Good morning, #Bermuda: today is #Monday, December 29 – and it marks 43 years since the Island’s first black head of Government took the helm: Sir Edward Trenton “ET” Richards, who became the head of the then-ruling United Bermuda Party in 1971. He stepped down on this date in 1975. Born in Guyana, or British Guiana as it was known at the time, Sir Edward swallowed his secret wish to train as a lawyer, and, following in the family vocation, came to Bermuda in 1930 to teach at the Berkeley Institute. During his tenure there, Sir Edward was to have a key influence on many students who later became prominent Bermudians. Sir Edward had grown up in a racially integrated school system, and he was appalled by the Island’s racial segregation. He was able to wage war on Bermuda’s institutional racism by contributing to the Bermuda Recorder newspaper, for which he also wrote as a war correspondent while in London in the 1940s. Sir Edward married a former student, Madree Williams, and the couple had children Patricia, Bob and Angela – their son nowadays serving as Bermuda’s Deputy Premier and Minister of Finance. In the general election of 1948, Sir Edward won a seat in Parliament. Now running a legal practice, Sir Edward proved instrumental as the winds of change slowly turned against racial segregation in Bermuda. He later joined the new United Bermuda Party, was knighted in 1970, and a year later succeeded the UBP’s leader, Sir Henry Tucker. When the Island’s Constitution changed shortly thereafter, Sir Edward became our first Premier. He retired from politics in 1976 and passed away in 1991, aged 83.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 12:12:33 +0000
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