THE CAPE TIMES FRESH AIR FUND

For 100 years, Cape Times readers’ generous donations have bought happiness for thousands of underprivileged children!
The Cape Times Fresh Air Camp, at Froggy Pond near Simonstown, provides a wonderful, fun filled holiday for children.
They learn life skills, swim in the sea,play games and enjoy hearty meals and lots of treats. An experience that will live with them forever.

So go ahead - buy a little happiness for a deserving child today!

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The Cape Times Fresh Air Camp brings joy to disadvantaged children. the camps are about bringing fun and excitement to young people who have never had a seaside holiday.

ABOUT THE CAMP

ONE of Cape Town’s most enduring and heart-warming charities turns 100 this year. The Cape Times Fresh Air Fund was started in 1919 by the Child Life Society, acting in the recommendation of the eminent author, poet and educationist, Dr Louis Leipoldt . The then editor of the Cape Times, B K Long, who was also a parliamentarian gave vigorous support to the venture. And later pledged the Cape Times’s full responsibility for the fund.

Camps for underprivileged children were held at various sites on the Cape coast, but by 1934 a permanent home was found for the fund at the quaintly-named Froggy Pond, just south of Simon’s Town – where the camp remained to this day.

The children were first housed in wooden bungalows. At the start of World War II these were requisitioned by the Royal Navy, and the camp was named HMS Afrikander. The navy used it for sailors in transit and also to billet men who manned the guns on merchant ships. It was in one of the bungalows that the famous Great Dane, Just Nuisance, was given a bunk of his own until he died.

Over the years the wooden bungalows have all been replaced by brick buildings, including the dormitories, dining room, kitchen, recreation hall, an office and flat for the secretary,. The money has all come from contributions by Cape Times reader, from the smallest of amounts to large bequests. Some of the fund have been donated by former beneficiaries of the camp, after they had succeeded financially in adult life.

Special outing have always be a highlight of each group’s week at the camp. One group will always remember its visit to the aquarium, another will be taken up Table Mountain by cableway, thanks to the generosity of the Cableway Company.

But Froggy Pond beach, just across the main road from the camp, has always been the main daily venue for bathing, sandcastle competitions and treasure-hunting. For many of the children, its their first contact with sea. Some, even from nearby Boland schools, have never seen it before.

The ages if the camp children ranges from six to 12 years. They are taught life skills, team building and are encouraged to develop their talents very evening in the hall where they out on shows for one another. For the first time in their lives, most of them learn what it means to have three square meals a day.

None of this would be possible without the involvement of volunteers who gave up their free time to be with children over the holidays. About 160 volunteers help out over a 12 month period, with eight children under the care of each volunteer. They guide them, nurture them and act as father or mother confessors.

The present chairman, Les Williams, former general manager of the Cape Times, has been on the camp’s committee for 37 years, and has served as the chairman for the past 20. Together he and Judge spearheaded the drive to have all the wooden structures rebuilt in brick, and safeguarded the camp’s existence for the future generations of children for whom a holiday by the sea might otherwise have remained just a dream..

DONATIONS

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Registration Number IT244/2001 | NPO number 003269NPO | PBO number 18/11/13/139

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