 2008 marks the 100th anniversary of diamond mining in Namibia. Since the early 20th century, mining of diamonds in this area along the coast has gone through many changes. In the early years, labor-based mining methods were utilized, followed later by highly mechanized and technology-driven processes later in the century. There are many stories of how fortunes were both made and lost along the diamond coast of Namibia. The history of mining here goes back to more than a century, when a merchant from Germany named Adolph Luderitz acquired the coastal strip in the southern Namib. He would never know how much wealth lay under that sandy coastline. In 1886 on a boat trip in the area, he drowned after his boat capsized. His rights to the land were transferred to a German firm named Kolonial Gesellschaft fur Sudwestafrika.
In 1897, a sailing ship captain returned to Cape Town with a parcel of diamonds he said he unearthed from the Namibia coast. In 1898 two diamonds were picked up in the interior of the country. Diamonds also were located near the coastline in 1905 and 1906. In April, 1908, large deposits of diamond s were finally discovered along the coast, and the rest is history.
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