Loerie is a town in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa, situated along the R331 Regional Route, approximately 25 km north-east of Jeffreys Bay and 11 km north-north-west of the mouth of the Gamtoos River.
The town is said to take its name from the loeries or louries, a turaco species (Tauraco corythaix) occurring here.
Loerie falls within the Kouga Local Municipality and the Sarah Baartman District Municipality, and is home to the township of Loerieheuwel, which is situated to the west.
Loerie had a railway station on the Avontuur Railway, which closed in 2011.
The town is host to the annual Naartjie Festival.
This small town has an interesting history. Early Settlers were present in the area as early as 1745. The first farms were allocated in 1817. Floods, droughts, and the big fire of 1869 took their toll on the pioneers of the area, but the community expanded rapidly, and the first school was opened in 1890.
The first bridge across the Gamtoos River opened up the area and eased the lives of the farmers considerably.
The inhospitable terrain with primitive roads was a nightmare with regard to transport to and from the markets in Port Elizabeth (officially renamed Gqeberha) and Kariega (formerly known as Uitenhage). Everything had to be transported by ox wagon, and a trip took a few days.
In 1899, it was decided in Parliament that a narrow-gauge railway line would be built from Port Elizabeth to Avontuur. It was completed in 1906 and started a new optimism in the whole valley. Farmers only had to bring their produce to Loerie, from where it was taken further by train. In 1914, the line was extended to Patensie.
In 1905, the S.A. Kerosene Oil Shale Syndicate started prospecting for oil at Loerie, and after favourable finds, options were taken out on 27 farms in the Loerie-Taaiboslaagte area. However, nothing came from it due to financial reasons. For a while, coal was mined in the area where the Loerie dam is now. Prospectors also looked for gold in the Loerie River, but only small traces were found.
The pine plantations, Longmore and Otterford, were started in 1918. Most of the workforce were soldiers who had returned from the First World War, and in 1922, their numbers were strengthened by strikers sent here by the Smuts government. The area was densely populated, and at least 12 schools existed at one or another time. By the 1930’s, the Otterford school boasted of more than 300 pupils, and a hostel had to be built for the teachers.
In 1933, the Eastern Province Cement Company (later PPC) obtained a farm in the Kleinrivier area and started the construction of a 14 km cableway to transport the stone to the Loerie railway station, where it was transhipped to the Avontuur Railway to be processed in a cement factory near Port Elizabeth (officially renamed Gqeberha). Production started in 1934, and high quality lime stone was mined here until the late 1990’s. Sadly, the cableway that became a landmark was removed after the mine was closed.
The Loerie dam was built as part of the Kouga dam scheme to supply Port Elizabeth with water. The dam includes a filtration and pump system to balance the pressure in the pipelines, controlled by one of the first computer systems in South Africa.
Although the population of the area has shrunk considerably in recent years, the fertile soil and temperate climate ensure that vegetables of high quality are produced here.
