DEBBIE WILLIAMS's Podcast
DEBBIE WILLIAMS's Podcast
Remembering the Windrush Generation
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This week, we welcome Tony Fairweather who opened one of the first Black bookshops in the UK, before going on to work for The Voice newspaper, where he managed The Voice book club. In 1989 he founded ‘The Write Thing’, an events company established to promote Black authors such as Bernardine Evaristo, Dr Maya Angelou, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Terry McMillan, and many more. Now an author himself, he is also the founder and curator of the Windrush Collection, a touring exhibition of artefacts associated with the Windrush generation.
Links:
- https://www.windrushcollection.com/
- https://www.hoperoadpublishing.com/twenty-eight-pounds-ten-shillings-a-windrush-story-75th-anniversary-edition
- debbiewilliamspodcast.com
Welcome to Storytelling. This week's guests opened one of the first black bookshops in the UK before going on to work for the Voice newspaper where he managed a Voice Book Club. In 1989 he founded The Right Thing, an events company established to promote black authors such as Bernardine Everisto, Dr. Mayor Angelo, Alice Walker, Tony Morrison, Terry Macmillan, and many more. Now an author himself, he is also the founder and curator of the Windrush Collection, a touring exhibition of artifacts associated with the Windrush generation. Please welcome Tony Fairweather. Hello Tony and welcome to the podcast.
SPEAKER_01Hello Debbie, it's nice to be here.
SPEAKER_00Tony, you've done a lot of work on the Windrush. Can you explain to everyone what it is?
SPEAKER_01The word Windrush is a terminology used for the movement of Caribbean people to the UK from 1948. They arrived on a boat called the Windrush, HMT Windrush. The boat actually went to Trinidad, Mexico, Jamaica, Bermuda, then on to London. And that was the first wave of official immigration to the UK, and these people were invited by the King of England. There were some ships before the Windrush, but the wave started when that Windrush ship arrived, and many ships came after that, and after that it went to the BOAC. So the terminology Windrush describes a generation of people from the 40s right through to the 60s.
SPEAKER_00So you have created a Windrush museum. Can you tell us a bit more about this?
SPEAKER_01I've created an exhibition, a travelling exhibition, that I hope to turn into a museum. I'm preserving artifacts from the 50s through to the 80s. Think like our front room, the Caribbean front room, which was very unique in the way it was put together. You had the Axminster carpet, you had the Harry Jacob picture, you had the blue spot gram from Germany, the glass cabinet with cups and plates and things that never were used, but they were your mother's and dad's pride or joy. And you had the sofa with many cushions on there, and of course the glass fish. Now many of these things, in when they were purchased in the 50s, people used to buy them on trust, and they used to pay two and six or three bob a week to pay it off. Unfortunately, now when these elders who are now passing and going with up to our ancestors, when they leave that house, the young people go in there, take what they want, and the rest is cleared by a house clearer. They are throwing away our heritage. These are antiques. They may not fit into their IKEA way of living, but they have a place in our history. And I'm preserving those things so our children, children, children can see how their great-grandparents lived when they came to the UK and dispel that we lived in poverty. We didn't. We came there with a grip and a piece of paper with an address on, but we made a lie for ourselves.
SPEAKER_00And where did you get these artifacts from? Because for some people they no longer exist within their families.
SPEAKER_01Some of them are I get some calls from families who someone's passed and they're clearing out the house and they say we'd love to donate certain items to your exhibition. Because each family that donates, their name is put on a plaque, and whenever the exhibition is shown, their names will be on display. Some of them I purchased myself, some I rescued out of back gardens and skips and dumps. People just throwing them out. And I've just had to clean them up and everything. And it's a shame because it's living history, and I would live through that front room. I was raised in one of those front rooms. I'm a witness to those things. And because it's living history, people don't respect it. They more respect the Egyptian tombs or King Henry VIII's Magna Carta or something like that than they would their own history, which they had the privilege of using and seeing.
SPEAKER_00So where is the exhibition taking place?
SPEAKER_01It's a travelling exhibition. It's been at the Black Cultural Archives for six months, the Bernard Centre for two months, at St. James Palace for a month. It's moving around. The next one we'll be doing will be at the Black Cultural Archives and also will be in Croydon. The dates will be put up on our website. We're just finalising the dates now. But as you know, it's Windrush month in June, and Windrush Day on the 22nd of June, and we have a number of different events happening with the front room. But the one place you can see it is on the 19th of March at Fairfield Hall in Croydon, part of In Celebration of My Sisters, which is a tribute to Windrush women. The set on stage will be a fully kitted Caribbean front room, and there'll be a second one in the foyer so people can see it close up.
SPEAKER_00So this isn't the only thing on Windrush that you're doing because you've also written a book about Windrush. Can you tell us about the book as well?
SPEAKER_01Yes, as I was collecting the items that were being thrown away, I started to discuss the items with elders in my community. As they were talking about their journeys over, I asked them why does no one ever talk about what happened on the boats? And they went quiet, and I realized there's something there, they're not saying collectively. So individually, I started talking to aunties and my mum, and the story started to come out with a little bit of, you know, uh Guinness punch and a little bit of rum, their tongues got a little looser. We forget that when they came over, they were 18, 19-year-olds, 20-year-olds. First time away from their parents, their island, and their pastor. And they got into a boat where there's 800 or more people who didn't know who they were. And on those boats there was music, dancing, drinking, gambling. A lot of people met their future wives and future husbands on those journeys over. A lot of people planned businesses on their ways over. And because of that, I took notes and I went to Tobago on holiday and I had my laptop with me, and I started to think about the route where the boat went, and my imagination took over, mixed with the stories. So it's a historical fiction story based on the ship, the Winrush ship, the journey over to London.
