Elizabeth Mmatanki Malatsi was born in 1904 near the small village of Boons, a farming area about 60km northwest of Johannesburg. The farm on which she and her 11 siblings were raised belonged to her parents, who were relatively well-off, selling vegetables and other foodstuffs to the markets of the growing ‘city of gold”.
As a child, Mmatanki worked in the fields — at the time, education was not deemed necessary for young black girls — but when she grew older, she decided, like many other young women, to find a paid job in the city. She moved there and settled in Madubalaville, the African township outside Randfontein, not far from Boons and 45km west of Johannesburg. She became a domestic worker and while she was visiting friends, she met a young man, John Rhodes Rathebe, named — ironically —after the British imperialist Cecil John Rhodes.
John Rathebe had been born in Phokeng village, a stone’s throw from Rustenburg, 110km to the northwest of Johannesburg. John’s family was also relatively well-off, and while other parents struggled to provide their children with an education, his were able to put him through high school, whereafter he became a teacher.
Lured by the prospect of better pay and better living conditions, John Rathebe moved to Johannesburg where, as a migrant worker, he initially stayed at the Crown Mines dormitories for single men. Miners were not allowed to bring their wives and children, so John had left his family in Rustenburg and only visited them over holidays, and occasionally on weekends — a common routine for many migrant workers.
It is here that Mmatanki Malatsi and John Rathebe met and fell in love. Although he had a spouse back home, John Rathebe moved in with her. In 1928, a daughter was born to them, whom they named Dolly Kedibone. ‘It was in Madubalaville that my mother gave birth to two girls and a boy who all unfortunately had died at infancy [says Dolly Rathebe]. Hence it was something of a miracle when I was born healthy on April 2 1928. My mother was so relieved that she gave me the name Kedibone, which means ‘I have seen it all’.”
It was also in Madubalaville that Mmatanki’s family converged, albeit scattered across the township. While her mother was at work, Dolly was initially cared for by her grandmother Dorothy. But Dorothy died when the little girl was only two years old and her uncle, Joseph, who worked in the local mine, assumed responsibility for her well-being and so became an important father figure to her. Although he lived in the mining compound, Joseph made sure that Dolly never went to bed with an empty stomach.
Dolly was still an infant when her mother, Mmatanki Malatsi, settled as a subtenant in a house in Ray Street [in Sophiatown]. At first, because her mother worked during the day, she was left in Madubalaville, but when she was old enough to attend the pre-school owned by Mama Mkajane in Ray Street, she moved in with her mother. Dolly afterwards attended St Cyprian missionary school — adjacent to her old pre-school — and sang in the school troupes — even though the sedate, well-organised music of school choirs was not quite to her taste.
She also went to Sunday school and was an ardent Girl Guide. She loved camping, going on parade and just hanging around the streets of Sophiatown in her smart, always-neat Girl Guide uniform.
Although Dolly did not see much of her father, as he now stayed with his own family, John Rathebe never deserted either her or her mother. He would often visit, never hiding the fact that Dolly was his daughter. He was ‘The best man I ever met,” she says. Sadly, he died in 1944 after a long illness.
For many years, Dolly’s mother was employed as a domestic worker by a Jewish family in Saxonwold, and Dolly would visit her at work every weekend and, occasionally, after school on weekdays.
Mmatanki Malatsi, in the meanwhile, was not coping well as a single parent and, after some time, fell in love with and married John Nge Matiwane, who worked in a hardware store. The couple moved to a bigger house in neighbouring Western Native Township with Dolly, where Dolly’s aunt Dorah Maleshane Kgomane joined them.
This was the beginning of a traumatic time in Dolly’s life. ‘This stepfather ruined our lives as he ill-treated my mother and always beat her up for no apparent reason. Every time he came back home drunk he would assault my mother and chase her down the street. I would also run away and sleep with neighbours. In the morning, I would go back home and prepare for school.”
In 1943, when Dolly was just 15 years old, her mother fell ill and Dolly left school to take care of her. Because her stepfather had run off with another woman, Dolly had to support the two of them.
‘My mother became very unstable emotionally and took ill often. As a result, I could not further my studies after passing Standard Six. Not able to bear this domestic torture and abuse, my mother moved out and went to stay with a cousin of hers, Emma Mokgosinyane, at Matta Street in Western Native Township. I was only 15 years old and terribly traumatised.”
Dolly Rathebe’s mother died in 1949. In the same year, Dolly was discovered singing impromptu at a picnic by talent scout Sam Alcock. She auditioned successfully for a part in a movie, Jim Comes to Jo’burg.
Although it was not a financial success, the movie certainly proved to be a popular success, and Dolly’s life changed dramatically: ‘I became the first African female film star. I became a celebrity overnight and people greeted me everywhere, while others hugged and kissed me.”
Dolly [became] a lead vocalist with both the Harlem Swingsters and the Inkspots, many of whose members had performed in Jim Comes to Jo’burg.
As a result, Dolly began to perform regularly in white nightclubs in Johannesburg, and was making plenty of money. Whereas once she wore sneakers and cheap skirts, she now was able to afford designer clothes and expensive shoes. Regarded as the sexiest woman to hit Sophiatown, Western Native Township and adjoining Newclare, she had many suitors clamouring for her attention.
In fact, she is reputed to have had such sexy and desirable thighs that when men greeted one another and wanted to emphasise that all was tip-top or ‘sharp”, they would say: ‘Is Dolly se boude [thighs]”. In time, the expression was shortened to ‘Is Dolly”.
One man — William Buti Nketle, a member of the notorious Americans gang, a smart dresser popularly known as ‘Toweel”, finally swept Dolly off her feet. The Americans gang was initiated in 1945 by George ‘Kortboy” Mpalweni, a boxer and knife expert, who banded together some of his boyhood friends, including William Buti Nketle. Together they formed a gang that stole mainly from the South African Railways trucks that delivered expensive clothes and shoes to boutiques in Johannesburg, and because the gangsters prided themselves on the American designer clothes they wore, they called themselves the ‘Americans” …
Dolly was madly in love with her handsome Toweel Nketle and together they moved to number 17 Meyer Street, Sophiatown. But Toweel’s mother and many others frowned upon the relationship: a woman in showbiz was regarded as a ‘tiekie-line” — as cheap.
‘She did not like me one bit and told him I would never give birth to children. But Toweel and I were so much in love that he told her that he loves me and only me and that he would never marry any other woman but me. He was my main man and he taught me so much about love and life. When I gave birth to our daughter Zola on May 17 1952, it was the crowning of our love.”
Dolly was crazy about her little angel, but found it extremely difficult to raise her daughter the way she would have preferred to, especially without the support and advice of a mother.
‘I did not know anything about raising a child. Once Zola became very sick and I did not know what to do. On the advice of neighbours and friends, I took her to the clinic where I was given medicine to treat her. But she did not get well and seemed to be getting worse. As her situation deteriorated, everybody thought that she was going to die. A friend introduced me to a faith healer who stayed in our neighbourhood. I went to this old woman who sprinkled water on her as she prayed continuously. After a night of prayer, we woke up the next morning and my baby was cured. It was a miracle.”
By the mid-1950s Dolly Rathebe was a big star. She had two more children, son Smilo and daughter Ntsiki Thelma. She performed with African Jazz and Variety and in Gibson Kente’s Sikalo in the 1960s, but by the 1970s her career had stalled. She ran shebeens until the 1990s, when she joined The Elite Swingsters and was rediscovered as one of South Africa’s great singers and actors.
This is an extract from Group Portrait South Africa, published by Kwela Books with KIT Publishers and compiled by Paul Faber