Essie Honiball

Essie Honiball (12 April 1924 – 25 November 2013), was a South African author and health educator in the fields of fruitarianism, fasting and natural healing.

Early life

Essie Honiball was born Esther Maria Wiese, in Edenburg, Orange Free State, South Africa. She attended Orange Girl High School in Bloemfontein, before studying at the Universities of Stellenbosch and Orange Free State, where she graduated in Biology (B.s.c.), Physical Education (Performers Licentitate) and Music (piano). She then travelled to Europe to continue her Physical Education studies in the Netherlands, Denmark and London.

Later life

After teaching Physical Education at schools in South Africa, Honiball lectured in health and biology education at the Cape Town Training College and at the Pretoria Normal College in Physical Education. She also served as Assistant Head of the Elizabeth Conradie School for disabled children.

Illness

A keen swimmer, she became a junior diving champion of Orange Free State, and a senior diving champion of Western Province (in the Western Cape) in 1946. However, in 1958, Honiball became very ill with tuberculosis and was hospitalized in Kimberley, Northern Cape. Although the illness disappeared, Honiball failed to regain her strength and fell into depression. After hearing of the healing power of fruits by a friend, the author Cornelius Valkenburg de Villiers-Dreyer, whom she married in 1959, and influenced by the writings of South African author Johanna Brandt, she recovered from her condition. When her husband died in 1962, Honiball went on to marry, T. O. Honiball in 1973, a notable cartoonist for The Burger (South Africa) and its magazines.

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