Historical landscape photographs featured in HUMANITEC digital showcase

Ulrich Nänni with two field assistants (names unknown) at Mount Aux Source, in the Drakensberg, 1961 (Source: Nänni collection)

Three of the PCU’s photographic collections will be featured this Thursday, 6 August, at UCT’s Hidding Campus, as part of HUMANITEC/UCT Libraries digital showcase. The PCU applied for and received a grant from UCT’s Digital Repositories Committee in 2014 for a HUMANITEC project which allowed for the scanning and digitising of over 1900 images from three PCU collections - Ulrich Nänni, Keith Cooper and Ed Granger. 

• Ulrich Nänni worked for the Department of Forestry in the Cathedral Peak area of the Drakensberg and focused especially on the grasslands and forests of the area.  His collection of landscape photographs dates from 1962-1980. 
• Keith Cooper was the former Director of the Wildlife Society of Southern Africa and took many photographs during the 1970s and 1980s of the forest of KwaZulu-Natal and the former Transkei region. 
• Ed Granger completed his PhD in the Drakensberg area of KwaZulu-Natal and focused his research on the impact of different land use practices on the ecology of the region.  His large collection of photographs and extensive metadata was developed over the period 1972-1997. 

These scanned photographs and associated metadata are very valuable both for us here at the PCU, as well as the wider public, to which they will be made available. The showcase will be open to the public from 6.30 pm onwards, and is also part of Cape Town’s ‘First Thursdays’ initiative.

Article by Esther Mostert