MAAAAARTINNNN!!!!

In the 1970s “Bez Valley” in Johannesburg was a dense suburb with many semi-detached houses lining the avenues. Fourth Avenue, not too far from the Jukskei river, Athlone Boys’ High School and Bezuidenhout Park, was at that time home to the Rudyards, Martin and his wife Edith with their three youngsters, two teenage boys and a much younger daughter. Their “semi” had a low wall (street side) and the single garage was at street level, right at the edge of the municipal building line near the rather narrow sidewalk. The avenues themselves were rather narrow and motor cars lined both sides, some with two wheels perched on the pavement, making it difficult for both pedestrians and vehicles to squeeze past.

Bezuidenhout Valley (known colloquially as Bez Valley) was a mainly lower middle class suburb, populated by generally honest, hard working families attempting to climb the social ladder through the sweat of their own brows. If not the parents, then, at the very least, their children would reap the fruits of upward social mobility. Bez Valley was situated on the old farm Doornfontein (purchased in the mid-1860s by Frederick Bezuidenhout and subdivided to be sold off in chunks by a descendant, Willem Bezuidenhout, at the turn of the century). As late as 1949 the Johannesburg City Council purchased upwards of 100 hectares to lay out the Bezuidenhout Park (Reference: N Musiker, 2000). Also downstream of the Jukskei River was the storm water catchment facility, essentially linking the whole area into the Greater Johannesburg hydrographic ecosystem.

The home in which the family resided was small, but comfortable – even if it was difficult to “swing a cat” in some of the rooms, as the saying goes. There was little space outdoors, the semi-detached premises having been constructed to use every available inch for residential purposes. Gardens were limited to asbestos planters (yes! Asbestos containers erroneously considered safe at that time) . Certainly little space for kids to play. The streets and neighbourhood parks would have to suffice as play areas. Impromptu cricket matches in the streets and the kicking around of a soccer ball in the park were par for the course. The Jukskei River was also frequented by groups of youngsters who played there, despite the admonition that they were to avoid it, especially if there was a cloud to be seen anywhere in Johannesburg. As the main conduit for Johannesburg’s storm water system, it could turn treacherous in minutes, as a downpour ANYWHERE in the city was channeled to the Jukskei and the catchment facility. Drownings were not unheard of in the dreaded Jukskei.

Martin was employed as a Permanent Force “Tiffy”. He was a Sergeant in the Technical Corps (Motor Mechanic), had a stable income from his job in the South African Defence Force, and was viewed by his colleagues as a reliable, competent petrol and diesel vehicle expert. His eight to five job brought home the bacon. His wife brought up the kids, cleaned house and cooked up a storm in her little kitchen. It was an accepted thing in those days for a wife not to be employed in the formal labour market, but to be the housekeeper of the family and the supervisor of homework and children’s’ discipline. It was also an era in which a single income was sufficient for a frugal family not given to ostentatious materialism or “Keeping up with the Joneses”. Prior to the proliferation of credit cards and the spending of borrowed money to impress strangers with unnecessary material goods, that generation who had lived through the Great Depression and the austerity of the Second World War, accounted for every penny – ensuring the pounds looked after themselves. Luxuries were routinely financed by running small income generating side-lines in their own free time. Edith baked the most scrumptious rusks that she sold by word of mouth. Martin applied his skills as a mechanic to run a backyard repair business over weekends and in the evenings. The SADF couldn’t have cared less about his backyard “hustle”(in the modern sense of being industrious, not the formal meaning of illicit or dodgy). As long as his work was done to the precision he was accustomed to achieving at the workshop, that was regarded as his own affair. In fact, the army probably welcomed the fact that he had this extension to his trade – honing his skills by working on other people’s vehicles could only make him a better tiffy.

