Die Bloe Kerkie was awarded heritage status.
On October 7, Tony Burisch of the Heidelberg Heritage Association awarded the latest blue plaque for heritage status to the hall at 42 Fenter Street.
The hall was built as the synagogue for the Heidelberg Jewish Community. The Jewish cemetery is at the far northern end of Fenter Street.
Jewish Services was held in Heidelberg Town Hall from about 1893. The foundation stone for the synagogue was laid in 1929.
The hall is estimated to be erected by about 1930. The cost for the erection of the synagogue at the time was around £2 500 (R50 414).
The hall was sold to the freemasons. The Heidelberg Free Masons Lodge holds its warrant from the Grand Lodge of England. There were claims that Heidelberg’s lodge was the second oldest lodge in the then Transvaal.
As far as what can be established, the building in Fenter Street was never used as the Free Masons Lodge for meetings. The Free Masons Temple was next to the Old Heidelberg Club on Verwoerd Street, which has since been demolished.
Free Masonry started in South Africa around 1772.
The first master of the Heidelberg Lodge was WB Crosby. Other masters were A van Geusau, H Ueckermann, GC Bär and Dr Edward John Nixon.
Dr Nixon served as master of the freemasons in 1907/8 and again in 1914.
Edward Nixon was commissioned as Lieutenant and took over command of Vallentin’s Heidelberg Volunteers when Major John Vallentin left in 1901.
Nixon was the local doctor in Heidelberg. Nixon’s wife, Ellen Elizabeth Phillipson Nixon, died by being smothered by their cat while they were sleeping in 1935.
Both Nixon and his wife are buried in the Heidelberg Kloof Cemetery. Nixon passed away on September 16, 1935.
Over the years, the hall was hired out for dancing lessons and social events.
The nickname the hall had was ‘Die Bloe Kerkie’.
The premises have now been converted into residential property with various townhouses and flats on the premises. The name of the complex is Ecclesia. Translated from Greek it means the church. The sponsor of the plaque is Villa Moura Pty Ltd.
