Barberton (South Africa)

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Barberton
Barberton (South Africa)
Barberton
Barberton
Coordinates 25 ° 47 ′  S , 31 ° 3 ′  E Coordinates: 25 ° 47 ′  S , 31 ° 3 ′  E
Basic data
Country South Africa

province

Mpumalanga
District Ehlanzeni
local community City of Mbombela
height 877 m
Residents 11,997 (2011)
Website www.barberton.co.za (English)
Satellite image of Baberton
Satellite image of Baberton

Barberton is a city in the South African province of Mpumalanga . It is located in the City of Mbombela municipality in the Ehlanzeni district and is 877 meters above sea level in the De Kaap Valley, on the northwestern edge of the Makhonjwa Mountains , which are up to 1,800 meters high and are also called the Barberton Greenstone Belt . The city with 11,997 inhabitants (2011 census) is 45 kilometers south of Mbombela and 380 kilometers east of Johannesburg .

The city was named after Graham Barber, a prospector who initiated the founding of the city.

Among other things, by the cut flower, the city known Gerbera ( English and Barberton Daisy called), which dates from around Barberton.

history

In 1881 gold was found by Tom McLachlan in the Barberton area . However, gold was not intensively mined in the area until two years later. The gold industry brought a lot of money to Barberton. The first exchange in what was then the Transvaal opened its doors in 1887. At the Witwatersrand 1898 larger gold deposits were discovered after the first gold was found there already 1886th Since many prospectors succumbed to malaria in the Barberton area , most prospectors migrated. The gold exchange was relocated to Johannesburg.

Today there are six smaller active gold mines around the city. The Sheba Mine is one of more than 100 years of operation of the oldest gold mines in the world. The other mines are: Agnes Mine , Consort Mine , Worcester Mine and the Fairview Mine (most productive in the area in 2010). Until 2016, Barberton was the seat of the municipality of Umjindi , which merged with the municipality of City of Mbombela to form the municipality of City of Mbombela. Barberton became the seat of the new parish.

Attractions

Facade of the historic stock exchange
  • Barberton Nature Reserve
  • Songimvelo Nature Reserve
  • two houses from the end of the 18th century, preserved in a museum
  • historical stock exchange, of which only the facade is preserved
  • historical mine tour with the possibility of panning for gold
  • Fortuna Hiking Trail
This two-kilometer hiking trail leads through an approximately 600-meter-long tunnel that was built at the end of the 19th century and was used to transport the gold-bearing ore from the Fortuna mine to the rock mill.
The tunnel leads through rocks of the Barberton greenstone belt (3.75-3.2 billion years old), in which the oldest known organisms from the approximately 3.5 billion old bacterial species Archaeospheroides barbertonensis were found. Over 100 native tree species can be found along the hiking trail. For comparison, there are only 67 different native tree species in all of Europe.
  • The Bulembu – Barberton material ropeway, once the world's longest cable car with no intermediate station, connected the Havelock asbestos mine in Swaziland with the Barberton train station until it was closed in 2001 . It has not been dismantled, but is noticeably deteriorating.

Daughters and sons of the city

Web links

Commons : Barberton (South Africa)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. 2011 census , accessed November 16, 2013
  2. More info at afristay.com (English), accessed on March 31, 2018
  3. Gerbera jamesonii Adlam.
  4. Geology of South Africa - A Contemporary History Overview. 2.2: Greenstone Belts ( Memento from July 14, 2004 in the Internet Archive ) Institute for Geosciences at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (archive version)
  5. Herbert Hasenbein: Life in glowing rock. In: Telepolis , April 24, 2004