There was a time in our recent past when life in the BVI was extremely hard.   In those days, we fished, burnt charcoal, cultivated the hillside, made many essentials and we fabricated craft items especially from straw.  

The Women of East End plaited straw covering for the bottles of Bay Rum made in St John and exported to the world as a bracing aftershave, astringent and cologne.   

Others made Tenerife lace and crocheted slippers for export through the Danish stores in St Thomas. They also boiled Job’s Tears and jumbie beads to string and weave into mats.  

But cattle farming was our business and we exported cattle on the hoof.  Outside Road Town, most men were farmers and they drove their cattle to market through Road Town, setting mothers of school children on edge.   

Have you ever wondered why the cattle dips existed in various communities?

Martinique and Guadeloupe were our markets.  The boats came up to Tobacco Wharf outside of the Agricultural Station and the trade was made.

It would also have been in the 1950s that the PWD paymaster walked with cash around Tortola to pay the men.  

In West End, he handed off the wages for Jost Van Dyke to his counterpart and a similar action took place at Beef Island for the Virgin Gorda employees.

Everyone knew he had the money but he was safe.   No one stole in those days except, perhaps, kind, gentle, soft spoken, one hand Willy whose father claimed the other hand for stealing.  It was a lesson.

We used to live in two room houses with neither locks nor keys but outdoor latches with an outhouse, often shared, and an outdoor kitchen unless one was a merchant of means.

JEW Georges was the countryman’s bank until mid-1990s.  They deposited their earnings at the store and shopped for merchandise against their account.  Their deposits even paid for their funeral because JEW Georges sold burial supplies.

But the Government’s Treasury provided the preferred banking service for BVI families although the merchants in the 60s used to give Captain Earnest Pickering their takings to deposit on their accounts in St Thomas.  

In those days we received 71% of Government revenue  from the UK in granting aid.  (Harrigan/Varlack) When government fell short on its payroll, a local merchant was reputed to make up the difference.

But BVI people understood that their salvation rested in travel to neighboring islands.  

Our forefathers, to support the family, went off to Dominican Republic ( primarily Consuelo and San Pedro de Macoris, Cuba, St Croix, St Thomas).

Our grandparents told us about the tragedy of the 'Fancy Me', a BVI vessel that took the lives of 59 Virgin Islanders on their return from Santo Domingo in 1926.  (Harrigan/Varlack) All drowned.

St Kitts/Nevis had a similar tragedy, in 1970, the Christina, 233 drowned with 70 survivors.  

In the days when the Saints were Danish, our ancestors travelled in and out at will.  Control was lax until the US purchased the islands. During the war years, BVI people worked unimpeded.  Some joined the armed forces.  But once the war was over, it became a thing of ingenuity to get into the USVI.

Men swam over to St John to find work there or on St. Thomas.  Some who entered on the 29 days pass simply overstayed and hid or contracted marriages of convenience with US citizens.

Meanwhile, BVI was becoming organized.  The great march of 1949 led by Theodolph Faulkner, Isaac “Glanny”Fonseca and Carlton deCastro resulted in the 1950 restoration of the Legislative Council.

And in 1967 (Harrigan/Varlack) a new VI Constitution ushered in the Ministerial System of Government.

We wonder why a bust of Mr Faulkner does not sit outside of the House of Assembly with the others regardless of what the Anegadians did to honour him.  That should be rectified.

From the 60s on, more BVI women birth their children on the Saints and most returned to the Virgins to raise them.  

It was an incidence of birth for health reasons, given the absence of relevant medical professionals, economics or both. 

But the children were no more Americans in socialization than the man on the moon for two BVI people would not have known what it meant to be American.  

They knew how to be BVIslanders and passed on those norms and values similar to Americans born outside the United States who are unquestionably, Americans.

So, there are a few generations of BVIslanders who were not born in the BVI but their BVI ancestry goes back several generations on both sides.

The Premier of the Virgin Islands is one such person.  And he has had to put up with the Opposition Leader telling him on occasions that he was not born here.

But the Opposition Leader also has an incidence of birth, perhaps, also, for economic reasons.  But does he understand our history?  He was not socialized by people who were BVIslanders but he and others as first generation BVIslanders had the opportunity to learn.  

School, church and community would have helped.  So, in their children, there is no ‘us’ and them.  There is only ‘us.’

And that is partly why it is so important to protect the Virgin Islands Constitution for people will constantly be coming and will be grafted in and it is inconceivable that they be defined the same as those Virgin Islanders who have an ancestral claim.  

And they must understand that when we speak of country, we speak of something sacred, something that is bigger than all of us.

Something that must not be a pawn in politics to divide us for no divisions must exist when one speaks of the homeland.  

So, all the talk of half and quarter breed is ignorant talk.  For we are already connected by marriage, blood, friendship, sentiments.  And if the civic backbone of the Territory is ever strengthened, then that connection extends to norms, values, belonging, flag.

Therefore, the Opposition Leader regardless of his heritage, is a representative of the people.  Those people are BVIslanders and that representation must be on their behalf.

Otherwise, he is in the wrong House and in the wrong country/territory.

Not too long ago, Fiji found itself in a conundrum that sparked a revolution.  Its guest workers who, subsequently became Fijians, took over the Administration of the islands and forgot who they had become.

They behaved as if they were still immigrants and did their best to disenfranchise the natives and empower immigrants.  But in the end, they were sowing the seeds for their own disenfranchisement.

Never ask for whom the bell tolls.

They despised the very people who embraced them and opened their homes, hearts, land and lives to them.  They forgot about the future of their children. 

If we do not pay close attention to the history we will make colossal blunders and destroy the very foundation upon which we stand.

We can now dig deeper and supplement what we discuss here on Fridays.

Happy Friday!