Parow

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Coordinates: 33°54′S, 18°36′E

Parow is a northern suburb of Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa.

Parow was founded by Johann Heinrich Ferdinand Parow.

[edit] Parow Beginnings

During a great storm in Table Bay in 1865, 19 ships were stranded. Amongst the many schooners was the Kehrwieder, the ship of Captain Johann Heinrich Ferdinand Parow. After being stranded, Captain Parow settled down in the Cape of Good Hope and married Johanna Wilhelmina Timmerman, the daughter of the family that helped Captain Parow after being stranded on the Cape coast.

Parow quickly realised the potential value of the Tyger Valley area north of Cape Town and that the area held great opportunities for cattle trade. Captain Parow soon moved inland to this area and started selling ground in the area which is today known as Parow, which built up a great deal of wealth for the Captain.

Parow died on 4 December 1910, in his house in Cassibelle, Maitland. His wife, JW Timmerman, died ten years prior to his passing away. They did not have any children.

Captain Parow's telescope is still being kept safe in the Town Hall of Parow.

[edit] Modern Parow

A village management board was established for Parow in 1902. It was upgraded to a municipality in 1939. The municipality was incorporated into the City of Tygerberg in 1996.

The Parow valley was included in the Cape Town municipal land area in 1944. During the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, Parow was largely transforming into a commercial area, with many shopping centres opening around Voortrekker road, one of the longest roads in Cape Town.

With the extreme political struggle of apartheid in the 1980s and the advent of democracy in the 1990s, Parow's popularity started to decline and many of its higher income population moved further north.

In 2005 Parow became the headquarters for the South African division of the International Alliance of Guardian Angels, the world's oldest and largest volunteer public safety patrol organisation.