Rhodesian Commentary

A Contemporary Archive of Rhodesian History

The first edition of Rhodesian Commentary appeared in January 1966 a little over two months after Rhodesia’s independence. The contents were compiled from various sources including local Rhodesian media as well as overseas press reports.  The Commentary was published more or less fortnightly usually with 25 editions a year.  It consisted of 8 unstapled pages of 8″ x 10″ which was the old British Imperial “large post quarto” size. In November 1971 this was changed to the slightly larger A4 size of 210mm x 297mm. The title banner was blue until December 1968 when it was changed to green in line with Rhodesia’s new flag.  From November 1975 publication was switched to monthly and the last Rhodesian Commentary appeared in December 1975. The following year it was renamed Focus on Rhodesia with an updated print style and in this guise it continued to the end.

Over 275 editions were published from 1966 to 1979 and by good fortune I still have nearly all of my original copies as below – albeit a few of the earlier ones are a bit jaded. These are being scanned and posted up as time permits thus providing a contemporary archive of Rhodesian life and history from 1966 to 1979 – over 180 editions posted to date.

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Click on an archived edition below to open a text searchable pdf file. Multiply pounds and dollars shown by 10-15 times to get today’s values!

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