Page 143 - Bulletin 17 2013

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inherited by the daughter of her second marriage, Caroline Maria Fish, who married C. M.

Hickman. Hickman had plans passed for a dental surgery to be built on the corner of Belmont
Road and Lever Street in 1929. It seems it was not built because plans for a house on the site

were passed in 1932.

On the ground floor of Melville House there were many tenants over the years, some of whom
will be remembered by older Kalk Bay people: Kallis the baker (bought out by Attwells), a vet,

A. Heaton – in 1919, Cooper the pharmacist (later Kalk Bay Pharmacy), Standard Bank – in

1925 – and by 1937 Grienem Markowitz, the fruiterer who bought the building in 1945.

The Washhouse

The washhouse was a significant part of Die Dam. (Figs. 3.26 & 3.27.) The land on which it

stood had been bought by the Municipality of Kalk Bay in various parcels from Robert Andrew
Fish, the Smit family, and from Dirk Gysbert Eksteen. It was built in 1901 on the site of the dam

and for many years served not only as a means of earning money, and providing clean clothing
and linen, but as a social centre for the women who worked there. It is not difficult to imagine

the exchanges of news and gossip that took place here over the years as one generation replaced

another. After going through many financial ups and downs, with the Council trying to close it
for economic reasons, it was finally closed in 1952. Various erven surrounding the washhouse

were consolidated into what is now known as the Lever Street Park.

On 29 June 1922 Emily September and 17 other washerwomen petitioned the Council to

disallow a coal yard in the vicinity. On its own this petition is an interesting historic piece but
more interesting is that it gives us the names of 17 of the women who lived and worked in Kalk

Bay 90 years ago. Many of these names are still well known and some of the families still live in
Kalk Bay. Emily September was the supervisor and probably part of the September family that

lived in ‘Myrtle Villas’ in Belmont Road. They are almost certainly the family of the well known

Daisy September who taught at the Klipskool for many years.