Sir Thomas Cullinan, digger and founder of the Premier diamond company, is born

Sir Thomas Cullinan was born in the The Cape Colony in 1862. He settled in Barberton, before moving to Johannesburg in 1887. He began working as a bricklayer in Johannesburg, a job he later left for prospecting. He discovered the Premier Diamond Fields in 1898 and was co-founder and member of what became the The Transvaal Chamber of Industries. He was knighted in 1910 in recognition of his contribution to the Diamond industry and has a town and the biggest diamond ever found named after him. He married Annie Francis Harding in 1886. He died in 1936.