197 Corlett Drive

My home from July 1980 to March 1983 and my mother's home in 1940. Pure co-incidence!

My father died in March 1980 leaving my mother with four children. Our family was not in a good place financially and the stress is probably what caused his heart attack. We were renting a house at the time and the lease was due to expire at the end of June. My father had retained a life insurance policy which enabled my mother to buy this little square, six roomed, tin-roofed house ( for R40 000.00) and we moved in at the beginning of July. The houses in this suburb of Bramley had big stands with lovely gardens and wonderful trees.

When my Gran came to the house for the first time she was surprised to realise that it was a house she had lived in forty years before. My mother was born in Cape Town and when she was a toddler they moved up to Johannesburg and rented this house at 197 Corlett Drive. Amazingly my Mom had come full circle. I like to think it was a sign that my Grandfather was watching over her after my Dad's death. (My Grandfather passed away in 1972.)

I have some fond memories of this house which I lived in from the time I was ten until just before I turned thirteen. My older brother and I used to race our bicycles around the back garden and climb the trees. Soon after we moved in he made a swing in one of the larger trees. He covered a plank with some sheepskin and when that was worn out he hung a tyre in its place.

From the outside the house was not much to look at. It had three bedrooms, a bathroom, a kitchen and a large lounge / diningroom. The window to the left of the front door was my bedroom and on the right was the lounge window.

The kitchen was big enough for our kitchen table to fit and because it was north facing and sunny, it was a well used room in the house. At the time my mother worked full day and I would walk home alone from school. We had a charlady (Meisie) who would clean the house and do the washing until 12pm and then my gran would walk up and wait for me to get home. She would make us tea and sandwiches while listening to her favourite lunchtime soaps on the radio. She was a very quite lady and we would do our own thing until my siblings and mom came home. My gran would stay for supper and then when the dishes were done my Mom would drive her home.

The lounge / diningroom was big enough for the large ten-seater diningroom table and five-seater couch my paternal Grandfather had made and the piano that was inherited from my paternal grandparents, which they said came up to Johannesburg on an ox-wagon with the voortrekkers. We also had a small black and white TV that my father had bought for us which we put on to watch programmes between 5 and 10 pm. (South Africa only got TV in 1976 and we had only one channel with limited hours and programmes in those days).

My brother and second oldest sister had their own bedrooms and I shared with my Mom. My oldest sister who was at uiversity stayed in a prefab room at the bottom of the garden.

The outbuildings of the house consisted of a garage and two maids quarters. One of the rooms I kept as a playroom and library. At that time my favourite activity was reading and I was a huge bookworm. There was a programme on TV called "Bennie Bookwurm" and that character was me. I clearly hid away from the reality of my circumstances by transporting myself into the world of stories!

We moved out of this house in 1983 when my Mother re-married and she sold the house for R80 000. 00. A very good profit on her investment.