supremacist[5] Eugène Terre'Blanche was born in Ventersdorp[5][6] and the town is the base of the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB), the far-right white separatist political organisation and former paramilitary group that Terre'Blanche founded. The town was the site of the 1991 "Battle of Ventersdorp" in which lethal clashes occurred between members of the apartheid government security forces and the AWB ahead of a scheduled appearance by then State President F. W. de Klerk.

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Main Place Ventersdorp". Census 2011.
  2. 1 2 "www.routes.co.za/nw/ventersdorp".
  3. ↑ "www.tourismnorthwest.co.za/southern/ventersdorp".
  4. 1 2 Raper, Peter E.; Moller, Lucie A.; du Plessis, Theodorus L. (2014). Dictionary of Southern African Place Names. Jonathan Ball Publishers. p. 1412. ISBN 9781868425501.
  5. 1 2 "Eugene Terre'Blanche obituary". The Guardian. April 4, 2010. Retrieved December 10, 2013.
  6. ↑ "Eugene Terreblanche killed in South Africa". BBC News. 4 April 2010. Retrieved 2013-12-10.

External sources

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Ventersdorp.
  • The Leader, His Driver and the Driver's Wife, a Nick Broomfield film (1991)
  • His Big White Self, a Nick Broomfield film (2006)
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