Madiba's bus

[fig]

Nick Wolpe, son of Harold Wolpe, is busy turning Liliesleaf farm in Rivonia (the hideout of the ANC leadership in the early 1960s) into a museum to the Rivonia Treason Trial. In the museum is a poster of this 1960 Microbus:



According to Nick Wolpe, a few weeks before the arrest of the Rivonia treason trialists, the bus was bought by Rivonia trialist Denis Goldberg (who spent 22 years on Robben Island) for the purpose of transporting Nelson Mandela and other members of the ANC leadership incognito (note the curtains in the back).

They are apparently hoping to find this bus if it has survived, so they can restore it to display in the museum.

[Pine]

Very interesting! Any idea what the original colour was? Dark green, I guess?

[fig]

Sealing wax red and beige grey apparently.

[Blitzkrieg]

I hope that this Bus has survived and is hiding in some obscure barn somewhere

and not on The Island

[Chris]

Some cop took it!!

[fig]

I hope that this Bus has survived and is hiding in some obscure barn somewhere

and not on The Island

It would be great if it's still around, but unlikely. Also, that TJ plate is the only identifying feature; there is no record of the VIN, so even if it has survived, it will be difficult to identify.

By "The Island" I assume you don't mean Robben Island. A few years ago I saw a pic of Robben Island with a Fleetline Kombi in the picture. It's probably still there, rusting away.

[Pine]

Always interesting to get the exact history of a car, but there are SO MANY hoax cars out there as well!

Last year I went to go and have a look at a Caddilac limousine in Krugersdorp, the owner swore it was H.F. Verwoerd's official car up to the day he died. (Funny enough, when I did some research I found that the Caddilac Betsie Verwoerd was driven in on her husband's funeral, was a completely different model, found pictures of the funeral in an old book.). H.F. Verwoerd of course had the famous TP1 reg number on his car, but the seller refused to show me the Caddy's reg number, in spite that my dad was seriously interested in buying it.

There are hundreds of Caddilacs in the USA for sale - of course, all of them belonged to Elvis, you know.

Same with DB5 Aston Martins - although there were only 2 used in the original 007 Sean Connery Goldfinger movie (one a stunt car, and one for publicity pics), there are several silver DB5s all over the world - all ORIGINAL Goldfinger props. An Aston Martin employee recently said that the original stunt car was sent back to the factory shortly after the movie was made, the 'ejection seat' hole in the roof was welded up, it was resprayed and sold again. No track was kept of the chassis number anyway...

There were more black 'original' Miami Vice Ferrari Daytona Spyder replicas (fibreglass shell, Corvette chassis and engine) advertised on Ebay than were ever used in the shooting of the first 2 seasons. (One of them gets blown up by an RPG7 in the first episode of Season 3, replaced of course by a white Testarossa).

Footnote: My Bay was used by the Stander gang when they robbed the Volkskas bank in Commisioner Street, Jhb, in the early 80s, Andre Stander himself shot at the Cops through the sunroof. Of course a 1600 Bus is not the best getaway vehcile (SAP had souped-up Skylines at the time), but don't let facts spoil a good story! He he he

[brianj]

DB6? saw one this morning interestingly... just changes hands for 2 bar.

[lowlight]

Ja Pine Dirks fleetline was in front of the bank HEHE -you must watch the movie