Those were the days before electronic gadgets began to proliferate in the motor trade. It was a time that one’s feet on the pedals, hand on the gear lever and the steering wheel, told a car how to behave. No computers under the dashboard and no subtle tracking of driving habits so that motor firms could wriggle out of the responsibility of honouring warranties. It was customary to have parts repaired at that time, rather than replace them. They were mechanics, not parts replacers. Diagnostics were reliant on a fine ear, good eyes and intelligence and some know-how – not plugging in a “reader” to spit out a code to tell the parts replacer which item needs to be tossed in a landfill somewhere, or find its way into the ocean as plastic waste. 

Martin’s garage was well equipped with tools sourced over a long period of being a backyard mechanic. One appliance that was particularly useful in this early version of a “man cave” was his refrigerator – not a bar fridge, but one of those sturdy Norge refrigerators equipped with a proper door handle and latch. These were still being phased out because of the danger they posed – many a young child dying from asphyxiation due to accidentally locking himself inside. Modern refrigerators merely require the magnetic seal to be pushed from the inside to free a trapped kid. Be that as it may, this refrigerator had a fine capacity to store copious amounts of beer. Martin’s garage became a gathering point and watering hole for the neighbourhood men who would stand around or sit on makeshift benches - probably old disused “trommels” (steel trunks) of SADF write-off variety. Martin had acquired a taste for beer, but was not a smoker. He got his nicotine “fix” by breathing the air exhaled in his garage by the neighbourhood buddies. Arriving home at 17h30, the crowd would saunter across to Martin’s garage around 18h30. Within another half an hour the air in the garage was so thick with cigarette smoke, it could be cut with a knife. Usually a troublesome V6 engine would be in a state of disassembly (tappet covers off, heads lifted out and engine block ready to be hoisted by a pulley). 

The cheerful banter would become ever louder as the beverages dulled the hearing and loosened the tongues. Edith generally had no objection to the gathering in the garage which, especially over weekends, was listening to Gerhard Viviers (Spiekerish) commentating on a rugby match of some import over the radio, in the days before television made it to South African shores. Martin would merrily continue stripping the engine to its constituent parts: valves, pistons, rings, gudgeon pins, cam, crank etc. The Lion Lager, his preferred brand, was hardly touching sides as it coursed through his body. The parts would be sent to a fitter and turner amongst his network of contacts for reconditioning. He would not even consider using SADF facilities for his backyard jobs – Martin being the altogether honourable man that he was. His only real vice was the few pints he had with his buddies.

As the streetlights began to flicker to life the children would start returning home and ascend the staircase alongside the garage to the small stoep (veranda) and into the house. There Edith would goad their filthy bodies into the bathroom, juggling this process with finishing off the evening meal to be served by 20h00 sharp, as was her custom. A stickler for punctuality, Edith would brook no tardiness and her voice would indicate quite clearly how close she was to the end of her tether.

One evening Martin pushed Edith’s tolerance a tad too far. At a few minutes past eight he was putting the finishing touches to the reassembly of the old Essex engine that he’d returned to the cavity in the engine bay of a Ford Capri. She was normally quite tolerant of his having quenched his thirst with the bitter beverage, but lateness for supper was a bridge too far. All were around the dining table – except Martin. That evening at the top of the stairs she stood with apron fastened, hands on hips and said loudly: “Martin, come for supper.” He and his mates sniggered and he continued to tighten the last few bolts. Seconds later: “Maaaaarrrrrtinnn! Come eat at once!!!” Followed by: “Come nowwww, or your plate will be in the bin!” – in an equally shrill exclamation of indignation.

Never before nor since had his buddies dispersed with greater haste – some can in hand, others simply at a hefty pace made a bolt for their own homes. Red-faced, due to the beer or embarrassment, no one knows, Martin made his way to the dinner table under the ear splitting whip of his indignant woman.

The drinking pals were left to wonder if he was making his way to Beulah land or the Jukskei maelstrom. Martin had pushed the envelope too far. And by Jove he knew it!

©Paul M Haupt

Reference:

N Musiker, R. M. (2000). A Concise Historical Dictionary of Greater Johannesburg. Cape Town: Francolin.