Episode 284 - Australians and the Struben Brothers Hunt Gold on the Ridge of White Waters

Gold sends a shiver through the spine of the adventurer, the merest hint drives men to acts of extreme bravery, or stupidity. Moderate men and women throw off their cloaks of social anonymity and travel thousands of kilometers in arduous conditions just to lay their hands on a Gramm or two of the yellow treasure.

Gold fever is a pandemic even in the modern world, although the price of gold fluctuates based on world geopolitics and economics. What is this allure? Callous investors of the modern era decry gold bugs and their passion, sneering at the pursuit of a commodity that appears to have very little going for it other than it’s scarcity.

Despite these days of blockchain, ETFs, polymarket and AI investor hullabaloo, the physical value underpinning billions is bullion.

By the 1880s, gold was more than something to lock away in a vault or fashion into a king's crown. It had become one of the world's essential industrial commodities, prized because it would not rust, tarnish or corrode, and because it could be beaten into sheets so thin they were almost transparent.

Gold leaf adorned the domes of public buildings, church altars, picture frames and the spines of expensive books. Dentists relied on it for fillings, crowns and bridges because it was soft, durable and chemically inert.

Watchmakers and instrument makers used it for precision components that had to resist corrosion, while jewellers transformed it into rings, brooches and chains for an expanding middle class.

Gold salts found their way into photography and medicine, and artisans incorporated the metal into fine porcelain, glass and luxury decorative objects. Yet these practical uses consumed only a fraction of the world's output.

The overwhelming demand for gold came from another purpose altogether: it was the metal that underpinned the global financial system. Nations minted it into sovereigns, eagles and francs, banks stored it in their vaults as the foundation of their currencies, and governments measured their economic strength by the weight of bullion they possessed. Every new reef discovered promised not merely ornaments or luxury goods, but the power to expand credit, finance empires and reshape the world economy.

Geologically speaking the Witwatersrand gold basin is a unique phenomenon, it is the most immense gold resource with the poorest grade ever discovered.

Witwatersrand makes up 1/3rd of all gold ever mined in the history of planet earth.
Standing south of Johannesburg these days and looking at the high ground, the Witwatersrand, gives you very little idea about why early settlers called this the Ridge of White Waters. It’s all developed now, there the inevitable town house development complexes, shopping malls, industrialised and urbanised land has obfuscated the look and feel of the landscape.

As the early trekkers made their way north from the Vaal River in the mid-1830s, they were struck by the beautiful vista of a broad ridge about 100 kilometers across, dotted with waterfalls in summer. To give you an idea about what this must have looked like, go visit the Walter Sisulu botanical gardens in Roodepoort to take a look at the stunning waterfall there.

The entire ridge was covered with these waterfalls, particularly spectacular after heavy rains — places like Roodepoort, Melville, Parktown, Upper Houghton, Orange Grove, Bedfordview were covered in clear running falls, long since channeled and drained, the silver cascades long gone.

The Australians have a lot to do with gold discoveries in South Africa - particularly Henry Lewis who had been lured to Southern Africa by reports of paydirt in the Eastern Transvaal - Pilgrims Rest etc. That was in 1874 and like many other diggers, he wondered about and eventually discovered alluvial gold on the farm Blaaubank near Rustenburg.
Fred Struben was the son of a Dutch naval officer who arrived in South Africa in the 1850s, and he disembarked in Cape Town with a thirst for adventure.