August
20 – The restored manor house of Groot Constantia is reopened after a fire devastated it in 1925.
13 January – Sydney Brenner, biologist and Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine laureate, is born in Germiston, Johannesburg.
May – Philemon (Duma) Pearce Dumasile Nokwe, the first black advocate of the Supreme Court of Transvaal and politician.
10 June – Mizream Maseko, artist and Zion Christian Church deacon.
22 October – Helenard Joe Hendrickse (Allan Hendrickse) is born in Uitenhage, Cape Province.
7 January – Cape – Sunland to Kirkwood, 14 miles 54 chains (23.6 kilometres).
10 February – Transvaal – Solarvale to Mount Carmel, 2 miles 25 chains (3.7 kilometres).
27 April – Cape – Landplaas to Bitterfontein, 31 miles 63 chains (51.2 kilometres).
1 July – Transvaal – Makwassie to Vermaas, 59 miles 29 chains (95.5 kilometres).
4 July – Natal – Candover to Golela, Transvaal, 12 miles 27 chains (19.9 kilometres).
14 September – Cape – Imvani to Qamata, 26 miles 79 chains (43.4 kilometres).
Seven new steam locomotive types, five Cape gauge and two narrow gauge, enter service on the South African Railways (SAR):
Ten Class HF 2-8-2+2-8-2 Double Mikado type Modified Fairlie articulated steam locomotives.
Thirteen Class GCA 2-6-2+2-6-2 Double Prairie type Garratt articulated branchline locomotives.
Thirty-seven Class GF 4-6-2+2-6-4 Double Pacific type Garratt locomotives.
Ten Class U 2-6-2+2-6-2 Double Prairie type Union Garratt articulated locomotives.
In December, the first of two Class 18 2-10-2 Santa Fe type locomotives.
Two Class NG G12 2-6-2+2-6-2 Double Prairie type narrow gauge Garratt articulated locomotives. They are the smallest Garratt locomotives to see service in South Africa.
The first three Class NG G13 2-6-2+2-6-2 Double Prairie type Garratt locomotives, on the Langkloof and Alfred County Railway narrow gauge lines.
