16/09/2026
Dalebrook tidal pool has been part of the Kalk Bay coastline for well over a century, and one of the people behind its beginnings was Frederick Beecher Steer.
Born in Maidstone, Kent, in 1867, Steer came to the Cape as a child. He later worked in his family’s property business, Steer & Co, but he also had a strong connection to Kalk Bay. His family holidayed here, sometimes camping in tents, and later rented a property behind the municipal hall at Dalebrook. In 1928, he received quotes to build the family holiday house, Muirfield, at 246 Main Road, overlooking the sea. The house still stands today.
His most lasting contribution to the area, however, may be Dalebrook tidal pool.
In 1903, Steer began laying the first sea breakwater wall that would become part of the pool. According to family history, he had witnessed a drowning and wanted to create a safer place for people to swim. Rather than wait for the municipality to act, he simply got started. The municipality later became involved, completing and extending the works.
That approach seems to have been characteristic of him. Steer was known in his family as a determined man with little patience for unnecessary delay. One of the letters of guidance he later wrote to his son was titled simply: “Do it now.”
He once wrote to his son that, from his earliest youth, his aim had been “to leave this world a little better than I found it.”
More than 120 years after he laid that first wall at Dalebrook, thousands of people still swim in the water it helped enclose.
It is easy to think of tidal pools as simply part of the coastline. But they were made by people, often over many years, and their histories are woven into the communities that continue to use them today.
The most recent photo of Dalebrook is by
