University of Cape Town

The UCT Mathematics Competition is an annual mathematics competition for schools in the Western Cape province of South Africa, held at the University of Cape Town. Around 7000 participants from Grade 8 to Grade 12 take part, writing a multiple-choice paper. Individual and pair entries are accepted, but all write the same paper for their grade. The current holder of the School Trophy is Rondebosch Boys High School, with Diocesan College achieving second place in the 2022 competition. These two schools have held the top positions in the competition for a number of years. The competition was established in 1977 by Mona Leeuwenberg and Shirley Fitton, who were teachers at Diocesan College and Westerford High School, and since 1987 has been run by Professor John Webb of the University of Cape Town.

The Jagger Library (also known as the Jagger Reading Room, previously known as the J. W. Jagger Linear Library) was the main reading room of the University of Cape Town Libraries.The building was constructed in the 1930s, named after John William Jagger, a major benefactor of the University of Cape Town Libraries. It served initially as the main library, then as a temporary lending center, and more recently, between 2000 and 2011, as the reading room for the African Studies Library. By 1980, the library was part of an eight-library complex at the University of Cape Town, and was the headquarters of the university's library service. It then contained 518,000 of the 741,000 volumes available in the library network, and could house 1280 readers in its reading rooms.In 2011, the university began a project aimed at restoring the Jagger Library to its original condition. The walkways and balconies installed in the 1960s and 1970s were removed, and it was subsequently painted, refurnished, and had its original elements restored, becoming once again the main library of the University of Cape Town. It was partially destroyed by the April 2021 Table Mountain fire. However, the library's fire detection systems stopped the destruction of the entire collection. The salvage operation ended on 18 May. The library will not be rebuilt—the collections will move to a new premises.

The FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology is a South African biological research and conservation institute based at the University of Cape Town. The mission statement of the institute is “to promote and undertake scientific studies involving birds, and contribute to the practice affecting the maintenance of biological diversity and the sustained use of biological resources”.

The Bolus Herbarium was established in 1865 from a donation by Harry Bolus of his extensive herbarium and library to the South African College, which later became the University of Cape Town. Its collection of specimens numbers over 320 000, making it the third largest university herbarium in the Southern Hemisphere. The collection is highly representative of the Cape Flora and also houses many type specimens. The international herbarium abbreviation BOL is used when referring to the Bolus Herbarium. Although the building caught on fire during the 2021 Table Mountain fire, which gutted several other collections in the university including the Plant Conservation Unit, the Bolus Herbarium managed to narrowly escape being destroyed in the blaze.

UCT Radio is a campus radio station operated by students of the University of Cape Town (UCT) in Cape Town, South Africa. UCT Radio broadcasts on the 104.5 MHz frequency from a 20 watt transmitter located at 33°57′30″S 18°27′45″E. According to the university website, the station broadcasts its signal from the main Upper Campus in the Southern Suburbs, and all the way across the Cape Flats towards the Northern Suburbs of the greater Cape Town area.According to the Radio Audience Measurement Survey, as of June 2010 UCT Radio had a weekly listenership of 30,000 people.

The Groote Schuur Zoo was a 2-hectare (4.9-acre) zoo in Cape Town, South Africa. Established in 1931 at the request of deceased Cecil Rhodes, it was free of charge and a very popular attraction in Cape Town until its closure sometime between 1975 and 1985. The zoo shut down due to a combination of the financial burden that the Apartheid government faced and an increase in animal welfare standards. During its operation, it housed many animals including lions, emus, crocodiles and tahrs. The zoo can still be visited today, as it has been abandoned and left open to the public. The most prominent feature of the zoo is the Lion's Den, both when it was open and today where it still stands, full of overgrown vegetation.

The 2009 Table Mountain fire was a large fire in and around the Table Mountain National Park in Cape Town, South Africa. It broke out at approximately 20:30 on 17 March 2009 in the vicinity of Rhodes Memorial and initial fears were that the fire would spread to UCT's Upper Campus. The Table Mountain National Park quickly deployed firefighting personnel on the mountain, but the fire spread due to the strong winds. At around 23:20 on Tuesday evening, the fire started moving up Devil's Peak and by 00:00 was at the tip and making its way around the mountain to the suburbs of Tamboerskloof, Oranjezicht, Vredehoek and Gardens on the north side. The flames were engulfing the mountain and the huge amounts of smoke made it hard for rescue and fire-fighting helicopters making their way to the fire. By 00:30, people from the aforementioned areas were told to evacuate due to the strong winds pushing the fire around the mountain. By this time, Fire & Rescue Services had deployed 29 fire engines and 90 firefighters who were assisted by 45 firefighters from the South African National Parks and volunteers of Disaster Management The day following the fire, four helicopters, including a South African National Defence Force Atlas Oryx, were called in at dawn to water-bomb the fire, and to lift a team of firefighters high onto the mountain. Table Mountain National Park Fire Manager Philip Prins said about 500 hectares (1,200 acres) of park land had been burned: some fynbos, some renosterveld, some grass, and stands of pine trees.

