Born in 1870 and at the age of 22 came to South Africa as a clerk to seek his fortune. He worked as a clerk with the railways and in a chemist shop. On being unable to find permanent employment, he tried to join the Cape Mounted Rifles but was turned down due to bad eyesight and decided to return to England.
Later in life he became a J.P. for Rye in Sussex and was the father of Rev Dr Alexander Roper Vidler, the distinguished writer and theologian.
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.
Regina Twala was South African writer of books, columns, articles and letters. She was also a feminist activist, a teacher, researcher evangelist and political activist in Swaziland (eSwatini). She studied at the Jan Hofmeyer School of Social Work and later completed a BA degree in social studies at the University of the Witwatersrand. In her second marriage she was married to Dan Twala, and they had one child named Vusi who is deceased, but had a daughter Pinokie.
Richard (Rick) Turner was a South African academic, educationist and theorist, who was murdered by the South African security forces in 1978. His killing was part of the public hearings at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), where members of the former security cluster were forced to testify.
Born in the Eastern Cape, Raymond Tucker grew up in Johannesburg. He studied at Rhodes University and later did a law degree at the University of the Witwatersrand. He was active in the Liberal Party and devoted himself to human rights. He increasingly handled political trial cases and thus became a known South African Human Rights solicitor, presenting at high profile cases such as Winnie Mandela, the Very Rev Gonville ffrench-Beytagh, Robert Sobukwe and the trial of the 'Pretoria 12' (Sexwale and 11 Others) . He was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of the Witwatersrand in 2004.