Pearston is a small town in the eastern

Karoo The Karoo ( ; from the Afrikaans borrowing of the South Khoekhoe Khoemana (also known as !Orakobab or Korana) word is a semidesert natural region of South Africa. No exact definition of what constitutes the Karoo is available, so its extent is ...

, in the

Eastern Cape The Eastern Cape ( ; ) is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. Its capital is Bhisho, and its largest city is Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth). Due to its climate and nineteenth-century towns, it is a common location for tourists. It is also kno ...

province of

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. It lies between

Graaff-Reinet Graaff-Reinet (; Xhosa: eRhafu) is a town in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. It is the oldest town in the province and the fourth oldest town in South Africa, after Cape Town, Stellenbosch, Simon's Town, Paarl and Swellendam. The to ...

and Somerset East at the foot of the Coetzeesberge, about north of

Port Elizabeth Gqeberha ( , ), formerly named Port Elizabeth, and colloquially referred to as P.E., is a major seaport and the most populous city in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. It is the seat of the Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan Municipal ...

. It falls within the Blue Crane Route Local Municipality and has a population of approximately 4,500 people.

History

In 1850 John Pears, a former professor of Classics at the South African College and the minister of the

Dutch Reformed Church The Dutch Reformed Church (, , abbreviated NHK ) was the largest Christian denomination in the Netherlands from the onset of the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century until 1930. It was the traditional denomination of the Dutch royal famil ...

in the town of Somerset (now Somerset East) began holding services in the open under a large pear tree on the farm Rustenburg, then the property of Mr Casparus Jacobus Lötter, on the bank of the Voël River. In 1858 the church announced its intention to establish a village named Pearston on that location. A portion of the farm was purchased and lots sold, and the village was officially founded on 21 September 1859. It became a town with municipal government on 3 April 1894.

Government

Pearston falls within the Blue Crane Route Local Municipality, which has its seat at Somerset East, and forms part of the larger Cacadu District Municipality. It is located in the fourth ward of the municipality, which is represented by Councillor Mncedi Mali of the

African National Congress The African National Congress (ANC) is a political party in South Africa. It originated as a liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid and has governed the country since 1994, when the 1994 South African general election, fir ...

Geography

Pearston is located about north of

, on the banks of the Voël River. It is situated at an altitude of on the Camdeboo plain. The Coetzeesberge, a spur of the Sneeuberge (a mountain), lie to the north, and the Groot-Bruintjieshoogte lie to the east. Pearston is the meeting point of two regional roads: the R63 from

to Somerset East and Cookhouse, and the R337 from Jansenville to Cradock.

Demography

According to the 2011 Census 3,435 people live in Pearston proper, and a further 1,081 live in the adjacent

township A township is a form of human settlement or administrative subdivision. Its exact definition varies among countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, this tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, Canad ...

of Khayanisho, giving the urban area a total population of 4,516. 56.9% of the people described themselves as "

Coloured Coloureds () are multiracial people in South Africa, Namibia and, to a smaller extent, Zimbabwe and Zambia. Their ancestry descends from the interracial mixing that occurred between Europeans, Africans and Asians. Interracial mixing in South ...

", 39.3% as "

Black African Black is a racial classification of people, usually a Politics, political and Human skin color, skin color-based category for specific populations with a mid- to dark brown complexion. Not all people considered "black" have dark skin and ofte ...

", 3.5% as "

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

" and 0.3% as " Indian or Asian". 64.2% of the people spoke

Afrikaans Afrikaans is a West Germanic languages, West Germanic language spoken in South Africa, Namibia and to a lesser extent Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe and also Argentina where there is a group in Sarmiento, Chubut, Sarmiento that speaks the Pat ...

as their first language, while 35.4% spoke

Xhosa Xhosa may refer to: * Xhosa people, a nation, and ethnic group, who live in south-central and southeasterly region of South Africa * Xhosa language, one of the 11 official languages of South Africa, principally spoken by the Xhosa people See als ...

and 0.4% spoke English.

References

{{Cacadu District Municipality Populated places in the Blue Crane Route Local Municipality Populated places established in 1859 1859 establishments in South Africa