“This is the kind of town I live in,” says Sheryn Nader, plonking a stack of books on the table. We’re at The Genesis Restaurant for dinner and pink G&Ts. “I just grabbed a few to show you how much has been written about this place. I have more than 200 books that reference Barberton.”
Raindrops start falling on the restaurant’s tin roof. It’s music to our ears since the town is facing a drought.
We page through the books: Dynamite and Daisies by Piet Meiring, Lost Trails in the Makhonjwa Mountains by Bernard John Lovell de Souza, No Time To Die by Grace H Hall, Pioneers of the Lowveld and Cockney Liz: Legendary Barmaid of Barberton by Hans Bornman.
Sheryn is an occupational therapist, originally from Pretoria. “I had better job offers there than here, but when I saw the mountains, I knew that this was home.”
In true Barbertonian fashion, Sheryn is also writing a book. “There are lots of people like me,” she says. “We’re a little bit obsessed with Barberton – its history and the stories.”
Sheryn has lived in town for 22 years – a drop in the ocean compared to her husband Mark’s family, who have been here since the 1890s. Her book will focus on lesser-known histories, from the town’s gold rush origins more than a century ago until modern times. Her research has led her to some interesting tales, like the network of tunnels under the town… “Nobody knows why they were built,” she says. “I have a map and I know where they start. We suspect they might be bunkers and possibly Anglo-Boer War related.”
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