Armstrong

Laura Tanna, Contributor

"We changed the complexion of Canada and you'd be surprised, what amuses me about my life is that most Jamaicans don't know what I've done." - Armstrong

What 82-year-old Bromley Armstrong did was win the first legal test cases against racial discrimination in Canada back in the 1950s. He founded numerous organisations, including the Jamaican Canadian Association, the Urban Alliance on Race Relations, Black Business and Professional Association, and the National Council of Jamaicans and Supportive Organisations, while being equally well known for his work with trade unions and as a commissioner on the Human Rights Commission. In addition, he produced a Caribbean newspaper, all of which earned him enormous recognition in Canada.

His awards include the Order of Ontario 1992, the Order of Canada 1994, the Stanley Knowles Humanitarian Award 1995, the Toronto Onyx Lions Club Award 1995, the Bahai National Race Unity Award and Harmony Award 1998.

Let me introduce you to a Jamaican-born Canadian who deserves wider recognition from Jamaicans, so many of whom have benefited from his pioneering efforts in Canada on behalf of all minority races who live in or visit that country.

Boilermaker

Born February 9 , 1926, at 4 Gold Street in Kingston and raised at 3 Albert Street in Franklin Town until age seven or eight when the family moved to Deanery Road in Vineyard Town, he says of his parents: "My father was a boilermaker who had odd jobs … He was more unemployed than he was employed, but my mother was always busy delivering babies, sometimes for nothing. Her most lucrative work was with the military at Up Park Camp. At least she knew she'd be paid."

The middle child in a family of seven children, Armstrong had three brothers and three sisters, all of whom have left Jamaica.

Bromley attended Alpha Elementary School on South Camp Road:

"I went to a little school called Waltham College, on Waltham Park Road and East Race Course. I wasn't satisfied with that so I left and went to work.

From age 16-21 Armstrong worked as a clerk, first at Hanna's and then Issa's. Armstrong describes why he left his first job:

"It was a foolish disagreement. This kid, another employee of Hanna's, was just a smart aleck. He was the apple of the manager's eye. We're in the back of the store and he spilled a glass of water on me, intentionally, so I got up off the wall and threw a bucket of water over his head! The manager wasn't too happy with me. I wanted to get out of Hanna's anyway, so I made contact with Issas and they agreed to employ me, but I couldn't get into the shoe department, so I was selling curtains, linoleum, things to make bags, but I knew I was going to get out of Jamaica anyway, so this was just another stop.

"My parents were always contributing to me. This was exactly why I wanted to go because I was looking forward to finding a better life for myself and I just didn't want to be a burden, particularly on my mother.

"I'll never forget that our upbringing was such that the guidance I got from my parents has stayed with me all my life. My father was a devout Roman Catholic who went to church every day of his life. He was always praying because manna was going to come out of the sky, and it never did come down. The manna was all my mother's doing.

"My mother finally set up a little nursing home on Deanery Road where she was delivering babies there, called St Monica's Hospital, or what-have-you. She made a good living, the backbone, financially."

What Armstrong did receive from his father was a great foundation in discipline and physical fitness. "My father was a nut for physical culture. He would get us up at five o'clock in the morning to run, even my mother … He would line us up and when my brothers had gone, I became the eldest so I was the drill instructor. I had to make sure that the ones under me were looked after.

"That's how I got involved in boxing, because my younger brother George got involved in boxing. We had a trainer, Kid Silver, who was one of the most outstanding boxers Jamaica ever produced. George and I were both selected to represent Jamaica in the South American Olympics in Colombia in 1946."

Concussion

Unfortunately, Armstrong, a welter-weight, was paired with a heavier middle-weight in his last fight before the Olympics and suffered a concussion, ending up in hospital instead of Colombia, but George went and enjoyed the experience. Their two older brothers got into Canada by joining the Canadian Army. When his eldest brother returned with a Canadian Regiment to Up Park Camp, he decided Canada would be ideal for 21-year-old Bromley who was involved in swimming, soccer and boxing.

"Most people don't realise that Canada, like Britain and Australia, had restricted immigration policies relating to people of colour - in those days we were called 'Negroes' or 'Coloured'. A white Jamaican could get into Canada with no problem, no restrictions, but a black Jamaican could not get into Canada. They told us we were British, brought up under the British Empire. We were British subjects, but under the Canadian Immigration Act, we were British objects, not subjects. This is my interpretation of the language because they don't recognise you as a British subject. Funnily, if you get into the country, for every other purpose you're a British subject. You could run for elections. You could become a Canadian citizen, no problem. You could get a job in the civil service or thing, like that but, for immigration purposes, you're not recognised as a British subject.

"So, my brother registered me and my younger brother in the Toronto Business College, that's how we got to Canada." I wanted to get away from Jamaica because in my teenage years I was very busy in sports and you get very popular. Before you know, everybody wants to get married to you, so I figured I saw no future in this …

But he wanted to say a special farewell. "I never forgot my first head mistress, Sister Fidelis, who had such a great effect on me. I went to St Catherine's where Sister Fidelis, [an expatriate nun], had retired to tell her I was thinking about getting out of Jamaica. I spent a whole day with her at the convent and she gave me a lecture about life - what to expect and what I would find when I got away." What he didn't expect to find was racial discrimination, something he said he had never encountered in Jamaica. This was 1947 and he remembers:

"Two hours after leaving Jamaica, we landed in Miami, Florida, to take another plane. My brother and I wanted something to eat. They ushered us to a back room in the Miami airport restaurant, with tables, no tablecloths, no nothing. That was for black people or coloured or whatever they called us. What bothered me was after you finished eating, you had to walk through the restaurant to pay the cashier, where everybody is there, white and black alike. And you paid with the same green dollars. That bothered me. That was my first stint of discrimination.

"I'll never forget it. My brother and I were dumbfounded. When we looked at the menu, we couldn't recognise anything except pears and ice cream. We thought it was some kind of Jamaica pear (avocado) so we ordered them. Anyway we et it. Two ladies came in, of colour, Jamaicans, and saw us. One woman came over: "Excuse me do you mind if I sit with you?" We said: "No, no problem." She said: "I know, you're just from Jamaica." I said: "How yu know?" She said: "I went through this twenty years ago. I'm on my way to Jamaica to bury my mother. I can see the look on your face. And I can tell, that's exactly what happened to me twenty years ago." She said to me: "Don't despair. You're in a new world and you'll survive." I've NEVER forgotten that. "You'll survive."

(Next: His early days in Canada)