The University of Natal and Pietermaritzburg
14 Jan 2010

The Act which gave birth to the University was promulgated on 11 December 1909. Subsequently the Pietermaritzburg City Council granted 40 acres of land in Scottsville on which the first university building was erected. Designed by the local architect J . Collingwood Tully and built at a cost of £30 000, its foundation stone was laid on 1 December 1910 by the Duke of Connaught. Ever since it was completed in August 1912 the Main Building with its clock tower has dominated Scottsville ridge. So perfect is its location that one can gaze down on the whole central area of the City spread out below. Yet what helped determine its position in those days when the motor car had barely arrived in Pietermaritzburg was the existing tramway system, which extended along King Edward Avenue and had its terminus at the pedestrian entrance to the University.

The University began with only 8 professors and 57 students, 'the Aboriginals'. One can only marvel at the range of expertise expected of the original professors. J. W. Bews, for example, was at the age of 26 Professor of both Botany and Geology; while R. B. Denison felt he held not the 'chair' but rather the 'sofa' of Chemistry and Physics.

During the First World War the advancement of the University was minimal, but an important landmark was reached when on 2 April 1918 the Natal University College became a constituent college of the University of South Africa, established as a federal university. The next phase in the growth of the NUC (as it was known in those days) was the establishment of new departments in Durban, primarily Engineering. They were housed in Howard College, opened in August 1931, and destined within a few decades to outstrip those in Pietermaritzburg.

The appointment of Dr E. G. Malherbe as Principal in 1945 signalled the dawn of the post-Second World War renaissance. With the cessation of hostilities came a rapid growth in the student population which rose from 340 on the Pietermaritzburg campus in 1945 to 654 in 1946. Even more startling were the plans of Malherbe himself, formerly Director of Military Intelligence. His two main aims were to advance the status of the NUC to that of a fully-fledged independent university, and to realize to the fullest extent Durban's potential as a university centre. To further these aims he successfully badgered the corporation and private enterprise for financial assistance, and through the Press made the public aware of the great potential asset they had in the University.

His first significant achievement was the establishment of the Faculty of Agriculture in 1947. Housed originally in converted hutments in what had been the Oribi Military Hospital, by 1954 the faculty was in its impressive building adjacent to the main campus. Subsequently the Ukulunga experimental farm near the Oribi aerodrome was acquired for its use.

As a result of the passing of the University of Natal (Private) Act no. 4 of 1948, piloted through Parliament by the local MP Colonel Oswald Shearer, the University was at last established. It was formally inaugurated on 15 March 1949 in the Grand Theatre (since demolished) by Dr A. J. Stals, Minister of Education in the new Nationalist Government. The Hon. Denis Gem Shepstone, the then Administrator of Natal, was elected the University's first Chancellor.

Perhaps the most controversial decision Malherbe took was to remove the centre of the University's administration from Pietermaritzburg to Durban, a project carried out during the long vacation of 1953–54. Understandably the City Council and citizens of Pietermaritzburg were up in arms when the decision was first announced, and more particularly when it seemed that all the teaching departments then in the City - with the exception of Agriculture - were to be moved down to Durban. In the end, this transfer was not implemented, but from 1954 it was obvious that the main focus for growth and development would be at the Durban centre. Although further development has continued to take place on the Pietermaritzburg campus, there is no disguising its dependent status.

During the 1960s and 1970s the University grew considerably: in 1967 the Government approved the University's plan to acquire the Scottsville golf course and in 1973 the City Council sold it the site of the Isolation Hospital. During the 1960s some academic buildings were extended and a new library, student residences and Students' Union were completed. The buildings for the Faculty of Education and the Department of Psychology on the new campus were completed in 1970, and were followed by those for the Faculties of Commerce, Law and Arts. Denison, a new residence for men and women, is still growing, and in 1983 the J. W. Bews Biological Sciences Building was opened adjacent to the Faculty of Agriculture. This steady march of new buildings along the former golf course has been matched by a similar, but less obvious, form of territorial expansion. Since the Second World War the University has been progressively buying houses in its vicinity, and either demolishing them to make way for developments such as the Malherbe Residence, or converting them to its own use, especially to the benefit of the burgeoning administrative staff, which in 1985 numbered 52 to the 231 academics and 85 technicians employed by the University.

On the whole, relations have always been reasonable between the City and the University so inextricably in its midst. Certainly, the University has tried to maintain contact, and through Inaugural Lectures, the Wednesday University Lectures, the Extension Lecture Programme, the Schools Lecture Programme, plays, concerts, and exhibitions of various kinds, has shared its expertise with the public.

