Leif Egeland, Ex MP, BA (N.U.C), MA (S.A.), LL.D. (h.c.) (Cambridge), was prominent in law, politics and international diplomacy. He was member of Council and National Chairman of the South African Institute of International Affairs 1959-1980, subsequently Honorary President of the Institute. He also served as Chairman of the Smuts Memorial Trust.

Dr. Ellen Hellmann (1908-1982) was a social anthropologist and obtained her D.Phil degree at the University of the Witwatersrand in 1940. The findings of her MA thesis in 1935, ground breaking research into the appalling conditions under which urban black Africans lived in slums such as Rooiyard in Doornfontein, Johannesburg, were published in the book entitled "Rooiyard: A Sociological Survey Of An Urban Native Slum Yard" in 1948.
She worked for the 'Joint Council of Europeans and Bantu' and later became an Executive member of the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR). She submitted evidence to various Government commissions at the time, including the Commission for Socio-economic Development of the Native Areas of South Africa (1955), known as the Tomlinson Commission, and the Commission of Inquiry into the Riots at Soweto and Elsewhere, 1976-1977, known as the Cillie Commission.
Ellen Hellmann was a member of the Progressive Party from 1959 to 1971.
(South African History Online)

Carien Engelbrecht was the Project Manager of the Alexandra Renewal Project, which was a Special Presidential Project for Urban Renewal, and of the Katorus Project, which was a Special Presidential Project for Housing. Her Papers contain reports and notebooks with personal notes of minutes and accounts relating to the two projects as well as earlier projects she was involved in.

Dr Errol Vawda was born in Newcastle in 1929. After completing his high school education at Sastri College in Durban he enrolled at the University of the Witwatersrand, where some of the progressive lecturers influenced the development of his political and social ideas. During his studies at Wits he became increasingly aware of discriminatory practices, not only at the University, but also in the wider South African society. When Vawda graduated as medical doctor (as a specialist radiologist), he was employed at McCord's Hospital in Durban. After a few years he went back to his hometown of Newcastle and later opened a private practice in the small town of Brits, where he was only black doctor in town. He moved to Durban, where he settled permanently. He became active in non-racial sports administration. Vawda was involved with non-racial South African Soccer Federation and was leading as a president for a number of years the South African Table Tennis Board, the only internationally recognized non-racial sporting code during the apartheid years. He was elected Deputy President for Table Tennis in Africa and represented both South Africa and Africa at many international table tennis forums. Errol Vawda held other executive positions in the South African Council of Sport (SACOS), which at the time led the way in boycotting all South African sporting activities at international level until there was a free and liberated South Africa. He also played an important role among medical practitioners in Durban, arguing that health of individuals and communities are fundamentally determined by political and economic circumstances, which inevitably requires political and policy interventions. While leaving and working in Durban, Vawda was involved with the independent non-racial trade union movement in the 1980's in their struggle to secure healthy working conditions for their members, and often performed X-ray diagnoses at his own expense. Dr Errol Vawda died in October 1993.

Samuel Evans, 1859-1935

Born in Wales, he took up the profession of journalism. In 1883 he was appointed to a post in the Egyptian Ministry of Finance, where probably because of his ability as a shorthand-writer in both English and French, he became private secretary to Sir Edgar Vincent, financial adviser to the Khedive of Egypt. From 1886-1889 he acted as chief controller of the Egyptian coast guards service and later when Sir Edgar became governor of the Imperial Ottoman Bank at Constantinople, he accompanied his chief as inspector-general of that bank, travelling extensively in Asia Minor and Persia. From 1892-1896 he managed the Turkish tobacco regie.

Samuel Evans' association with the Witwatersrand began in 1896 when he arrived in Johannesburg. Two years later he joined H Eckstein & Co, becoming a partner in 1902 and retiring in 1909. During the 2nd Anglo-Boer War he served on the staff both of Lord Roberts and the military governor of Johannesburg. After the war Evans helped to organise the gold-mining industry and in 1909 he became chairman and managing director of Crown Mines Ltd. He was a pioneer in applying scientific methods of hygiene to the mining industry and was largely responsible for the establishment of the S A Institute for Medical Research. He also helped to found a gold refinery and a branch of the Royal Mint soon after the end of World War I. He was a strong advocate of gold as a medium for currency, retaining his interest in economic matters throughout his life. Another field of interest was education and he was closely associated with the Council of Education and the University of the Witwatersrand. He was one of the first to recognise the importance of aviation.

