BASSETERRE, St. Kitts - AFTER losing his left arm in an unfortunate incident involving a locomotive and spending more than three months in hospital, Roosevelt Howe was uncertain about returning to school to face his peers.
Howe - now a Fire Sub Officer (FSO) with the St. Kitts and Nevis Fire and Rescue Services Department - recalls that his teacher, Ms. Jennifer Hensley, ensured that he kept abreast with assignments whilst convalescing.
To return to school or not
However, Howe’s overly protective grandmother, who was concerned about him being teased and ridiculed by his peers, did not want him to return to school.
“It was my teacher who encouraged me to go back to school, because my grandmother had already told me she wasn’t going to send me back. She was sort of trying to protect me. They didn’t want anybody to tease me and those kinds of things.”
Howe however went back and, after entering the then Junior High School, he experienced the verbal cruelty of his peers.
“I went to Junior High for three years rather than two. I went to First Form and Second Form and then I met some difficulties with some older boys who used to pick on me and tease me and so on. I used to run away from school! Not that I didn’t want to go to school, but I just didn’t want to face them.
“Then Ms. Viola Jacobs - the Principal - called me in her office and she spoke to me. She told me she knew I had the potential to do better and she didn’t know what is bothering me. She tried to get it out of me but I didn’t say anything...because, me, with one hand was the lesser person and couldn’t answer back anyone. At that time, growing up as boys, we would pick on the lesser person. I had one hand and if you said something to me and I say something to you, you might want to bang me up.”
The Fireman said he performed and was shifted from 3B1 to 3A1 after which he advanced to the Senior High School, a place where he said he experienced the best years of his youth.
“Senior High School was the best time of my youth growing up. I had no difficulty, no problems there...nobody teased me. By that time, I just worked out that I would be myself and stop being scared of what people think. I just continued doing my work, and by that time everybody knew me and we all got along well.”
Work experience
Admittedly, he always liked to see the fire trucks, but having left school in 1994 he did not make application for employment in the Fire Services until some six years later.
“After I finished with school in 1994 I went to certain places to look for a job and it was basically discrimination against me because I have one hand...
“In late 1995 a friend of mine named John Glen used to work at Kawaja Food Centre, and one time I asked him for a job and he said he spoke to the boss and boss said I should come so he could see what I could do. I went there the Friday and I remember they had just gotten in some Cheetos and they were packing them away, and I asked if I could help. So I said just throw the box to me and he watched me funny. When he threw it, I caught it in the centre of my hand and tossed it because I knew they were light...”
Howe got the job, but sometime after Hurricane George he lost it and was again without employment until 1999 when he made what many would call a bold move and went to work at the St. Kitts Sugar Manufacturing Corporation (SSMC).
While working there during the 1999 and 2000 crop seasons, he maintained a job at RAM’s and he explained that wherever he worked or whatever he was doing, he always endeavoured to prove himself worthy.
The Fire Department
Howe said in 2000 he had heard that the Fire Services - which formed part of the Royal St. Christopher and Nevis Police Force - would have separated therefrom and he took the opportunity to make an application for employment.
“...I wanted a better job. So I asked Mrs. Fough (whose husband was the Fire Chief) if I applied to be a fire officer if she thinks they would take me. She told me she couldn’t answer the question but I should apply if I was thinking of doing so.
“I came and I did the exam and I was selected to go on the medical. During the medical certain things came out and I was told that as long as I got accepted I wasn’t supposed to go on the truck. So I said no problem because I was still getting a job.”
Howe admitted that he felt misplaced because people were speaking about him but he purposed within himself that he would give it his all. And he proved himself.
Following the Swearing-in Ceremony in November 2000, there was a fire drill at the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank and, in his excitement, Howe ended up on the truck and assisted with the exercise. He was subsequently summoned to Fire Chief Fough’s office and he thought he would have been reprimanded, but he was told that he made the Fire Chief proud.
“I found out later that the gentleman at the bank at the time...went to him and told him that they are very proud of him because of me. He said it shows that it is open to anybody once it can be managed. And from that day I started going on the truck...started holding the branch.”
The final part on this miniseries will explore some of Howe’s achievements, whether or not he has any regrets and what advice he has to offer to children who are of a rambunctious and disobedient nature.
