Page 204 - Bulletin 9 2005

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THE STORY OF CAMPS BAY
AND THE STORY OFTHE BOOK ABOUT CAMPS BAY

CAMPS BAY: AN ILLUSTRATED HISTORY

Talk by Gwynne Schrire

to the AGM of the Kalk Bay Historical Association, 5 April 2005.

Introduction

I feel at disadvantage writing about Camps Bay for the Kalk Bay Historical Association

because I represent the new kid on the block. Camps Bay was certainly a late starter.

Kalk Bay was recognised by Simon van der Stel way back in 1687 and had resident
fishermen when the nameless bay on the other side of the Peninsula was just an

occasional grazing ground for the Gorinhaikwa. One hundred years later (1781) Camps

Bay had acquired a temporary earthen battery on Kloof Nek (which is sort of Camps
Bay). (Fig. 5.1) By 1800 when Kalk Bay was already a fishing village that brought in as

many as 40 whales a season and lots of whalebone for corsets, Camps Bay only had a
guardhouse, around which the local butcher grazed his beef and mutton-to-be, and a

dilapidated farmhouse. Forty years later Kalk Bay cottages were being advertised for
sale but Camps Bay still only one house, no longer dilapidated, that belonged to the

Attorney General, along with the rest of the bay, and he had a nasty habit of suing his

only neighbour who lived in the round guard house in the Kloof.

I got into this book by accident. The late Hillel Turok had been collecting photocopies
of maps and pictures of Camps Bay and wanted to publish these with chronological

tables he had drawn up, but was told he needed text to go with it. He asked me to
research and write such text. When that project did not work out Albert Louw

approached me to publish the book, helped me to assemble some wonderful pictures,

and this beautiful book is the outcome. And, indeed, with Albert’s sense of balance and
desire for perfection, it is truly a beautiful book.