NCHM History

The Staatsmuseum of the South African Republic (ZAR) was a national museum, founded by and intended for the Government. The policy of the Staatsmuseum provided for historical, anthropological, archaeological and natural history collections and exhibitions.

The Museum was situated in the small market hall on Market Square (now Strijdom Square) in Pretoria - a locality that attracted many visitors, but with a bad environment for collections. Soon the hall was too small to accommodate the Museum.

Work already started on the new building in Boom Street, Pretoria, prior to the outbreak of the Anglo-Boer War. The building was completed after the War and opened on 15 December 1904. The name was first changed to Pretoria Museum and then to the Transvaal Museum.

Attention was now paid especially to the expansion of natural history collections and exhibitions. Soon, this museum was also too small. In 1912 part of this collection moved to a new building in Paul Kruger Street. The natural history exhibitions followed in 1925.

For many years, however, the museum in Boom Street remained a landmark in Pretoria. The historical, anthropological and archaeological collections were housed and displayed there, but without museological care. As these consisted of objects of historical significance, a cultural historian, Mrs. Kotie Roodt-Coetzee, was appointed in 1953. She started collecting cultural history objects and information. From 1963 this new section had a separate budget.

Separation between the cultural history and natural history sections of the Transvaal Museum was completed with the founding of the National Cultural History and Open Air Museum (NATCOM) on 21 August 1964.

In 1988 the name was shortened to National Cultural History Museum (NCHM) because of a new approach favouring in situ preservation (site museums) instead of the removal of structures (open air museums). The NCHM head office was already managing a number of satellite museums that had been developed over the years, such as the Kruger, Voortrekker Monument, Sammy Marks, Pierneef, Coert Steynberg and Pioneer Museums, as well as the Willem Prinsloo Agricultural Museum. The Tswaing Crater Museum, situated in a locality north of Pretoria where salt had been mined, was the first enviro museum to be developed in South Africa.

For nearly thirty years the NCHM endeavoured to find a suitable site for a functional museum, as the old building in Boom Street became more and more dilapidated. This building had to be evacuated when a water pipe burst, resulting in a flood damaging the objects on display. The offices moved to new premises.

In 1993 the old Mint building in Visagie Street, Pretoria, was allocated as new museum of culture. A functional facility with practical areas for exhibitions, storage and communication was the result of a creative process of adapting a building designed for a mint to a museum. The Museum opened on 1 March 1997.

The sequel would reverse the 1964-happening: the Transvaal Museum and the National Cultural History Museum were amalgamated, with the addition of the South African National Museum for Military History in Johannesburg, as the Northern Flagship Institution, from 1 April 1999. The satellite museums either devolved or became independent museums. The Institution is managed by a Chief Executive Officer and a Board replacing the three previous museum boards.

Contact person:

Ms. E. Grobler

National Cultural History Museum