Rev Dr. William Nicol (23 March 1887, in Robertson – 22 June 1967) was a

Dutch Reformed 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 fami ...

minister, theologian, educator and Administrator of the

Transvaal Province The Province of Transvaal (), commonly referred to as the Transvaal (; ), was a province of South Africa from 1910 until 1994, when a new constitution subdivided it following the end of apartheid. The name "Transvaal" refers to the province's ...

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 ...

Life

In 1906, he obtained his bachelor's degree at

Stellenbosch University Stellenbosch University (SU) (, ) is a public research university situated in Stellenbosch, a town in the Western Cape province of South Africa. Stellenbosch is the oldest university in South Africa and the oldest extant university in Sub-Sahara ...

and then studied at the Free University of Amsterdam and Princeton. From 1913 to 1938 he was a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church in Johannesburg East, called Irene Church. In June 1938, he became a minister in Pretoria East. From 1934 to 1948 he was the moderator of the Dutch Reformed Synod of the Transvaal. In Johannesburg, he was a champion for the recognition of the Afrikaans language and the establishment of Afrikaans-medium schools. Nicol was the founder of Johannesburg East's parish magazine, Irenenuus, in January 1923, that he wanted the members in their particular situation escorted to their faith. It was written in Afrikaans in a time when the language just started gaining a foothold in schools and was rarely heard from the pulpit. Nicol in August 1923 (date uncertain) made history when he wrote the first sermon in Afrikaans broadcast on the radio directly into the radio studios in downtown Johannesburg. At 9:45 on Sunday, 7 June 1924, the minister and church made history when full service was held in Afrikaans for the first time. He also broadcast on the Union broadcast and from Irene Hall. A month later, on 4 October 1925, the first communion service was broadcast from Irene Hall led by Nicol. He was the second chairman of the

Afrikaner Broederbond The Afrikaner Broederbond (AB) or simply the Broederbond was an exclusively Afrikaner Calvinist and male secret society in South Africa dedicated to the advancement of the Afrikaner people. It was founded by H. J. Klopper, H. W. van der Merw ...

from 1924-1925. On 1 November 1948 he was elected as the administrator of Transvaal and ten years later his work, especially with regard to education and culture, continued to grow. He retired on 1 October 1958. Nicol believed in teaching education in the person's mother tongue and said any education taught in a second language would hinder a person's growth and learning ability. Thus he also helped translate the Bible with help from African religious leaders into Zulu. He opposed the National Party's Bantu Education and suggested a model with learning in the mother tongue with English as a second language so that people could all communicate.

Legacy

A number of roads in South Africa were named after Nicol, most notably

William Nicol Drive William is a masculine given name of Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is ...

in the Northern suburbs of Johannesburg. On 26 September 2023, the road was renamed to Winnie Mandela Drive. This resulted in controversy, with the Afrikanerbond, a successor of the Broederbond criticising the ruling party, the ANC, for attempting to rewrite history. Nicol is considered as one of the architects of apartheid and co-authored a book, 'Regverdige Rasse-Apartheid', which translates as ''Just Racial Apartheid'', which calls for the creation of Apartheid with attempts at religious justifications.

Works

; Book * ''Regverdige Rasse-Apartheid''. Stellenbosch: CSV-Boekhandel, 1947. (co-author with E.P. Groenewald and G. Cronjé).

References

^{/sup>

1967 deaths
1887 births
Afrikaner Broederbond members
Stellenbosch University alumni
Princeton University alumni
Dutch Reformed Church missionaries
National Party (South Africa) politicians
People from Johannesburg
3
h
aily Maverick. JRChronologizer, Retrieved 23 September 2023

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nicol, William}