Card of the Day: The Opening of South Africa House, London

As Britain recovered from the Great War and tried to rally during the Great Depression, King George V and Queen Mary were adamant that all of the Empire was represented in London and were quite proud when a central location for South African officials was erected in London.
The fortieth in the series of 1935 Silver Jubilee cards by Wills’s Cigarette Company shows the opening of the new South Africa House in London.

The reverse of the card reads:

THE OPENING OF THE SOUTH AFRICA HOUSE, LONDON


Another fine Dominion Head-quarters in the heart of London was inaugurated by the King on June 22nd, 1933, when he drove in state from Buckingham Palace to South Africa House in Trafalgar Square. General Smuts accompanied him as Minister in attendance-an honour never hitherto conferred on a Minister in a Dominion Cabinet. After the King had unlocked the great door with a golden key, he congratulated South Africa on this new "monument of concord and amity"; and declared the building open. The ceremonial was slight, but the atmosphere of Imperial friendship highly cordial.

The South Africa House, an attractive bit of architecture, still proudly stands—unaltered—in London.