SPEAKER_00Tony, what would you say is the main thing that you learnt about your history writing the book?
SPEAKER_01I found a lot of interesting facts because I did a lot of research into archives and records and black cultural archives and things like that, and spoke to people who were actually on the Winrush ship and other ships that came after that. And one of the things I found out was said to me when I was in the home office, in fact, a very elderly white man came up to me and I said, You do realize that the Winrush ship at one point was going to be diverted to South Africa. I said, No, he said, Yes, it's not a well-known fact. But there was a big row in Parliament about this ship coming, and they were gonna divert it to South Africa. Fact like that you just don't get every day. Finding out things like that, and finding out there were Polish people on board, Cuban people on board the Winrush ship, and how people were treated. Some people had very bad journeys over, they were sick from the time they got in a boat to the time they got off, they were seasick. Some people just didn't have enough money and they literally slept on the deck. Some people were stowaways and they got caught. So these stories make up my book and make up the history of who we all are and where we came from.
SPEAKER_00There was one moment of the rainwash when everyone arrived. They were told to get back on the ship to actually smile and make everyone else feel as though they were a nice, friendly bunch coming on shore.
SPEAKER_01I mean, it's hard for me to say this, but the Windrush ship was a propaganda ship. That's not demeaning the people who are on it, but the government use it as a propaganda weapon. If you look for any other footage of boats coming from the Caribbean, you won't find any. You'll find tons of it about the Windrush. And it was very staged, and everything was edited before it went out. And the film they showed of the people coming off the Windrush and Lord Kitchener singing Landan, need the place for me, all those things were staged. And that film was shown back in the Caribbean and the Africans to recruit more people. Because we've got to remember that time, it was just after the war. England was on its knees. A lot of men and women had been killed in the war. A lot of our people, black people, also died in that war. And they needed us to come over here and help build the country up and start the NHS, and that was built on African and Caribbean people.
SPEAKER_00So, what would you say is the main message of your book?
SPEAKER_01If there's a message in there, it's the message is never give up. Because the characters in there face a lot of obstacles on board the ship. And in part two, which I'm writing now, because the first book ends when the ship comes into Tilbury Docks. But so many people said, What happened to this character, that character, that character? So I'm writing book two. But throughout the thread through both the books, you can do what you want to do, and you can overcome obstacles. On the boat, there were obstacles put there. There's racism on the boat, and when they got off the boat, there's even more racism. And kids today don't imagine going to a house to rent a room and there's a sign outside that says no blacks, no Irish, no dogs. Or if you ring the doorbell and I see a black person standing there, they slam the door in your face. Kids today would not put up with that. Our parents did, so we could have a life. So the message is you can achieve, you can go forward, you can achieve. That's the main message in my books.
SPEAKER_00And a dramatization of your book is going to be in our theatres pretty soon.
SPEAKER_01Yes, we're working on a script now for October to do the first stage play of the book £28.10 and Winwash Story. The same name of the book, the same name of the play. And that'll be then, and also I've written another book based on my front room collection called The Front Room. And that'll be aired in April at Croydon Town Hall. And that's a Sunday in the front room in a Caribbean African house. And those of you of a certain age remember that your parents just unlock the front door on a Sunday to air it out. And you're allowed to go in as a child, but you couldn't touch anything. You couldn't sit down, but you could go into this amazing room that you couldn't seize for six days a week. And I've done a day in the life of that as a play, as a homage to the Windrush generation, and we're in the Windrush year.
SPEAKER_00So the name of the book, £28.10, that was the price of the ticket to board the ship, wasn't it?
SPEAKER_01That's correct. And that's why I called it that. So people can see that's equivalent of nearly £600 in today's money. So, you know, a lot of people sold their pigs, their goats, their cows, their tools to get on that boat to get to London. Because they knew the money they could earn here could feed their family and then other families too, and relatives, and buy land and bet their self because the war had its effect on the Caribbean too, because no trade was going backward and forward. So people were really being hit in the Caribbean. So after the war, when nothing happened, people just were building to get an invitation for the King of England to come to London and work and you can earn all this money, you earn more in one month than maybe you earn the year in Jamaica. People were clamoring to come.
SPEAKER_00So what's next? We know that the paperback version of the book is out next month. We have the dramatisations play happening in October, and you have an international tour taking place as well.
SPEAKER_01Yes, and I'll be embarking on a national tour from Edinburgh to Brighton this year, also stopping in Jamaica in May, and there'll be several appearances of me in schools, colleges, universities, etc., throughout the year.
SPEAKER_00Has there been any surprising comments about the book since you've written it?
SPEAKER_01A lot of people have said to me it's their parents' story. They've given the book to their parents or told the parents about it, and they've said that's their story that they've experienced that. I'm privileged that I got those stories from the elders, and half of those people who spoke to me of their past, they're now with the ancestors. I'm honored that I've kept their stories alive in my book. And their children and children's children can see that.
SPEAKER_00It's great to see the legacy live on.
SPEAKER_01Indeed, it is. And history is written by the victor. Always remember that. And in this country, we read history books written by the victor. They don't tell you about the African history. We've got to reclaim our history, and part of what I'm doing is to reclaim our Caribbean history in this country. To have a black museum dedicated to the African and Caribbean experience in this country, going right back to Roman times.
SPEAKER_00Tony, I just want to thank you so much for sharing your story, and thank you for being a guest on this podcast.
SPEAKER_01Thank you for the invitation. I really enjoyed it. Thank you.
SPEAKER_00If you would like further details about Tony Fever and information about upcoming events, then please follow the link in the show notes.