FLAGS : their reason for being

Flags are interesting reflections of the doings of human beings. As one moves around a city or its suburbs examples of flags in varied colours and designs are to be seen on buildings.  No longer are they only official banners/symbols representing the state, royalty, military but have been adopted as advertising material by corporate business houses, hotels, insurance, motor car companies etc.

School flags are also attention catching but researching details of their history has sometimes not been easy to discover. First one has to find the schools who have flags (many have badges but not flags), then face the fact that the particulars of the designs have not always been recorded.  Next begins a search for a teacher/parent/learner of the present or of the past who may have noted down facts or who may remember details, dates etc., and who have the time to explain and answer the researcher’s questions. Some knowledge of the history of the specific place where the school is situated and/or of the surrounding area, is useful.  In this way details are pieced together and an answer begins to appear. Odd facts come to light: some flags are hung inside a school hall and not outside; occasionally a flag is designed by Grade 12 learners.

Simon’s Town School Flag

Some of these flags use ordinary emblems to promote a school, while others use the more complex vexillological symbols as well as Latin mottos. For example: As Simon’s Town School is to be found in this naval town, one expects a connection to the sea or to the navy.  This expectation is met by dark blue crossed anchors and wavy lines in white and a lighter blue – references to the navy and the sea.  This is on the lower part of the flag with the upper section filled by a lion rampant (rearing in profile) in red on a blue background.  This referring perhaps to the Navy’s British/colonial past.  The motto is FAC ET SPERA

By contrast the flag of the Zwaanswyk High School, Retreat is attractive but plain in style.  It was designed in 1961 and has a white swan facing the flagpole on a background divided into three – the top portion is royal blue, the middle portion white and the lower end black.    The swan obviously refers to the Zwaan in the name of the school but one wonders why a swan?  Here one can only speculate; it might be a reference to the historic farm Zwaaneweide, which became the present day Steenberg farm and which was owned by a woman, Catherina Ustings.  Or it could simply be a name given by a later owner who saw large birds there and thought they were similar to others he/she had seen in his/her birthplace.  I say a later owner because the land on which this school was built was once part of a very old grant of the 1680s and known as Baas Harman’s Kraal.

The flag of Bergvliet Primary School, which incidentally was the first school to be built in the new residential area, was designed by an art teacher, a Mr Walters. The background is bottle green in colour with an orange/red erica flower in the centre.  The green colour I was told reflects the school’s strong environmental ethos and the erica was a plant once found in numbers in the area.  The land on which the school was built more than a half century ago,  was once part of Bergvliet farm and that in turn had once been, up until 1712,  a part of governor Simon van der Stel’s farm, Constantia. The motto is  SERVIMUS.

Wynberg Boys High and Junior schools has a history that goes back to 1841 when a school began in Glebe Cottage, Waterloo Road, Wynberg.  At that time it was known as the Wynberg Established School.  It was co-ed and only became a boys school in 1853.   The school grew in numbers and in time moved into new buildings designed by architect Herbert Baker.  Then the high school moved to separate buildings not far from where the school began life.  Their flag design came into being after 1945 and is quartered and centred on a plain blue background.  Various icons are represented in each quarter.  They are:  the three rings of Jan van Riebeeck, he grew grapes on his farm in what is today known as Bishopcourt;   a white anchor entwined with black rope;  a white tent, a reference to the Wynberg Military Camp;  three fleur de Lys and a bare vine.  It was explained to me that the last is a reference to the Huguenots who furthered what has become a growing wine industry.  The school motto shown is : Supera Moras.

Wynberg Girls High School Flag

Wynberg Girls’ High School founded in 1844 has as its badge the crest of the family of the Dukes of Wellington.  The flag has the school badge placed in the centre of a brown background and shows a red lion surmounting a ducal coronet.  The lion, which has a coronet placed in front of its body, holds a flagpole flying a white banner with a red cross.  The motto states “Honour before Honour”.

The history of the South African College Schools and the history of the University of Cape Town began in 1829, not as separate institutions but rather as an educational foundation that in time grew into the two institutions.   After occupying various “homes” in Cape Town SACS moved, in 1960, to Newlands, not far from the University.  In 1859 Charles Davidson Bell, the Surveyor General of the Cape, was asked to design a Coat of Arms for the school which in time became part of the school flag.  Bell was also the designer, in 1851, of the Cape triangular postage stamp.

The Coat of Arms is placed on a plain royal blue background.  At the top is a sketch of Table Mountain, below that is a lamp of learning, then a crown, a book resting on an anchor.  The school’s motto is : Spectemur Agendo.                                                         

It may come as a surprise that a school flag would suggest so much local historical information .

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