The South African History Archive (SAHA) and Historical Papers were approached by thirty seven people, who were imprisoned on 22 September 1981 and detained for anything from fourteen days to just under one year, to document and preserve their stories. The interviewees are: Cedric de Beer, Hannchen Koornhof, Maurice Smithers, Prema Naidoo, Norman Manoim, Caroline Cullinan, Emma Mashinini, Merle Favis, Pravin Gordhan, Audrey Coleman, Gavin Anderson, Barbara Klugman, Cedric Maysom, Kathy Satchwell, Alan Fine, Monty Narsoo and Joanne Yawitch. A number of the detainees (Rob Adam, Barbara Hogan, Alan Fine, Hannchen Koornhof, Prema Naidoo and Shireesh Nanabhai) went on trial and, in the case of Hogan and Adam, were jailed until the release of political prisoners in 1990. Neil Aggett died while in detention. Whilst other people were detained during this period, the detainees listed here were picked for their links to one another.

Compiled by Dawie Bosch, a lawyer, this collection consists of three discrete archives groups. These groups document the process of formulating the Extension of Security of Tenure Act (ESTA) and the legal battle for restitution of expropriated land by the Makuleke community. A collection of newspaper clippings and pamphlets, published in the wake of the announcement of the Tricameral Parliament forms the third group.

This collection includes minutes of the Executive Council and Transvaal Regional Committee of SAITA; Lenasia Branch AGM papers (1975-1976), correspondence, memoranda and press cuttings relating to Y Eshak, E Seedat, MA Moosa, A Essop, V Poonan and Y Cajee. It also includes copies of the "Teacher's Chronicle".

This collection includes annual reports for 1994-1996, a research report and newsletter, pamphlets, stickers and postcards.

The initial deposit of Planact material was made when the premises that Planact occupied in Rockey Street, Yeoville were literally bursting at the seams.

This was mainly material in their storerooms.

This was the documentation of completed projects that Planact was involved with, and the files from the offices staff who had resigned from Planact.

Before the new staff occupied the office, the 'old' material was packed up and kept in the storeroom.

The bulk of the Planact material, however, was transferred to SAHA after they moved to their new premises in Braamfontein.

This also included the documents from the offices of ex-Planact employees and from the Planact Resource Centre which was closed down.

The bulk of the collection covers the period 1988 - 1992. There is a gap of earlier Planact material - both of the project work and the internal organisational material. An attempt has been made to separate the project documentation (Sections 1-49 & Sections A1-A70) from the organisation records (Sections P1-P9).

However, this was not totally possible as in some instances there was a blurring of distinction when project work was discussed at meetings, and memos and reports written.

The first deposit was roughly sorted, and listed by Ephraim Siluma.

When Ephraim had almost completed, the second acquisition arrived.

It was then decided to incorporate this with the first, and to rework the classification scheme using the broad headings that the (newly arrived) boxes were labelled with (Sections 1-49).

Sections A1-A70 was added to incorporate material that was either misfiled, marked miscellaneous or unknown.

Planact did not have a centralised filing scheme - each staff kept their documents in various systems with some using the Resource Centre as a repository.

As a result there are overlaps and duplications in some of the sections.

Where possible this has been weeded out. Given the size of the collection, documents on particular topics or townships are dispersed throughout the collection.

An attempt has been made to cross-reference material to assist researchers in finding related material.

Given the voluminous nature of the collection, 3 people have worked on this collection and creating this finding aid.

This is based on the Planact Annual Reports, informational leaflets and brief discussions with an ex-Planact employee.

The collection includes a passive resistance certificate, banning orders imposed on Thandray and a profile by Ahmed Kathrada.

This collection includes minutes, reports, correspondence, and other documents relating to training projects in human relations in the workplace and management consultancy.

Some of the materials in this collection have duplicate hard copies, whereas most of these are also available in digital format.

All items from AL3051 The Bernstein Collection have been withdrawn from this collection. Contact Historical Papers.

The calendars that make the sub-series H was de-accessioned from SAHA Collection AL2446 (posters) and re-accessioned into this collection in November 2011.

The items in the ephemera collection has been arranged according to their format, for example: wardrobe items category "A"; banners category "B".

The images in this collection are digital surrogates of a substantial portion of a unique and historically significant collection of photographic materials donated to the South African History Archive (SAHA) in October 2007 by former Rivonia Trialist, Mr Denis Goldberg whose late wife, Edelgard, had been married to Zenzo Nkobi and had taken possession and responsibility for these items following his death.

Over 10,000 images were given to SAHA, mostly in plastic sleeves within loose-leaf folders, held in cardboard boxes; with some dates and places handwritten on the sleeves (which do not always correspond to the images inside). The donated materials include images from the book Zimbabwe in the struggle, published in 1978 in East Germany, but generally there was very little identifying data accompanying the materials and it is difficult to discern from the negatives exactly what events are recorded in the collection without further research.

About 5,000 negatives were then selected for scanning from the Zenzo Nkobi materials, based on the scarcity and significance of the content of the images, as derived from labels on materials (where available) and from examining the negatives using a lighting box, where possible. These negatives were then scanned, with funding provided by the British Library Endangered Archives Programme (EAP) in late 2008 and early 2009.

Only the digitised images from those donated are described in this finding aid. At a later stage, further images will be scanned and the remaining materials processed and added to this listing.

Original order of the materials has been retained, with box, file and sheet numbers used to indicate the location of the original materials donated to SAHA, with corresponding references used to label all digital copies. Because only a selection of materials has been scanned and the Edelgard Nkobi-Goldberg materials were subsequently removed, there are resultant gaps in the sequence of digital folder and file names.

SYNOPSIS OF DIGITISED MATERIALS SCANNED FROM ORIGINAL MATERIALS

AL3265 - BOX 1

From File A

Negative sheets 30, 31, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 40, 42, 44, 45, 47, 48

From File C

Negative sheets 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 10, 11, 12, 13, 16, 18, 19, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 34, 35

From File D

Negative sheets 01, 03, 13, 40, 45, 46, 63, 65, 66, 67, 69, 73, 74, 78, 81, 82, 83, 91

From File E

Negative sheets 01, 02, 03, 04, 09, 10, 11, 12, 15, 17, 18, 19, 21, 24, 31, 33, 35, 39, 43, 44, 45, 56, 57

From File F

Negative sheets 05, 06, 07,.08, 09, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 18

From File G

Negative sheets 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 09, 10, 11

AL3265 - BOX 2

From file A

Negative sheets 06, 07, 09, 10, 11, 18, 19, 20, 26, 27, 28, 29, 51, 57, 59, 61, 67, 71

AL3265 - BOX 3

From File A

Negative sheets 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23

From File B

Negative sheets 01, 03, 04, 05, 07, 08, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41

BOX 4

From File A

Negative sheets 02, 17, 18, 28, 29, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 40, 42, 44, 45, 46, 52, 53, 54, 58, 62, 64, 65, 66, 70, 71, 72, 73, 80, 89, 90, 92, 93, 97

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION ABOUT INDIVIDUAL ITEMS, PLEASE SEE CONTAINER LISTS

Items in the collection.