Molemane Store Ruins was where the men who arrived from Pitsane and (then named) Mafeking gathered before setting off on the ill-fated Jameson Raid, a prelude to the Anglo Boer War in which the disenfranchised English mining magnates, including Cecil John Rhodes tried to overthrow the government of the Transvaal Republic under President Paul Kruger.

Kelly's discovery led to the first gold fields in South Africa, which President Paul Kruger visited under the guidance of the local magistrate, a Mr Otto.

Otto reportedly said he hoped the gold fields would turn Melemani into a large town, upon which President Kruger was said to answer: "good, then we shall call it Ottoshoop".

Legends differ, but some have it that more than 100,000 men lined up in the flat, arid scrubland that characterizes this part of the North West province, each clutching a sharpened plank with a number painted on it with which to stake his personal little el Dorado, or claim.

Such was the gold fever at the time and so many were the punters hoping to strike it rich that Ottoshoop had seven flourishing honky-tonk hotels on Commissioner, its main street.

As the original seTswana name hinted, the town sat on top of what some old-timers describe as an underground river that is 25 kilometres wide in parts.

Rising levels of crime and disease called for a town to be built quickly, and the pragmatic government decided to dust off Gilfallen's plans for Ottoshoop's to use as the blueprint for Johannesburg.