Architect and Builder Magazine South Africa November/December 2013 | Page 12

BookWatch

topical, noteworthy books on architecture and related fields

Healdtown

Under the Eagle’s Wings
by
Trevor Webster

H

ealdtown – Under the Eagle’s Wings is Trevor Webster’s
account of Healdtown, the African mission school where
many of the black elite who became leaders in the
struggle for democracy were educated.
Among the illustrious past students of Healdtown are
politicians, church leaders, academics, publishers, doctors,
historians and members of the legal fraternity, including Nelson
Mandela, Govan Mbeki, Raymond Mhlaba (first Premier of the
Eastern Cape province), Robert Sobukwe (Founder President of
the Pan Africanist Congress), John Nyathi Pokela (a leader of the
PAC), Professor Loyiso Nongxa (first black person appointed as
Vice-Chancellor of Wits), Dr Mvuyo Tom (now Vice-Chancellor of
Fort Hare University) and Judge Thembile Skweyiya (Justice of
the Constitutional Court of South Africa and Chancellor of Fort
Hare University).
Enoch Santonga, teacher and Methodist lay minister in the
Eastern Cape, wrote Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika for his choir in 1897.
The Healdtown students sang this hymn on Sundays. It was sung
in 1912 at the first meeting of the South African Native National

Congress, the forerunner of the ANC, and became the national
anthem of many African countries and, along with Die Stem, SA’s
present-day national anthem.
Begun as a Methodist mission in 1855 during a time of
frontier conflict, Healdtown became the largest high school
in the country. The Rev AA Wellington, who was governor of
the institution from 1928-44, called it “the greatest missionary
institution of its kind south of the Zambezi River.”
The Bantu Education Act of 1953 saw the beginning of a
gradual decline in the standards of Healdtown and, sadly, today
the infrastructure is in a serious state of decay. The Historic
Schools Restoration Project is attempting to restore respect to
this once great institution.
The book was published by the Methodist Publishing House
in association with the Historic Schools Restoration Project and
is available at leading bookstores nationwide.
Format: Paperback, fully Illustrated with full colour photographs,
196 pages. Retail price: R250

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Trevor Webster has had a lifelong
involvement in education, giving him an educationist’s
insight into many of the issues that affected the rise and fall
of Healdtown as an academic institution. His parents were
on the staff of Healdtown and many of his young days were
spent immersed in the school’s ethos.

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