Inevitably, though, it has been the presence of university students which has had the most obvious impact on the City. Many citizens would associate the University most readily with the annual Rag Procession which took its modem form in 1932, and with its magazine Nucleus. Neither necessarily are greeted with much approval, though the purpose of both is to collect money for charity. The students involved are too easily perceived as being disorderly and irreverent. Students impinge on the public in other ways too. Their favourite pubs are places to be avoided by the older and more conventional citizens, and it is many a householder's fear that a students' digs be established next door. In earlier times the majority of students lived in university residences or boarded in homes which had been officially approved. But escalating fees, a degree of selection by residences that cannot cope with growing student numbers, and a greater spirit of independence among the young, has led to the establishment of digs or communes all over town, though particularly in the Scottsville area. Some communes, in large rented houses, are systematically organized and effectively run. Others are not. A deteriorating house full of students is perhaps too common a sight, and neighbours have suffered all too often from the sounds of revelry from large and uncontrolled 'digs parties'.

At certain stages students' clothes and hair styles have been a real source of irritation to respectable citizens. In the 1930s and 1940s the dress of women students was still conventional and men wore slacks and sports jackets. Dinner jackets and long dresses were worn at university balls, and suits on other formal occasions. The striped NUC blazer (which one hardly sees today) was worn by both men and women to informal functions and sporting events. Gowns were worn to morning lectures and to meals. This dress code was strictly adhered to. In the 1950s the trend was towards greater informality: dresses and sandals; or shorts with long stockings for the men. With the advent of the Beatles in the 1960s the student fashion scene changed dramatically. Long hair for men became commonplace and remained so for over a decade, much to the fury of many of the local conservative burgesses. Abbreviated shorts or jeans became the norm for men, as did 'slops' instead of shoes. Women took to the abbreviated mini-skirt. Student fashions in the 1970s and 1980s have been less outré, and have reflected what is normally worn by young people elsewhere, though the 'ethnic' look with beads, sandals and shawls has survived among some of the women. Essentially, dress today is informal, and the academic gown has disappeared from the campus. Even the lecturing staff has abandoned them, the last member to do so being Professor Mark Prestwich, who retired in 1976.

Now, as the City commemorates its 150th anniversary, many citizens will critically examine the role played by the University that has been in its midst for nearly eight decades. Surely their considered verdict will be that a worthwhile and positive co-existence has generally been maintained between 'town and gown'.

Caption:

Staff and senior students of Natal University College, 1921.

Bottom Row: C.P.W. Douglas de Fenzi, G.W. Sweeney, A.D. Mudie, AF. Hattersley, R.U. Sayee, G. Besselaar, J.W. Bews, O. Waterhouse, W.N. Roseveare, R. Beckett Denison, P.A. Guiton, R.D. Aitken, D. Dyer, V.C. Harrison, F. Smith.

Second Row: L.V. Thorrold, P.A. Menzies, O. M. Thorrold, N. Marshall, E. Grundy, E.A. Thorrold, W.L. Saville, I.D. Cochar-Hall , K.M. Holmes, M.G. Rhodes, N.W. Benson, D.E. Serruijs, M.H. Holderness, A. I. McKenzie, M.E. Calder, C.D. Scott.

Third Row: R.O. Pearse, A.S. Paton, C.J. Armitage, L.M. Dugmore, S.R. Dent, S.F. Bush, G.W.Gale, K.A. Fishlock, E.H. Goodall, R.W.Whitelaw, R. Jay Browne, J.B. Colam, W.S. Shaw, C.E. Peckham, W.H.C. Hellberg, A Gardner, W.M. Adams.

Top Row: L.E. Morin, A.W. Bayer, L.P. McGuire, M.E. Pennington, F.N. Howes, L. Egeland.

Caption:

E. G. Malherbe, acclaimed educationist, Principal of NUC and the University of Natal, 1947-1965.

Caption:

University Hall (built in 1922), the first residence for women, with the clock tower of the original College building in the background.

Caption:

The float procession and student antics during the annual Charity Rag have changed little over the years. What is different is the composition of the student population. Now dedicated to serving all the people of Natal, the University has begun to move away from white exclusivism. In 1988 it enrolled at its Pietermaritzburg campus 465 black , 64 coloured, 419 Indian and 3 502 white students (total 4 450).

SOURCE: Pietermaritzburg 1838–1988: a new portrait of an African city, edited by John Laband and Robert Haswell (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press and Shuter & Shooter, 1988), pp. 157–9.