The motorcar is regarded as the greatest mechanical marvel in transport.

 The motorcar is regarded as the greatest mechanical marvel in transport, since the invention of the wheel. In 1886 the first petrol powered auto-mobile in the world was the Benz Patent-Motorwagen, invented by Karl Benz. A decade later, in 1896, the first motor car was introduced to our country. 

By the end of the 1920s, the car industry was dominated by three large companies: General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler.

The first car to be seen on the Genadendal roads was that of German businessman and lessee of the Genadendal Mission Stores, Emil Hermann Weder,. The first image, top left, shows Mr. Weder boasting in his Chrysler (1924), behind the famous Genadendal ox-wagon. 

For many villagers it was unbelievable that two people could sit on a machine and ride in top gear with an impossible speed of 20km/h. 

Others wondered what would happen to this world when the numbers of these vehicles would increase in our streets with their deafening noise and sickly oil odour.

 Before electric starters were introduced, starting the car was a long-winded process; the engine. had to be cranked by hand. 

Soon people became used to the roaring engines that replaced the sound of galloping hoofs of horses.

After the Great Depression and World War II some of the professional people on the mission station started to have their own private cars. 

Local Bus Companies like Hermann Wildschut Transport and Awie Plessis Transport later took control of public transportation in the community. 

When modern taxi services were introduced, only the famous bus stop names like “Die Braak” ”Vyeboomstasie” and “The Cross” remind us today of the famous gathering places where villagers would wait, thrilled with excitement, to welcome their loved ones after a time of absence or where, with tears in the eyes, the last good-byes were said to those who would leave for some time.

Top right image shows a number of private cars parked on the Genadendal Werf (Church Square). The other two photos below show a Vauxhall and Dodge during breakdowns.

"And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven." - II Kings 2:11