Kruger Park History

Kruger Park history begins in 1898 when Sabie Game Reserve was established. It was founded by Paul Kruger after he became aware of the damage being done to wildlife caused by hunting. This was spurred by the trade in:

• Animal skins
• Horns
• Ivory

The park was expanded to nearly 2 million hectares (4.9 million acres) in 1926 when Sabie Game Reserve was joined up with Shingwedzi Game Reserve and various farms. This new enlarged park was renamed Kruger National Park.

When was Kruger National Park opened to the public? In 1927.

The first park tourists arrived on the Selati Railway which ran between Komatipoort and Tzaneen and so the history of Kruger National Park reached a milestone. The actual train that people travelled on is now the show-piece of the Selati Station Grillhouse at Skukuza Rest Camp. It's an interesting place to soak up some Kruger history while enjoying fine dining.

In 2002, Kruger National Park agreed to join Zimbabwe's Gonarezhou National Park and the Limpopo National Park in Mozambique. The combined park is now called the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park, a so-called "peace park". Fences have started to come down between the parks to let the animals follow their original migratory routes.

A recent piece of Kruger tribal history is about the Makuleke tribe. They submitted a land claim for a portion of northern Kruger National Park for land taken from them under the apartheid regime. The claim was successful, but the tribe approached the private sector to develop game lodges on the land rather than occupy it themselves.

Kruger Park history would be incomplete without mentioning archaeology and the stone age. There are more than 300 archaeological sites of stone age man in Kruger National Park. Cultural artefacts have been found from the period 100,000 to 30,000 years ago. Plus there is substantial evidence that prehistoric man roamed the area between 500,000 and 100,000 years ago!

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