On October 7th this year the KCOBA Florida Chapter put on its annual fundraiser which many of us for obvious reasons now call, ‘The Big Miami Session’. This was the eighth anniversary of the fund raiser which seems to be getting bigger and bigger every year. It is not a session for KC Old Boys only; it is a session or dance for the entire Jamaican community in South Florida held on the first Saturday in October every year. If you have not yet been to one of these dances you should make the effort to go next year. It is an experience you will never forget.
When Ivor Nugent, stalwart of the Florida Chapter, picked me up at the airport at 9pm on the eve of the session, his first words were, “We are having a little pre-session get-together by Audley Hewett’s office, so we are going to pass by.” By the time we got to Audley’s place there were about twenty persons present and by 11pm the little pre-session get together could no longer be described as being little as there were about 70 persons there. Among them were new Principal Rupert Hemmings, Robert Kelly and Clinton ‘Fat Man’ Clarke from New York and Winston Ulett, Prof Rainford Wilks, Locksley Henry and Ray Fraser from Jamaica. As a group of us sat at a table sipping Derek ‘Freddie’ Mills delicious fish soup, an Old Boy who had just arrived came over to our table and asked of Robert, “Kelly, a nuh Hemmo from 1D dat over deh so a talk to dem man deh?” Without batting an eyelid Kelly replied, “No, that’s not Hemmo, that is Mr. Rupert Hemmings, Principal of Kingston College!” The gentleman who was not aware that KC had a new principal immediately went over to greet his past classmate and we are sure that he didn’t call him ‘Hemmo’.
In a short informal address to the gathering, the Principal spoke of some of his immediate and short term plans for KC including a proposal to launch a teacher incentive programme at the school within the current school year. Immediately afterwards, people like Kelly, President of the NY Chapter and ‘Fat Man’ Clarke could be seen crunching the numbers trying to determine how much it would cost to get the programme started and how much the chapters would have to raise in their fundraising activities this year to make it a reality.
We left at about midnight despite the fact that we had not exhausted Freddie’s supply of food and drinks.
Photographs by Freddy Mills Click here for more photos of the Big Purple Session
According to the advertisement put out by the Florida Chapter, the Big Session was due to begin at 9pm on Saturday night. As we prepared to leave the house, my son reminded me that only old people went to a party at 9pm and that he was not planning to be there until 11pm. I was crushed because up until that moment I had not thought of myself as being old.
Photographs by Freddy Mills Click here for more photos of the Big Purple Session
When I got there at 9:15 there were few persons in the hall and any skeptic who arrived at that time would be convinced that the event would be a flop. However, by 10pm people started to arrive and DJ Dave Brent-Harris had started to warm up. By 11pm one had difficulty getting to the three bars because the crowd was so massive and by midnight there was not an empty spot on the dance floor as Fab Five had the crowd rocking to the music. A lot of my friends took up permanent strategic positions near to the bar as they had no intention of jostling the crowd to get a drink.
I saw old boys of every era and ran into many whom I had not seen since our student days. I often heard that many who had not been seen in years were there but the crowd was so thick that I was never able to meet these folks. The Jamaican posse was quite impressive. Flying in from Kingston were Churchill Neita and his wife, Prof Rainford Wilks, Stratton Palmer accompanied by his wife and eldest daughter, Dr Ray Fraser and Winston Ulett who ran one of the bars with a business like efficiency. There was no doubt others from Jamaica were present but the ones mentioned were those whom I personally saw and chatted with briefly.
As usual, the NY Posse was there. It is well known that some members of the NY Chapter seldom miss a KC function anywhere in North America. From New York we saw President Robert Kelly with his wife and daughter, Clinton ‘Fat Man’ Clarke and his wife, Denise and Robert Rodney who was one of George Thompson’s favourite footballers of the late ’70s at KC. From Toronto, I glimpsed and had a drink with President Lance Seymour and Treasurer Ruddy Hart was also there. Whylie Chambers (as is customary) represented the Atlanta Chapter well. One old boy traveled all the way from Switzerland to attend the dance. He was Horace Hale (and his wife Kemi) who said that after hearing about the function for so many years he was determined to attend this year so they flew across the Atlantic to attend and to support KC.
For those of you who feel that this was a function put on by the Florida Chapter for KC old boys, you are wrong. Firstly, the ratio of females to males was in favor of females and secondly, many of the males in attendance were not KC old boys at all. The fact is that the dance is now a well established calendar event for the Jamaican community in South Florida and is viewed as a stellar event where one can go to enjoy good music, meet friends of yore and simply have a wonderful time. As usual, Fab Five was at its musical best and entertained the large gathering with an array of oldies and current hits. Guest artiste Mikal Rustle was also well received titillating the ladies. When the band members rested the disco took over and this tandem kept the dance floor crowded until 3am. And how could I forget Gem Myers who entertained the crowd for about one hour. I first saw her perform at a show in Mandeville in about 1988 and I swear that since then she had not gained a gram in weight. Between her songs she told the crowd that as a child she got many beatings from her mother for always “dancing and whining up her waist” but that now that was how she was earning a living on the stage!
For many old boys the best place to be was by one of the three bars, preferably by the one which was close to the kitchen and also relatively close to the washrooms. That was where most of the debates and reminiscing took place. It was here that the Errar brothers(Shango and Danny) reminded ex-KC cricketer Audley ‘Fleet’Patterson that in the Spaulding Cup match versus Vere Tech in the mid ’70, KC’s winning Sunlight Cup team which included ace pace bowler Michael Holding was put to the sword by the Clarendon team whose openers both made centuries. Funny that Danny Errar should remember that fact. He also remembered quite vividly that Patterson, batting in the KC middle order, was given out stumped by the Vere wicketkeeper, Herbert ‘Dago’ Gordon, the excellent school boy footballer and cricketer who had just transferred from Trench Town Comprehensive to Vere. Errar claimed that he remembered this event because Patterson was stumped off Vere’s pace bowler as ‘Dago’ Gordon was crouched behind the stumps as he would to a spin bowler. In his defense Patterson recalled that he was not out of his crease at all and that it was the standing umpire who gave him out instead of the square-leg umpire as the cricketing law required. However, having been given out, wrongfully, he walked, because he was a gentleman and cricket then was a gentleman’s game. Patterson had to buy us a round of drinks as a result of that batting failure of his 30 years ago. Had Michael Holding been present at the dance he would have fared no better than Patterson as I am sure that to this day the Errar brothers still remember his bowling statistics in that match which KC lost.
The session ended at 3am sharp. Many did not want to leave so soon. Several were seen going to the bar to get one last drink. One person remarked to me that the Florida Chapter had found the ‘winning formula’ for fundraising. I agreed and promised that I would see him there next year. With everybody out of the hall, the Members of the Florida Chapter got to work to clean up the hall which had to be ready for church in a few hours time.
