10 000 years ago the plains of Sandton were traversed by stone-age hunters
1000 years ago tribesmen watered their herds at Sandton's many streams and springs
400 years ago the tribesmen ran an iron-smelting economy
120 years ago the richest gold field on earth was discovered
100 years ago Sandton comprised Johannesburg's lush market garden
50 years ago Sandton comprised a world of rich estates and sandy horse trails. Sandtonions were dubbed the 'mink and manure set'
30 years ago the country's premier shopping mall, Sandton City, was built.
The 'Southern Suburbs' of Sandton were laid out quite early in the century and by the thirties they were well established as 'gentleman estate' areas with most of the properties being one morgen or larger. At this stage they formed the 'northern' suburbs of Johannesburg and in some cases extended beyond the boundaries of the city.

Rivonia was in most respects a rural village - owing its existence to its convenience as an outspan stop on the old wagon road to Pretoria -- which 'joined' with Johannesburg when it spread north. It is the only 'district' of Sandton that can claim the distinction of not owing its existence directly to the northward spread of Johannesburg.

The first moves by Sandton to achieve independence from Johannesburg go back to the early sixties and were probably prompted by Randburg becoming a municipality in 1959. Sandton was promulgated as a municipality in 1969 - celebrating its 30th year of existence last year -- with the name Sandton being formed from a combination of the names Bryanston and Sandown.

Sandton was largely a farming and smallholding community when it was promulgated and has been described as comprising of 30 000 whites and 15 000 horses at the time by former town planner B Bristow.

The first few years of Sandton's existence were turbulent with the issue of whether Sandton should remain a quite semi-rural dormitory town or a more balanced entity with significant business and higher density residential components splitting the town council apart.

In 1956 the Peri-Urban board had bought some large tract of land for municipal purposes - one of these being the 11 ha site in Sandown where the Civic Centre now stands. Of this, 3.4 ha was sold to the TPA for the building of Sandown Primary School and in 1965 the land directly south of the Civic Centre area was allocated extensive retail and flat rights - the land then belonged to Mr Bob Edmunds, the chairman of Standard Bank, and was sold to property developers Rapp and Maister in 1968.

The first step in transforming Sandton from a farming community to a bustling business district came with Sandton City, which was developed and constructed by Rapp and Maister on this site during the early 1970's, opening for trade in 1974.

The rush of commercial space began in the mid to late 1980's when land in Sandton, Rosebank and Parktown was cheaper than that in the Johannesburg CBD and could also offer a life-style, such as rolling lawns, fountains and low-density, affordable-to-own office space that could not be accommodated in the CBD. In accordance with Sandton's amendment scheme 292 the council agreed to approximately 200 000 square meters of office space - today the figure for Sandton Central alone stands at more than 1million square meters.