Page 5 - Bulletin 10 2006

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tenant from eviction at the whim of the landlord or because of non-payment of the rent.
This precarious situation was made more so because the tenant’s only source of income,

very often, was fishing which was an unpredictable occupation at best.

The early records of the settlement in Kalk Bay are non-existent. It appears that there was

little order and dwellings of various forms and sizes arose in a somewhat hotch-potch
arrangement on various properties. John X Merriman, in 1890, described Kalk Bay as “…..

one of the loveliest places in the world” …. [but] …. “full of tin shanties and jam tins.”

This situation continued even with the establishment of a Village Management Board, 1891
- 1895, as it had limited powers to promote orderly development. But it changed once

Municipal status was granted, as it now became necessary for the newly formed Kalk Bay –

Muizenberg Municipality to promote and regulate development, and also impose property
rates. Against these rates the Municipality could then raise loans for capital projects such as

piped-water, water-borne sewage, and the supply of electricity. The income from rates had

to equal, in a pro-rata proportion, the interest payable on capital loans. The greater the
income from rates the larger were the loans that could be raised for capital developments.

This requirement was entrenched in the Kalk Bay – Muizenberg Improvement Act of 1897.

However, this introduced the prospect of landlords raising the rentals in order to recoup
their rates payments, with this in turn worsening the poverty levels amongst the fishermen.

It was not surprising, therefore, that Father Duignam led a petition in 1895 to the Colonial

Governor requesting that Municipal status not be granted to the Village Management
Board. He was unsuccessful.

With the passage of time certain areas of Kalk Bay came to be occupied predominantly by

fishermen’s families. The largest concentration was at “Die Land”, south of Clairvaux
Road, which housed over 300 people, and on the Point, an area generally known in those

days as “Die Kompanjie” because of the many fishing companies that had owned it from