Ventersburg is a small town in the

Lejweleputswa District Municipality Lejweleputswa ( Sesotho word meaning "Grey rock" in English) is one of the 5 districts of Free State province of South Africa. The seat of Lejweleputswa is Welkom. The majority of its 657 019 people speak Sotho (2001 Census). The district code is ...

of the Free State province in

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 ...

, 148 km north of

Bloemfontein Bloemfontein, ( ; , "fountain of flowers") also known as Bloem, is one of South Africa's three capital cities and the capital of the Free State province. It serves as the country's judicial capital, along with legislative capital Cape To ...

History

It was established on the farm Kromfontein which was owned by PA Venter who died in 1857. His son allowed a Reform Church to be established on the farm in 1864 and by 1871, the first plots of the original farm were sold. Ventersburg was declared on 6 May 1873. The Dutch Reform Church was built in Ventersburg in

1891 Events January–March * January 1 ** Paying of old age pensions begins in Germany. ** A strike of 500 Hungarian steel workers occurs; 3,000 men are out of work as a consequence. ** Germany takes formal possession of its new Af ...

but it was burnt down in 1900 by the British forces during the

Boer War The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the Sou ...

. The church was later re-built in 1912.

Law and government

Government

1903 Events January * January 1 – Edward VII is proclaimed Emperor of India. * January 19 – The first west–east transatlantic radio broadcast is made from the United States to England (the first east–west broadcast having bee ...

, Ventersburg became a municipality. On 5 December 2000 it was incorporated into the

Matjhabeng Local Municipality Matjhabeng Local Municipality is a local government serving an administrative area in the Lejweleputswa District of the Free State in South Africa. The municipality services Welkom, Virginia, Odendaalsrus and Allanridge. The name is a Sesotho ...

along with the city of

Welkom Welkom () is the second-largest city in the Free State province of South Africa, located about northeast of Bloemfontein which is the provincial capital. Welkom is also known as Circle City, City Within A Garden, Mvela and Matjhabeng. The ci ...

and the towns of

Allanridge Allanridge is a gold mining town in the Lejweleputswa District Municipality of the Free State province in South Africa. It is the main centre of the Loraine Gold Mining Company and is dominated by the tall headgear and complex reduction works tha ...

Hennenman Hennenman is a town in the Free State goldfields in the Lejweleputswa District Municipality of the Free State province of South Africa. The settlement is unusual for the district as being supported by agriculture rather than the mining industr ...

Odendaalsrus Odendaalsrus is the oldest gold mining town in the Lejweleputswa District Municipality in the goldfields of the Free State province in South Africa. History It started out in 1912 as a ramshackle collection of farms and a central church that b ...

, and

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

. Under

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

, many black residents lived outside Ventersburg in ''Mmamahabane'', an extra-municipal township. The location has since been expanded into a second district, Tswelangpele.

References

Populated places in the Matjhabeng Local Municipality Populated places founded by Afrikaners Populated places established in 1873 1873 establishments in the Orange Free State {{FreeState-geo-stub