Dr Dylan Kerrigan
Writing about 19th-century Port of Spain, the historian Suzanne Goodenough quotes the words of colonial town planners from 1871 describing the expansion of Port of Spain and the first glimpses of housing on Woodbrook Estate.
“The town (Port of Spain) is not happily situated for extension hemmed in by Queen’s Park (Savannah) and the Bay, all of which space is occupied though much less closely built on than it might be, abutting onto the malarious swamps to the east its only direction is westward beyond Richmond Street, along with St James and Tragarete Roads and north-east up the Laventille spurs and towards Belmont. New Town is filling in well and a row of cottages now shows across the Tragarete Road on the Woodbrook Estate.”
On November 1, a famous square mile in our local national story – Woodbrook –celebrates its 110th birthday and the anniversary of its purchase by the Town Board from the Siegert family.
What today is often most well known as the liming capital of Port of Spain and the annual heart of the Carnival arts has seen many changes in that century and more of life. From its origins as a sugar plantation to its development for housing, and from a place of colonial values to one of more nationalistic ones, to its role in the Carnival and theatre arts, and the impact of its churches, schools, and sporting venues on the lives of its residents – Woodbrook has a lot of different stories to tell.
[caption id="attachment_921873" align="alignnone" width="1024"] The Woodbrook Christian Brethren Church, one of the area's landmarks. - PHOTO BY SUREASH CHOLAI[/caption]
To commemorate this lifetime, the Woodbrook Residents Committee (WRC), in collaboration with the National Trust, is putting the final touches on a coffee-table book about the social history of the suburb. Growing Up Woodbrook – A Tapestry of Then and Now reflects on the different cultures, people, and histories who came to live, mix, and adapt to each other in this one square mile, and who in many different fields made a big impact on the nation for an area so small.
For the book to sing the outcomes of these events and the lives who made them, it is more about the living history of the Woodbrook community, than an academic tome. The WRC – whose members include Lynette Dolly, Grace Talma, Wendy Sealy, Petal-Dawn Hinkson, Kathleen Gittens, Rhonda Wilson, Ronald Chuckaree, Miguel Browne, and Ray Holman – has spent almost ten years on the project, applying its hive mind to the collection of data, in the main first-person recollections from across eras.
In the best TT fashion, they have combined their contacts and memories to collect stories and tales from current and former residents. These personal recollections span back to the 1880s and 90s, with some families able to provide handed-down stories and documentation from these early times.
[caption id="attachment_921869" align="alignnone" width="805"] 101 Tragarete Road was once an art gallery. - PHOTO BY SUREASH CHOLAI[/caption]
The meat of the recollections and
