J.W.B. Gunning

Who was J.W.B. Gunning?

Jan Willem Boudewijn Gunning, a physician, was director of both the Staatsmuseum and what was then known as the Pretoria Zoological Gardens.

Gunning was the second son of the famous Dutch theologian Johannes Hermanus Gunning and Johanna Jacoba Gunning. He attended the University of Amsterdam, Leiden University and Jena University, qualifying as a doctor of medicine. In 1884 he emigrated to South Africa and started a practice in the Orange Free State. The same year, he met and married Susanna Neethling on 10 November 1884. From the Free State, he moved to the Cape Colony and practised there until 1897 when he was appointed as first director of the Staatsmuseum in Pretoria, which later was renamed the Transvaal Museum. He remained director until his death in 1913. Gunning was responsible for founding the National Zoo in Pretoria in 1899.

While Winston Churchill was imprisoned in Pretoria during the Boer War, he became well acquainted with Gunning, who was one of the directors of the prison. Of him, he said: