History of De Beers - Diamonds Facts & Trivia @ DiamondSource.in

The De Beers Group is a Johannesburg-based diamond mining and trading corporation. In the 1980's the firm had a near de facto monopoly on the world's diamond trade (80% share), however that share has been reduced to 60% due to discoveries outside of De Beer's control (such as in Russia and Canada). In 1994 De Beers was charged by the United States Justice Department with antitrust violations for conspiring to fix prices for industrial diamonds. On 14 July 2004 De Beers pleaded guilty to the charges and paid a $10 million fine. The plea has enabled De Beers to trade directly in the United States diamond market after years of acting through intermediaries. In the past, De Beers was able to create an artificial scarcity of diamonds, thus keeping prices high. The modern tradition of diamonds as a part of engagement in many cultures has been largely created by De Beers through an amazingly effective advertising campaign started in 1938. The "A Diamond is Forever" campaign not only convinced the public that the only suitable gift for engagement is a diamond, but also served to limit the market in used diamonds.

De Beers distributes diamonds to favored customers (called sightholders) by selecting batches of diamonds themselves and offering them "as is". Now and in the past De Beers has sold diamonds mined from their own mines, most of which are in South Africa and Botswana. Currently, De Beers is involved in a joint venture that is developing a diamond prospect in Canada.

De Beers was founded on 13 March 1888 by Cecil John Rhodes along with Charles Dunell Rudd. In 1902 the De Beers Association Football Club was established when De Beers commenced construction of a dynamite factory near The Strand and Somerset West. The factory was located on the False Bay coast just west of the mouth of the Lourens River. In the 20th century the Oppenheimer family became the major shareholders. Sir Ernest Oppenheimer, his son Harry Oppenheimer and his grandson Nicky Oppenheimer have been chairmen of the company. Other related persons are Alex Oppenheimer and Taylor Plant, both heirs and relatives.

The company's name comes from Johannes Nicholas de Beer and Diederik Arnoldus de Beer, two Afrikaner farmers on whose farm, called Vooruitzicht, near the confluence of the Orange River and the Vaal River, diamonds were discovered. The brothers were not able to protect the farm from the ensuing diamond rush, and sold it for £6300. Two diamond mines formed on the site, known as the "Big Hole" or Premier Mine. Although the brothers did not become the owners of the mines, one of the mines was named after them. Cecil Rhodes and Charles Rudd gained control of both the De Beers mine and the Kimberley, South Africa mine and merged them, forming De Beers Consolidated Mines Limited. See also Barney Barnato, an important competitor to Cecil Rhodes, whose company's diamond interests in the Cape Colony were bought out by De Beers for a check written for 4 million pounds, the largest single check written up to that time in history.

In the late 19th century, South Africa underwent rapid industrialisation during the "Mineral Revolution", creating an increasingly high demand for labourers to work in the colony's gold and diamond mines. In Kimberley, industrial labour was largely provided by Khoi and Xhosa seasonal migrants - young men who would travel to the diamond mines to work for wages in the summer, but this was unreliable and did not provide a static pool of workers. This, combined with the increasing paranoia that workers were stealing diamonds, led to De Beers introducing closed compounds for their workers. Mine workers signed fixed-term contracts with the company agreeing to remain on-site for the duration. Although white workers were allowed to live in the town, black workers were required to live on the compounds, where their wages were exchanged for accommodation, meals, and vast amounts of cheap sorghum beer provided by the company. Black workers were allowed into town on weekends, but this was curtailed in 1887 to prevent the entire labour force turning up on Monday mornings with hangovers.

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Fun! Did you know that some of the frequent typos for the term diamond are: diamonf, diamonfs, diamons, diamong, diamongs, siamonds, fiamonds, xiamonds

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