The 2000 Table Mountain fire was a number of large veld fires that burned in and around the Table Mountain National Park in Cape Town, South Africa from 16 January to 20 January 2000. Over 120 fires were reported to have started around the Cape metropolitan area and spread rapidly due to dry and windy conditions on 16 January 2000.By the time the last fire was put out on 20 January 2000 over 10,000 ha had been burned across the Western Cape with 8,000 ha burned in the South Peninsula alone. It is estimated that fire caused around US$500 million in insurance claims alone . Over 70 houses and 200 informal dwellings were damaged or destroyed. Over 1,200 firefighters and other official and volunteer personal were involved in fighting the fire at a cost of $3 million.

The Rhodes Memorial on Devil's Peak in Cape Town, South Africa, is a memorial to the English-born South African politician Cecil John Rhodes (1853–1902). The memorial was designed by the renowned architect, Sir Herbert Baker.

Groote Schuur ([ɣroːtə sxyːr], Dutch for "big shed") is an estate in Cape Town, South Africa. In 1657, the estate was owned by the Dutch East India Company which used it partly as a granary. Later, the farm and farmhouse was sold into private hands. Groote Schuur was later acquired by William De Smidt, and remained in the family's possession until it was sold by Abraham De Smidt, Surveyor General of the Cape Colony, in 1878, and was bought by Hester Anna van der Byl of the prominent Van Der Byl / Coetsee family. In 1891 Cecil Rhodes leased it from her. He later bought it from her in 1893 for £60 000, and had it converted and refurbished by the architect Sir Herbert Baker. The Cape Dutch building, located in Rondebosch, on the slopes of Devil's Peak, the outlying shoulder of Table Mountain, was originally part of the Dutch East India Company's granary constructed in the seventeenth century. Little of the original house remained after a fire in 1896. The traditional thatched roof was replaced by sturdier Welsh slates. Rhodes gave no strict instructions as to what he wanted from Baker. Rhodes abhorred any mechanically made items (such as hinges for windows) in the house and set out to remove them and have them replaced with brass and bronze items that would be cast. Baker replaced the front of the house, added a long stoep in the back and constructed a new wing. The wing contained a billiard room and master bedroom above on the second floor that contained a large bay window overlooking Devil's Peak. He also added a grand hall with a massive fireplace.Sir Herbert Baker also played a significant role in the furnishing of the house. After initially furnishing with modern furniture from London, Rhodes, influenced by Baker, began a shift from the modern to more traditional Cape furniture. This would mark the beginning of Cecil Rhodes’ collection of colonial furnishings.The gardens of the house were as Rhodes demanded 'masses of colour'. Surrounding the house was a mass of roses, hydrangeas, cannas, bougainvilleas and fuchsias. Farther away from the house on the slopes of Devil's Peak, Rhodes kept antelopes, zebra, eland, wildebeest and ostriches.Rhodes was always a generous host while at Groote Schuur. He used the residence as much as a business and political headquarters as a home. His life at the time was one of dinner parties and meetings on the stoep, where he would be joined by as many as fifty people.From 1910 to 1984, it was the official Cape residence of the Prime Ministers of South Africa and continued as a presidential residence of P. W. Botha and F. W. De Klerk. However, P.W. Botha never resided there, opting rather to live in Westbrooke.In May 1956, Time magazine reported, "a party was held at Groote Schuur for South Africa's Nationalist Prime Minister Johannes Strydom after he had won the parliamentary campaign to continue white supremacy in a land of 2.6 million whites and 10 million nonwhites. The party was given by some of the younger nationalists and their wives to honor him. They organized a caravan of 130 vehicles and slowly drove up to the Groote Schuur. After reaching the house, they began to sing old Boer war songs—the Volksliederen of the Transvaal and Orange Free State. A speech was given by Mrs. M.D.J. Koster, the only female member of the parliament, 'Every white woman and every white mother thanks you from the depth of her heart.' Strydom’s response to this was, 'We must never be swerved from our goals...the struggle must continue.'"The building was the site for the signing of the historic "Groote Schuur Minute" between Nelson Mandela, of the African National Congress (ANC), and F.W. De Klerk, the then State President of the Republic of South Africa, on 4 May 1990. The document was a commitment between the two parties towards the resolution of the existing climate of violence and intimidation as well as a commitment to stability and to a peaceful process of negotiations. A working party was established to investigate the granting of temporary immunity to ANC cadres, to advise on how to deal with the release of political prisoners and to make recommendations on the definition of political offences. Under Nelson Mandela, as President of the Republic of South Africa, the Genadendal building (formerly called Westbrooke) became the Cape Town residence of the South African President. Groote Schuur is now a museum and open to the public only by appointment.

Mostert's Mill (Afrikaans: Mostert se Meul) is a historic windmill in Mowbray, Cape Town, South Africa. It was built in 1796 and was the oldest surviving complete windmill in South Africa. It was gutted in a wildfire on 18 April 2021. The fire had started on Table Mountain and spread, severely damaging a number of buildings.

Genadendal Residence [χəˈnɑːdəndal] is the official Cape Town residence of the President of South Africa, situated on the Groote Schuur estate in Rondebosch. It has been the official residence since 1994 when Nelson Mandela took up residence here rather than the main Groote Schuur manor house. The mixed Victorian-Georgian residence, formerly known as Westbrooke, is named after the town of Genadendal – itself an Afrikaans word meaning "Valley of Mercy", until it was changed to the current name in 1995.The residence first came into existence in the early 18th century as a grain barn, and was converted into a residence in the mid 1800s.