On Thursday, 24 September 2020, Councillor Zahid Badroodien, the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Community Services and Health, unveiled the new Rondebosch Fountain.
The original cast iron ‘fountain’ – a horse and dog watering trough with a lamp post, was donated to the citizens of the then-Rondebosch Municipality by the surveyor and railway pioneer George-Pigot Moodie on 25 September 1891.
Pigot-Moodie sat on the Cape Legislature from 1889-1890, and was a resident at Westbrooke when he died in 1891, the year he donated the fountain. Westbrooke is now called Genadendal and is an official residence of South Africa’s State President.
The original fountain, is a Provincial Heritage Site in terms of the National Heritage Resources Act (Act 25 of 1999). The fountain was badly damaged in a motor vehicle accident in 2015. The City of Cape Town recovered the remnants and held it in safe keeping. It was the City’s intention to repair and to restore the fountain to its former glory. However, the fountain was so badly damaged, that it could not be repaired. It had previously been repaired and cobbled together over the many years that it stood in the heart of Rondebosch. As a result, the fountain which was destroyed, was not identical to the fountain which was unveiled 127 years ago.
The new fountain was donated to the City by the Simon van der Stel Foundation and Heritage Castings. The new fountain is as close to the specifications of the original as possible, but different in some small details. It is in its original colours and its details are as crisp as the day the original was bolted together when it arrived at the Cape Town docks from Scotland.
‘I am so excited to see this iconic landmark back to its former state. The fountain has great historical value and was cherished by the Rondebosch residents. The replication and accession process took longer than we would have hoped as there were legal requirements that the City had to adhere to,’ said the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Community Services and Health, Councillor Zahid Badroodien.
‘The restoration of this fountain would not have been possible without the generous donations from Max Teichmann of Heritage Castings and the Simon van der Stel Foundation. The foundation gave a monetary contribution while Max Teichmann donated his time and materials towards this labour of love. The City is indebted to these donors. The fountain is now in its original position for the first time in many years,’ said Councillor Badroodien.
An electricity connection for the fountain light to be switched on, will be done at a later stage.