Prior to its establishment as a community within Cape Town the area was inhabited by the Goringhaiqua Khoikhoi clan.

However Indians were allowed to live in Salt River provided they buy or rent a house attached to a corner grocer shop.

On almost every corner in Salt River there used to be grocer shops where people could buy daily necessities over the counter.

Today Salt River is still largely populated by second and third generations of Cape Malay and coloured families.

At one point (c. 1976) this high school became too small to accommodate the pupils of, not only the area (Salt River), but also from further afield, Woodstock, Maitland and Kensington.

Because of this self-containment, residents of Salt River rarely found the need to venture too far from home, with the result that they were not really affected by discontented feelings of what came to be known in the Apartheid era as "the previously disadvantaged" peoples.

As a result of South Africa's prolonged recession many businesses in the area closed while unemployment and crime increased.

On the evening of 4 August 1996 members of the group marched to the Salt River home of gang leader Rashaad Staggie in London Road where they attacked, shot and burned him alive.

[3] The suburb has been pegged for revival as part of a R20bn urban renewal initiative across Cape Town.