PLETTENBERG BAY NEWS - Len Swimmer, who headed the Van Plettenberg Historical Society (VPHS) for seven years, has announced his retirement and relocation to Cape Town to be closer to his family.
He has had a corporate career with Barlow Rand and previously served on the executive committee of the Plett Ratepayers Association.
He was also chairperson of Probus (the professional and business club) in Plett, and was part of the original Global School of Business, which has been bought over by education company AdvTech.
“I am sad to be leaving Plett and will miss the interaction with the different people in Plett,” said Swimmer.
His most memorable recollection of the VPHS? “My talk I gave on Thomas Charles John Bain that took me three months to put together,” Swimmer responds humbly.
School bell
Swimmer introduced his successor Kevin Leathem, a “born and bred Plettonian”, at a VPHS meeting on Thursday 12 March where Leigh Dunn did a presentation, “The Sons of the Soil”, on the original inhabitants of Plettenberg Bay.
Dunn is a direct descendant of Captain Robert Charles Harker, Plett’s first postmaster and magistrate, whose family graves can be seen at Poortjies, a national heritage site.
Dunn, born and raised in New Horizons, displayed the cornerstone of the Harker House, built by Robert Charles Harker 200 years ago.
He also produced the school bell from 1912 - when his grandfather, Michael William Dunn, was headmaster of St Peter’s Mission School - and entertained the audience with snippets of historical facts that opened a chapter on Plett’s history before and after the promulgation of the Group Areas Act.
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