During the internecine wars of the Maasai which disturbed southern Kenya and northern and central Tanzania in the early 1800’s, a group of Arusha Maasai, cattle herders who also practiced agriculture, left the plains and settled the southwestern slopes of Mt. Meru, where they prospered. By the late 1890’s they were powerful enough to dominate both the mountain and surrounding plains, sending raiding parties as far as eastern Kilimanjaro fifty miles away. It is no surprise, therefore, that they have a city named for them.
Arusha dates to 1900-1905 when the government of German East Africa built a fort or boma to protect German settlers attracted by Mt. Meru’s fertile volcanic soils and cool temperate climate (Arusha is 4,593 ft in elevation). By 1964, when I arrived, Tanganyika had been under British control for forty-five years and Arusha was a bustling little town of about 10,000 people (878 of whom were whites / Europeans).
Arusha’s economy was based on agricultural products including Arabica coffee, pyrethrum, sisal, and papain. (I’ve dealt with coffee and sisal in my posts, Going Upcountry and Mt. Kilimanjaro, but pyrethrum and papain need some explanation.) Pyrethrum is a pesticide made from the flowers of a species of chrysanthemum. Effective against insects (I used aerosol cans of it to kill tsetse flies) it has a more soporific effect on larger animals, as in the case of a rhino which, encountering a field of pyrethrum (this was in the 50’s when rhinos were still abundant), ate some and promptly slumped over and went to sleep. Papain is an enzyme extracted from Papaya fruits for use in meat tenderizers.
Tourism also contributed. Tanganyika National Parks and the Ngorongoro Conservation Unit were headquartered in Arusha, and the town’s New Arusha and Safari hotels catered to tourists headed for the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and Ngurdoto Crater, Lake Manyara, and Serengeti national parks. (These will come up in future posts.)
Arusha appealed to me, partly because I’ve always been drawn to small towns, but also for its interesting mix of cultures–European, Indian (south Asian), African–and, on clear days, its views of nearby Mt. Meru.
Arusha had leafy suburbs where Europeans, and better-off Indians and Africans, lived in large houses with lush, well-kept yards, often behind high walls or dense hedges. They were nice, often lovely, places, but not especially interesting. Here are some snapshots taken elsewhere in town.
Ismailis are a branch of Shia Islam noted for the their enlightened views on the rights of women and the values of secular education, modern medicine, and Western culture in general. Their leader, the Aga Khan, periodically gains notice when Ismaili communities donate funds for charity equal to the value of his weight in gold, diamonds and platinum. A single weighing event of the previous Aga Khan, who weighed 243 pounds, brought in $1,400,000.
I have fond memories of Arusha as it was in 1964. However, its population has since burgeoned to over 400,000 people. It’s a big city now with attributes one expects of such a place. Some are positive, as, for instance, numerous quality hotels (tourists visiting northern Tanzania’s national parks have become the city’s major revenue-earner http://www.tanzaniaparks.go.tz), a shopping mall, international conference center, and two sports teams; others, including an increased crime rate and award-winning traffic jams, not so much.
Times have changed.
But, the market’s still there. If you ever visit Arusha, check it out. Maybe it still sells those small, sweet bananas.
Good notes, and photos (some of which I will purloin).
An additional notes about Arusha you might want to insert – it was the town where the movie “Hatari” was filmed. (John Wayne and Red Buttons (and some pretty lady I don’t remember), starred as animal collectors.)
The Peace Corps had a regions office there; Katy Newlin ad Alice Katsensparger (sp?) were th secretaries. I lived at Tengeru, Setliff and Mesner in town, and Roberts and Hettinger at the Forestry school. There were a couple T-6 teachers in town too, as well as about six T-4 road/culver engineers.
Hope all is well with you and Cathy. Naga and I are finally settling into the Tucson environment…sort of like Dodoma, 🌵
Cheers,
Mike and Naga
Virus-free. http://www.avast.com
On Tue, May 26, 2020 at 12:03 PM Stories of East Africa by Dennis Herlocker wrote:
> Dennis Herlocker posted: “During the internecine wars of the Maasai which > disturbed southern Kenya and northern and central Tanzania in the early > 1800’s, a group of Arusha Maasai, cattle herders who also practiced > agriculture, left the plains and settled the southwestern slopes of” >
Mike, thanks for the comments. I briefly thought about mentioning Hatari, especially as Cathy and I honeymooned there, but then, never did. I’ll save the Peace Corps information for use in future blogs.
You have a nice looking place in Tucson. I would envy you except I’ve heard about the summers down there (one of my brothers lived in Phoenix for a few years).
Cathy and I are fine, although I could do without my bad leg and bunged up shoulders.
Enjoy all that sun.
Dennis and Cathy
Excuse me jumping in with a quick comment about Hatari, a number of my ISM friends remember the filming well, with lots of anecdotes about the actors.
We lived out on the Iringa Coffee Estates outside Arusha in the early 70s.
The Peace Corp – weren’t your offices in the same building as the DANIDA offices? (I think it had been a German post of sorts)?
