Kimberley, Northern Cape

Kimberley is the capital and largest city of the Northern Cape province in South Africa. It is about 110 km east of the meeting point of the Vaal and Orange Rivers. It is important because of its diamond mining past and the siege during the Second Anglo-Boer war. British businessmen Cecil Rhodes and Barney Barnato made their fortunes in Kimberley, and Rhodes set up the De Beers diamond company in the early days of the mining town. On 2 September 1882, Kimberley was the first city in the Southern Hemisphere and the second in the world after Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the United States to set up electric street lights. The first stock exchange in Africa was built in Kimberley in 1881. References