Barney Barnato, Kimberlite Pipes, and the founding of a diamond monopoly
Barney was brilliant in business and wit, and such a huge personality at the Kimberly diamond mine that people enjoyed doing business with him. He rose from being an impoverished street performer in London to millionaire mining magnate within ten years of arriving to South Africa. He was a rare combination of brilliance and fortitude. He was also the magician at the dinner party, the boxer in the ring, actor on the stage. He was a fearless entrepreneurial thinker who regularly pushed in all his chips to move his business interests forward.
My special guests is Nancy du Tertre, who discovered through her research that Barney was her great, great uncle.