After the Council meeting on 7 September 2023, the members welcomed Yvonne Viljoen who retired from the Council and the Western Cape Branch committee in April this year.  The Vice President, Dr Antonia Malan, presented her with the President's Medal for her outstanding contribution to the Council from 2003-2023, as Vice-President of the Society from 2018-2020, and as Chairperson of the Western Cape Branch since 2004. The silver medals were commissioned by Dr Tim Maggs in 1995 after his term of office as President of the Society from 1992-1994. They are awarded at irregular intervals to members who have made significant contributions towards the organisation of archaeology in southern Africa. 

Yvonne is greatly admired for her infectious energy and for registering relatively late in life as an archaeology student at UCT. Her academic studies began in 1966 in Cape Town at UCT. After her marriage in 1967 she settled in Pretoria where she completed her BA degree at UNISA (1970) (French and English). In 1973 she moved to Johannesburg and joined the ArchSoc in 1989, frequently attending meetings and outings. After moving back to Cape Town, she joined the Western Cape Branch in 1994. In 2001-2002 she registered at UCT to complete a major in archaeology.  Arising out of the 2022 UCT Field School in Clanwilliam she commenced research curating the accumulated artefacts from the excavation site. She was awarded an MPhil degree in historical archaeology in 2011 with a thesis on the history and archaeology of a late 19th and early 20th century farm in the Western Cape. A summary entitled ‘A contested Clanwilliam farm: the history and archaeology of Warmhoek 1873-1933’ was published in 2014 in the South African Archaeological Bulletin Vol 69: 59-71.