Henley on Klip is a town in

Midvaal Local Municipality Midvaal Local Municipality is an administrative area within the Sedibeng District Municipality of Gauteng in South Africa. The municipality's name references its geographical location halfway between the Johannesburg and East Rand areas and the Va ...

Gauteng Gauteng ( ) is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. The name in Sotho-Tswana languages means 'place of gold'. Situated on the Highveld, Gauteng is the smallest province by land area in South Africa. Although Gauteng accounts for only ...

, South Africa. It is situated next to Highbury off exit 27 on the R59 along the

Klip River The Klip River is the main river draining the portion of Johannesburg south of the Witwatersrand, and its basin includes the Johannesburg CBD and Soweto. The mouth of the river is at Vereeniging where it empties into the Vaal River, which is a tri ...

between

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a megacity, and is one of the 100 largest urban areas in the world. According to Dem ...

and

Vereeniging Vereeniging () is a town located in the south of Gauteng province, South Africa, situated where the Klip River empties into the northern loop of the Vaal River. It is also one of the constituent parts of the Vaal Triangle region and was formerly s ...

History

The village was founded in 1904, by Advocate Horace Kent. Born in 1855 in

Henley on Thames Henley-on-Thames ( ) is a town and civil parish on the River Thames in Oxfordshire, England, northeast of Reading, west of Maidenhead, southeast of Oxford and west of London (by road), near the tripoint of Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Bucking ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, Kent came to

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...

in 1898. The area where Henley on Klip is located reminded Kent of his hometown in

. Kent, in conjunction with the Small Farms Company (SFC), bought the land from a Mr Van Der Westhuizen for a price of 5000 pounds, and the land was divided into

smallholding A smallholding or smallholder is a small farm operating under a small-scale agriculture model. Definitions vary widely for what constitutes a smallholder or small-scale farm, including factors such as size, food production technique or technology ...

s from . In 1904, the SFC decided to build the Kidson Weir on the Klip River in Henley on Klip. The weir was named after Fenning Kidson, the grandson of an 1820 settler. Fenning was educated in

, but returned to

as a young man and became a transport rider, a contemporary of Sir Percy Fitzpatrick. Soon after the outbreak of the Anglo Boer War, news came to Kidson that a commando was on his way to his farm to arrest him. Under the noses of the Boers he escaped, riding sidesaddle, his burly frame crammed into his wife's riding habit. He finally made his way to Natal, but returned to the

Transvaal Transvaal is a historical geographic term associated with land north of (''i.e.'', beyond) the Vaal River in South Africa. A number of states and administrative divisions have carried the name Transvaal. * South African Republic (1856–1902; af, ...

after the war, settling in Henley on Klip with his wife, Edith. The family home was named Tilham, which is the manor house on the river at the corner of Regatta and Shillingford Roads

Community organisations

* Henley on Klip Community Policing Forum * Henley Watch * Lions Club * Rotary Club * Henley Performing Arts * First Henley Scouts * Henley @ Heart * Henley Soup Souls

Schools

There are four schools and home schooling tutor centres in the village. *

Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls – South Africa (OWLAG) is a boarding school for girls, grades 8–12, in Henley on Klip, Gauteng Province, South Africa. The school is a project begun by the American entrepreneur and philanth ...

* Henley Primary School * Assemblies of God (AOG) College * Hope Christian Academy * Orchards Academy (Impaq Centre) *Nicholas Bhengu Theological College (A non-denominational college established in 1991 and named after Reverend Nicholas Hepworth Bhengu of the Assemblies of God is headquartered in the Assemblies of God Conference Center, Henley on Klip)

1970 bus accident

At 14:15 on 28 January 1970, a schoolbus stalled on a level crossing and was hit by a passenger train; 23 children were killed and 16 were injured. Johan le Roux, a matric scholar at Dr Malan Hoerskool in Meyerton, saved two children by pushing them out of a bus window before the train hit the bus, and he died in the accident.

Notable people

Kai Luke Brümmer Kai Luke Brümmer (also stylised as Brummer; born 17 February 1993) is a South African actor. He is known for his role as Nicholas van der Swart in the film '' Moffie'' (2019). ''The Guardian'' named him one of the best new-and-up-comers at the ...

, actor

References

External links

Midvaal Local MunicipalityVaal Triangle InfoOprah Winfrey Leadership Academy Foundation Vaalmeander90.6FM - The Vaal's Hit StationHenley High & Preparatory SchoolHenley WatchHENLEY-ON-KLIP
{{Authority control Populated places in the Midvaal Local Municipality