Founders’ Day Ceremony

The morning of the 170th Founders’ Day Ceremony dawned cloudy and overcast which dismayed all the boys who knew that the occasion was being used for an historic photograph of the entire school with Table Mountain in the background. The rain held off long enough to allow the moment to be captured and the school, joined by their parents and numerous Old Boys, assembled in the Clegg Hall for the main ceremony.

The ceremony was made more special by the fact that the Dominee of the NG Kerk, Dr Danie Nel emulated the prayer of his forebear, Rev Philip Faure, 170 years before when he opened the school which was reported in the Cape newspapers of the day. Boys representing the different cultural groups of the school also offered prayers in their languages. Colonel Lionel Crook (Matric 1948), concluded the prayers with one for his fellow Wynberg boys (many of whom he knew), who fell in any of the world’s major conflicts. He joined the Headmasters of the High and Junior schools in laying wreaths at the Memorial Wall.

The Head Prefect, David Maasch, read out the name of every Wynberg boy who lost his life in war and Siyabonga Beyile took on the inspiring task of paying tribute to these names with his rendering of the Last Post on his trumpet.

JD Breytenbach, RCL Chairman, informed the audience about the 170 Time Capsule which he was burying in front of the Memorial Wall to be dug up at the school’s 200th Anniversary in 2041. He included a letter to the (yet unborn) matrics of that year from David Maasch. This letter can be read on the school’s website.

Matric pupil, Louis Mbuyu, gave the first of the Keynote Speeches, telling the audience what Wynberg meant to him. It was an outstanding and moving effort. He was followed by guest speaker, John McInroy, originator of the Redsockfriday Charity, who gave the John McNaughton Address. He urged the school to follow the example set by Wynberg Old Boy, Phil Masterton Smith, who won the Comrades Marathon eighty years ago in 1931 as a 19 year old before losing his life in North Africa during the Second World War.

View some of the images from this ceremony now: