1959 in South Africa

Decades:	1930s; 1940s; 1950s; 1960s; 1970s;
See also:	1959 in South African sport; List of years in South Africa;

The following lists events that happened during 1959 in South Africa.

Incumbents

9 – Wing Commander Michael Beetham flying a Royal Air Force Vickers Valiant sets a record of 11 hours 27 minutes for a non-stop London-Cape Town flight.^[1]

11 – Members of the United Party led by Helen Suzman secede and form the Progressive Party.

1 – Twelve countries, including South Africa, the United States and the Soviet Union, sign the Antarctic Treaty.
11 – Charles Robberts Swart is appointed the 11th Governor-General of the Union of South Africa.
12 – The 47th Annual Conference of the African National Congress takes place in Durban.

1 January – Thulas Nxesi, national minister
7 January – Peter Mokaba, member of the South African parliament, deputy minister in the government of Nelson Mandela (d. 2002)
14 March – Tertius Bosch, cricketer.
16 March – Tito Mboweni, politician.
4 April – Kenneth Segal, South African-born Israeli industrial designer and educator
7 April – Etsko Schuitema, Afrikaner businessman
21 April – Manne Dipico, politician
16 September – Dave Richardson (cricketer), cricketer.
18 November – Christine Barkhuizen le Roux, writer (d. 2020)^[2]

April 15 – Leonard Beyers, South African army general (b. 1894)
February 7 – D. F. Malan, South African politician, 4th Prime Minister of South Africa (b. 1874)
April 15 – Leonard Beyers, South African army general (b. 1894)

Three new Cape gauge locomotive types enter service on the South African Railways.

May–July – Seven Class 1-DH Henschel type DH 1420 diesel-hydraulic locomotives.^[3]
November – The first of 115 Class 32-000 General Electric type U18C1 diesel-electric locomotives in South West Africa.^[4]
The first of 135 Class 5E1, Series 1 electric locomotives, an upgraded and more powerful version of the Class 5E.^[4]^[5]

^ "Records set by the RAF". Air of Authority – A History of RAF Organisation. Archived from the original on 12 August 2011. Retrieved 10 June 2012.
^ "Christine Barkhuizen-Le Roux (1959–2020)". Flanders Literature. 30 November 2020. Retrieved 13 April 2022.
^ Paxton, Leith; Bourne, David (1985). Locomotives of the South African Railways (1st ed.). Cape Town: Struik. pp. 143–144. ISBN 0869772112.
^ ^a ^b South African Railways Index and Diagrams Electric and Diesel Locomotives, 610mm and 1065mm Gauges, Ref LXD 14/1/100/20, 28 January 1975, as amended
^ Dulez, Jean A. (2012). Railways of Southern Africa 150 Years (Commemorating One Hundred and Fifty Years of Railways on the Sub-Continent – Complete Motive Power Classifications and Famous Trains – 1860–2011) (1st ed.). Garden View, Johannesburg, South Africa: Vidrail Productions. p. 293. ISBN 9 780620 512282.