Hi,
They were probably good anecdotes, too, if they were about actors. Are you free to share them? There was, indeed, an old German boma in Arusha, but the Peace Corps office was located in a building about a block from the clock tower down the main street (name forgotten) running west out of town toward Ngorongoro. I don’t remember DANIDA in Arusha when I was there. ISM means International School of Moshi? Morogoro?
Dennis,
I visited you at Ngorongoro in April of 1965, and so my memories of Arusha match yours. I never visited Tanzania at a later time, so these are still my memories of Arusha. I believe that I spent the night at the New Arusha Hotel. My friend from Ghana, Major Charles Langley (with whom I had traveled from Dar es Salaam to Moshi), drove me to Arusha from his house at Lyamungu on the slopes of Kilimanjaro above Moshi, and dropped me off, telling me that this is where safaris began. I remember spending an evening drinking beer in the hotel bar and talking with some local Brits who had previously spent time in West Africa – we all agreed that we were “Coasters” (from the Gold Coast or other West African Coasts), and we had a hell of an interesting time, until I stumbled off to sleep – the next morning, I wandered around Arusha looking for a way to get to Ngorongoro and the Serengetti, until I met the two RAF servicemen (John Kahan and Peter Champion) in their Land Rover, and began my several weeks of travel through Tanzania, Kenya, and Uganda with them.
I’m afraid that not only Arusha, but almost every place, has grown like mushrooms and become unrecognizable. When I first arrived for Graduate School in Austin, Texas in August of 1965, it had a population of 140,000 and the University of Texas had ca. 19,000 students. Now Austin has ca. 1,000,000 people, and UT has over 50,000 students. I’m glad that we were in Africa in the 1960s, as everything that came later wasn’t as interesting or as friendly. Ghana has gone from 7 1/2 million population to 31 million. In Ghana, locals Ghanaians used to wave our Jeeps down along the roads, and we picked up many locals for rides and drop-offs in PC Jeeps. Nowadays, the roads in Ghana are crowded with vehicles and one never stops for anyone, due to the potential for armed robbers.
On Tue, May 26, 2020 at 12:03 PM Stories of East Africa by Dennis Herlocker wrote:
> Dennis Herlocker posted: “During the internecine wars of the Maasai which > disturbed southern Kenya and northern and central Tanzania in the early > 1800’s, a group of Arusha Maasai, cattle herders who also practiced > agriculture, left the plains and settled the southwestern slopes of” >
Robert,
I remember those two British air force guys, especially the stories told by the one who was Welsh.
Just heard from another member of our Peace Corps group, recently moved from New Zealand to Tucson. His yard looks a lot like yours, landscaped with desert plants. I don’t envy him the summers down there, however. One of my brothers, who lived in Phoenix for a couple of years told me all about that.
Hope you two are handling the COVID virus thing o.k.
Dennis and Cathy
Thanks. Enjoyed learning a bit of the history of Arusha. My 1999 visit I remember as being very congested but I loved the exotic (to me) calls from numerous mosques near our hotel.
I probably would be disappointed if I were to visit Arusha again. That’s interesting about the numerous mosques. Either Islam is gaining a stronger hold on the area or (and maybe it’s the same thing) all those mosques are the result of the Muslims who where there in the 1960’s having lots and lots of children.
Hello Dennis. Islam has had a very strong foothold here in Tz from its earliest times. The slave & ivory trade plied up & down the East African coast for centuries and to this very day the key families in coastal Tz and the towns & villages along the old trade routes to Lakes Victoria & Tanganyika are Muslim.
The pull of the cities is strong in all developing countries. Especially educated young people want to go where there is “more.” Unfortunately that includes more traffic, more air pollution, more crime, etc. I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Bukavu, Zaire (now Democratic Republic of the Congo) in 1984-’86. It was 25,000 when I was there and 20 years later the population was 400,000. The past 20 years were sad, civil war and genocide. I am glad that Arusha has not been in that horrible situation. Your photos and the sharpness of your memories is wonderful.
Thanks for the nice words. So you were at Bukavu. From the pictures I’ve seen of it, it has a scenic setting, but its recent history has, as you said, not been so nice. How are the girls?
Thank-you, that brought back memories. We lived on the Iringa coffee estates just north of Arusha when I was a child in 69 – 71. I was in Moshi a year ago. When I suggested a trip to Arusha, my host said ‘no ways’ – going there just wasn’t worth the trouble one was bound to encounter there. Moshi was still Moshi, bigger, busier, the trees were taller, but it still felt like Moshi.
Thats so weird!! I’ve lived here for 20 years, at Usa River half way between Kikimanjaro International Airport & Arusha Town. I guess your host felt it was just too far and too alien and if they didnt know their way around, they’d have felt understandably out of their comfort zone. There isnt much left of what you remembered, but a few places would have been recognisable. It has a very different ambience to Moshi which was so well laid out all those years ago
Hi, Thanks for your comments. I’m interested in what you’ve been doing at Use River for the past two decades.
Do you know of a murder by a woman who shot her father-in-law in Arusha in the early 50s?
Amar, No, I don’t. That was about 10 years before my time. Have you checked past issues of the local newspaper (or is that even possible)?