Mpopoma
Named from the Mpopoma stream; the word is variously explained as the sound of running water, a waterfall, or springs. A large township built in the 1950s.
Mpopoma takes its name from the stream that runs through it towards the Khami River. Everyone agrees on that. They do not quite agree on what the word means.
Three tellings
- The oldest explanation: a descriptive name taken from “the sound the Mpopoma river makes when flowing.”
- The Herald (Mabikwa, 2024): in isiNdebele mpopoma refers to a waterfall, and the stream once had one.
- Another Herald article: the area was wetland with springs.
The first two are close relatives, since a waterfall is a stream making a noise.
Mpopoma in 1960
The City Council’s own account of its townships, printed in 1960, records 2,580 houses in Mpopoma at about £300 each, let on 99-year leases with 25-year loans, on the model of Highfield in Salisbury. It also records the Gertrude Macintyre Hostel, built for 133 women and 3,000 lodgers. That is the Council describing its own work, and we would like to set residents’ memories beside it.
What we don’t know yet
Is the waterfall still there? What was it like to grow up in Mpopoma? Do you remember the Gertrude Macintyre Hostel? Tell us.
Sources
- Bulawayo’s suburb names, A to M
- F. Q. Mabikwa, ‘Tracing the roots: How Bulawayo’s townships reflect city’s rich Ndebele heritage’, The Herald, 2 November 2024
- ‘Suburbs, street names origin explained’, The Herald (Zimbabwe)
- ‘Bulawayo Municipality’, NADA No. 37 (1960), pp. 75–80
Do you know more about this? Corrections, photographs and your own account are all welcome, and a correction is published on the page with the date it was made. Send something in.