Over 60,000 coloured and black people were forcibly removed from their homes. Most buildings were bulldozed. The man that was doing the demolition collected most of the streetsigns, later donating them to the museum. All churches and mosques were also spared.
Some people refused to leave, living among the rubble. Our guide, Ruth, grew up in District Six, getting married and moving away a few years before the bulldozers started destroying the neighbourhoods that had housed generations of families. 
Ruth's father was a black man, and her mother was coloured, coming from a mixed marriage (German father and black mother). Ruth said her fathers death, a short time before the removals started, was actually a blessing. Had he lived, he would have been separated from his wife and children. Her mother however, along with some younger siblings, defied the bulldozers, and remained through the removal of electricity, and then running water. Once they lost the water, health problems destroyed any more hopes of remaining. Ruth made the comment...."if only more people had stayed". In 1981, Ruth and her siblings helped her mother pack up and move to one of the designated neighbourhoods. Two days later, her mother died.
Ruth's mothers suitcase of family treasures...
The Namecloth....ex residents were invited to sign the cloth. The signatures and comments were later embroidered over, to preserve them. The cloth is over 1.5 km long...
The current government has committed to bringing the displaced people home, building new housing, but it is very slow. The ex-residents originally had to buy the new homes from the government, but that has changed, and now the government has agreed to resettling without having to buy back.
I couldn't help hut compare the similarities to this museum and Amsterdam's Dutch Resistance Museum.
Very moving. Thank you.
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