David Everatt combined years of experience in applied social research, particularly in the areas of youth, violence and voter education in South Africa. He has received a doctorate from the University of Oxford and taught at the Universities of Cape Town, Rhodes and the Witwatersrand. He was formerly the Executive Director of the Community Agency for Social Research (CASE) and later went on to become a founding partner of Strategy and Tactics in 1998.

Also, see collection number A2419 for his PhD entitled "The politics of non-racialism: white opposition to apartheid, 1945-1960".

Feetham was appointed deputy town clerk of Johannesburg in October 1902; he served under the town clerk, Lionel Curtis, who was a friend from his New College days. In April 1903 Feetham became the town clerk when Curtis was made Assistant Colonial Secretary. Two years later, in April 1905, Feetham resigned from the Town Council and was appointed to the South African Bar; he acted as legal adviser to the High Commissioner of South Africa from 1907-1910, and again from 1912-1923. In 1907 Feetham began his political career as a member of the Transvaal Legislative Council (1907-1910). In 1915 he was elected to the Union House Assembly as a Unionist for the Parktown constituency in Johannesburg; he later became a member of the South African Party. During World War I, Feetham gained a commission in the South African Cape Corps and served in East Africa and briefly in Egypt (1916-1918). Feetham resigned from Parliament in 1923 to take silk, and was appointed to the bench of the Transvaal Division of the Supreme Court. In 1930 he was appointed Judge President of the Natal Provincial Division, and in 1939 became Judge of Appeal in Bloemfontein. In 1938, Feetham was elected vice-chancellor of the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and became its chancellor in 1949. He was also appointed chairman of various commissions both in South Africa and abroad including the Southborough Committee on Constitutional Reform in India (1918-1919), the Irish Boundary Commission (1924-1925), the Kenya Local Government Commission (1926), the Shanghai Municipal Council Commission (1930-1931), the Transvaal Asiatic Land Tenure Commission (1932-1935), and the Witwatersrand Land Titles Commission (1946-1949).

Leibl Feldman 1896-1975

He was born on 8 June 1896 in Skopiskis, northern Lithuania. He was the second son of Joseph and Minnie Feldman. He came to South Africa in 1910 at the age of 14. His education took place at the Jewish Government School, Johannesburg. Leibl went into partnership, in a small shop trading under the name of Feldman & Stein. After a year Stein sold out to Leibl. The firm then became L. Feldman and survived under this name for 40 years.

Trade did not occupy all his interest and energy. He was a man of wide interests and a strong social conscience. After the World War I he became involved with the Jewish War Victims Relief Fund. In November 1918 he was instrumental in founding a branch of the Socialist-Zionist Poalei Zion Party in Johannesburg. In the late 1920s he became involved in the Organisation for Rehabilitation and Training (ORT). The aim of the body was to reconstruct the nature of Jewish life all over the world. In 1929 he joined the Jewish Workers Club which was anti- Zionist. In 1932 he married Shura Miller. They had one son and two daughters.

When World War II broke out he became involved in the South African Jewish war appeal. In 1946 he volunteered to join the South African Jewish Board of Deputies which visited the Displaced Persons camp in (?).

Richard Feldman was born on September 15, 1897, the son of Joseph and Minnie Feldman, in Lithuania and came to South Africa at the age of 13. His education took place at the Jewish Government School, Johannesburg. He joined the family firm of L. Feldman and Tobacco & General Supplies Ltd., where he rose to be a director. In 1931 he married Freda Ginsburg and had one son and one daughter. He died on 14th February, 1968, after a long illness.

He was a man of wide interests and with a strong social conscience. After the first world war he became Chairman of the Doornfontein Branch of the Jewish War Victims Fund. His sympathy for the underdog led him to join the South African Labour Party and he was secretary of the Party's Organizing Committee before being elected to the Transvaal Provincial Council in 1943, a position he held for 11 years. He was a member of the Central Rand School Board and his interest in education, both European and non-European, showed itself in many ways.

For several years he was an executor of the Morris Isaacson Education Fund, which grants bursaries to deserving African students. This fund had its origin in the Peretz School for Africans, which Feldman established earlier and which was incorporated into the Isaacson Fund.

The South African Ort. Oze was another body which benefited from Feldman's enthusiasm and he played a vital role in developing Ort (Society for the Promotion of handicrafts and of industrial and agricultural work among the Jews) in South Africa.

All his life Feldman was a writer and was a contributor of articles to the daily press on a wide variety of subjects. His abiding love was for the Yiddish language which he had learnt as a boy. In 1935 he had published in Warsaw a volume of short stories in Yiddish entitled Schwartz un Weiss.

These stories had as their theme the difficulties of living experienced by the non-Europeans in South Africa. After the second World War a second and enlarged edition of his work was brought out.