NUMSA was founded in 1987 as one of the largest affiliate of the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), and remains the biggest metal workers trade union. It was expelled from COSATU in 2014 and is now one of the biggest affiliate in the South African Federation of Trade Unions which was formed in 2017.

The National Progressive Primary Health Care Network (NPPHCN) is a national non-government organisation founded in 1987, to advocate for the implementation of a national health system for South Africa based on the principles of the Primary Health Care (PHC) approach. It consists of a group of health and development projects, health worker organisations and individuals who are committed to an idea of Progressive Primary Health Care or P.P.H.C.

The South African Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU) was founded on 24 October 1987, as a merger of Municipal Workers' Union of South Africa , Cape Town Municipal Workers' Association (CTMWA), the Municipal workers' sections of General Workers' Union of South Africa, South African Allied Workers' Union and Transport and General Workers' Union. These unions were once individual affiliates of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, to which SAMWU also affiliated. Later SAMWU also incorporated other Municipal Workers Unions from Durban and Johannesburg.

Helen Joseph, tireless campaigner against apartheid, was born in Sussex, England on the 8th of April 1905. Before coming to South Africa in 1931, she taught in India. In 1932 she married Dr. M.W. Joseph. Between 1942 and 1946 Joseph was a full time Welfare and Information Officer in the South African Air Force, a move which was to alter her life irreversibly.

Joseph divorced in 1949. From 1951 to 1966 she became Secretary of the Transvaal Clothing Industry Medical Aid Society. It was here that she met Solly Sachs, from whom she learnt much of her politics. In 1953 Helen Joseph became a founding member and member of the National Executive Committee of the South African Congress of Democrats. She became the Transvaal Secretary and a National Executive member of the Federation of South African Women (FEDSAW) in 1954. Joseph was a speaker at the Congress of the People and in 1956 she was one of the leaders of the mass protest of 20,000 women at the Union Buildings. In December of the same year she was charged with treason. She was banned in 1957 and in 1962 she was the first person to be placed under house arrest (1962-1971).

Other organisations in which Helen Joseph was involved were: the Human Rights Welfare Committee, which aided banished people; the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS), of which she was Honorary National Vice-President (elected in 1971); the Anglican Students Federation, of which she was an Honorary life President and the United Democratic Front, of which she was an Honorary Patron (elected in 1983).

Helen Joseph died on December 25th, 1992 at the age of 87.

Yvonne Silbert was born in Krugersdorp In 1926. Before she was twenty she wrote a musical play called 'Take It or Leave It!' The play was produced in Johannesburg by Norah Taylor in August 1948.

Yvonne Silbert travelled around the reef teaching Speech and Drama, and acted in amateur theatre productions in South Africa. A play she wrote about Crippen was presented on Springbok Radio.

In 1950 Yvonne Silbert married Rupert Abrahams, an attorney. Two weeks later she contracted poliomyelitis and was confined to a wheelchair for the rest of her life. She regained the use of one hand but composed no more songs as she could no longer play the piano.

She continued to write plays and short stories. Most of her time was taken up with teaching speech and drama, and she produced a number of Shakespearean plays at Afrikaans high schools.

She died in 1975

T.C. Robertson was born in 1907 in Middelburg, Transvaal, where he grew up and matriculated at the Middelburg High School in 1923. He then completed two years of a law degree at the University of the Witwatersrand before entering the profession of journalism. In 1926 he was the Johannesburg correspondent of "Ons Vaderland" and the following year became editor of the "Livingstone Mail" in Northern Rhodesia and a correspondent of the "London Times". He then travelled to the Far East, working, in Ceylon and Australia. On his return in 1931 he was parliamentary correspondent of the "Cape Times" and in 1934 on the editorial staff of the "Rand Daily Mail" and "Sunday Times". He covered the 6th Imperial Press Conference in 1935 and was the author of a book on it. In 1937 he edited "Forward", a labour party newspaper.

In 1938 Robertson stood unsuccessfully as labour candidate for Fordsburg and in 1939 became parliamentary correspondent for "Rand Daily Mail" and "Sunday Times" visiting East Africa as a war correspondent. During, the war years he was director of the Union Unity Truth Service, a propaganda machine for General Smuts, supporting the war effort and editor of its journal ''Libertas". He was given occasional assignments in North Africa and reported the whole of the Madagascar Campaign. There is a small amount of material in this collection on the Union Unity Truth Service but the bulk of it is in a separate collection, A883.

In 1945 he returned to his original love, nature, and sat at the feet of Dr. Hugh Bennett, the father of soil conservation, who arranged a two year course for him in the USA. On his return General Smuts persuaded him to stand as a United Party candidate for Witbank but was unsucessful. In 1948 he became Director of the National Veld Trust and remained in this position until his retirement in 1966. He served on several committees connected with conservation and was the author of books and articles: Grond is Lewe (soil is life), 1968; Water, 1970; Big Game, 1970; South African Mosaic, 1978. This last was his major work, incorporating some extremely good illustrations. He was a speaker at many conferences and spearheaded the publicity campaign to make people aware of the environment and dangers facing it. He was truly the pioneer of South African Conservation, having a great influence on conservationists like Ian Player and James Clarke.

He received several honours, a doctorate from the University of theWitwatersand in 1979; the Decoration for Meritorious Service in 1983, was nominated for the Tyler Award and given the gold medal by the National Veldtrust in 1978.

T.C. Robertson spent his retirement years in Scottburgh, actively pursuing his conservation aims despite increasingly poor health due to diabetes. He was a man of great humanity and lover of life. He died on 11 January 1989 in Durban.

Mrs Esme Berman was born in 1929 and studied at the University of the Witwatersrand and Trinity College, London. She is a distinguished art critic and historian, and was involved in a great number of art projects. She was the founder of the Children's Art Centre in Johannesburg, Director of the Art Institute South Africa, executive member of the S.A. Association of Arts, professional adviser to the Rembrandt van Rijn Art Foundation and permanent art critic to the SABC and various journals. She was the selector and adjudicator for various national and international art exhibitions, and the author of 'Art and Artists of South Africa' and other books and articles.

Mrs Berman is now living in the USA.

Clive Nettleton was Assistant to the Director of the S.A. institute of Race Relations. This collection comprises SAIRR documents from 1970-1974 including minutes, correspondence, papers, records of the Youth Programme and Open School as well as records of other organisations - such as SASO, NUSAS, and Wilgespruit Fellowship Centre.

C.T. Loram 1879-1940, educator and professor of education in South Africa and later at Yale, was inspector of schools in Natal 1906-1917, Chief Inspector of Native Education 1917-1920, member of the South African Native Affairs Commission 1920-1929, Superintendent of Education 1930-1931. He was the first chairman of the South African Institute of Race Relations but left to take up a position at Yale University in 1931.