Fourways is classic northern Joburg: fast-growing estates and townhouses, lunchtime traffic on busy arterials, and destination hubs like Montecasino and Fourways Mall drawing a steady stream of visitors. It’s a place of school runs and shopping runs—where you know every robot by feel and every shortcut by heart. And yet, along Winnie Mandela Drive, there’s a landmark many of us miss.

In this HOT 1027 News report, Al Prodgers—a great storyteller who also has a successful YouTube channel—pulls over opposite the Leaping Frog Centre and takes a closer look at the modest building locals know as the Witkoppen Clinic. On site, with ambient traffic in the background, Al sketches a story that stretches back to 1946, when the clinic began as part of a farm school and quietly grew into a lifeline for Johannesburg’s most vulnerable.

Without giving it all away, Al’s piece touches on the clinic’s role during apartheid and its connection to Dr Mary Susan Malahlela, South Africa’s first Black woman to qualify as a medical doctor in 1947. She volunteered here, pushing past immense social and political barriers to serve patients with courage and skill. There’s a poignant detail about her final day that Al handles with care—one best heard in his own words.

Today, Witkoppen Clinic still hums with purpose: partnering with schools, mentoring students, and training young professionals who will carry its ethos forward. Many Fourways residents have queued here to vote over the years; far fewer know the depth of the history behind those walls.

If Fourways is your neighbourhood—or your daily commute—this is a short listen that will change how you see it. Then share it with your friends and neighbours!