Tweet
<span style="color: #000099"><span style="font-size: 17pt">Regal farewell</span>
<span style="font-size: 11pt">Prof Nettleford eulogised as ‘king’ by name and nature</span></span>
BY INGRID BROWN Observer senior reporter [email protected]
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
PROFESSOR Rex Nettleford’s final curtain call could not have been a better production for the attentive and appreciative congregation, drawn from all spheres of Jamaica’s social strata, who yesterday celebrated the life of a man whose worth and work could not be sufficiently captured in the glowing tributes which flowed through the hallowed halls of the University of the West Indies (UWI) chapel in Kingston.
The small urn bearing the cremated remains of Ralston Milton ‘Rex’ Nettleford — originally from Bunker’s Hill, Trelawny — sat in the centre of the table at the front of the chapel in stark contrast to the life-sized portrait, hanging on a wall on the altar, of the man who seemed to loom even larger in death than in life.
<span style="font-style: italic">University of the West Indies students form a guard of honour as the Jamaica Constabulary Force Bearer Party walks from the University Chapel with the urn bearing the cremated remains of Professor Rex Nettleford to the Registrar’s Office where the vessel was handed over for interment on the chapel grounds at a later date. (Photo: Bryan Cummings)</span>
[Hide Description] University of the West Indies students form a guard of honour as the Jamaica Constabulary Force Bearer Party walks from the University Chapel with the urn bearing the cremated remains of Professor Rex Nettleford to the Registrar’s Office where the vessel was handed over for interment on the chapel grounds at a later date. (Photo: Bryan Cummings)
[Restore Description]
1/1
“I don’t know when and how Ralston became Rex... but no one here today would doubt the appropriateness of that name,” said the Rt Rev Alfred Reid, qualifying his comment with the fact that Rex is the Latin word for King.
Giving the Homily, Reid, the Lord Bishop of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands, said it is not just Nettleford’s regal bearing of sense of presence and self but his graciousness and wellcultivated manners that characterised his attitude to all persons irrespective of class or position.
“He was Rex by name and Rex by nature,” he said.
Known for punctuality, it was only natural that the Official Funeral service to honour Nettleford’s life began promptly at 10:00 am and the tributes which flowed from those who knew and loved him were to the point.
In her tribute to the man she described as her friend, Opposition Leader Portia Simpson Miller said Nettleford defied the odds and crafted his own destiny.
She said he was a role model for those who might believe the opportunities are too limited and the odds too great.
“As an icon, that is his example to every Jamaican boy and girl that they can beat the odds and maintain their dream,” Simpson Miller said.
His passion and zest for life and commitment to the development of the Jamaican people, she said, will never be forgotten.
“This is your farewell, Trelawny boy, Jamaican scholar, Caribbean man. We will remember you favourably, and when we have dealt with the sorrow of your passing our snapshots of you will bring us smiles,” she said.
Prime Minister Bruce Golding said Nettleford — the first UWI alumni to become vice chancellor — helped to clear the mirror for many Jamaicans who had doubts about their identity.
“Rex Nettleford helped to clean that mirror to enable us to see ourselves for who we really are and caused us to revalue ourselves,” he said.
Noting that he will be missed by the artistic community, the UWI family and the entire Caribbean and Jamaica in particular, Golding said the country has lost one of its most able, willing and dedicated sons.
“The people of Jamaica owe Rex Nettleford a huge debt of gratitude — a debt we will never be able to repay but a debt we acknowledge today with a proud spirit and a grateful heart,” said Golding.
In the Eulogy, which provided a brief glimpse into Nettleford’s life, Professor Emeritus Edward Baugh summed him up as one who spoke up for every “puss, dog and fowl and worked to make them feel that they were people too”.
Remembering Nettleford as one who was self-assured without being arrogant, Baugh said the late professor had many simultaneous mutually energising careers.
“Goodnight, sweet prince and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest. Professor Rex, we say to you as you were fond of saying to us at leave taking, bless you,” Baugh said.
In his tribute, Lloyd Goodleigh, president of the Jamaica Confederation of Trade Unions, said the Caribbean and Jamaican trade union movements are indebted to Nettleford .
“The Jamaica trade union movement is indebted to Rex Nettleford because he spent a significant portion of his life in the education and training of Caribbean workers and their leaders,” he said.
Marlon Simms, dance captain of the world-acclaimed National Dance Theatre Company co-founded by Nettleford, remembered the professor as not only the group’s greatest teacher but a father, uncle, brother, friend, confidante and a rock to stand on.
“Renewal and continuity was his most recent mantra and in his own words this is intermission and not the end,” he said, as he ended his tribute on a sombre note.
At the end of the service, as the Jamaica Constabulary Force Bearer Party walked slowly down the isle with the earthen urn to one of Nettleford’s favourite songs — Lord Of The Dance — many stood in silent applause of a life that was well choreographed and acted out on the world stage.
University students formed a guard of honour as the Bearer Party walked slowly from the chapel with the urn to the university’s Registrar’s Office where the vessel was handed over for interment on the chapel grounds at a later date.
In addition to Golding and Simpson Miller, the service was attended by Governor General Sir Patrick Allen, former prime ministers PJ Patterson and Edward Seaga, Antiguan Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer, Jamaican parliamentarians, persons from academia and representatives of civic society and corporate Jamaica.
Nettleford died in George Washington University Hospital on February 2, six days after he collapsed in his hotel room in Washington and a day before his 77th birthday.
He had suffered a massive heart attack and was admitted to the hospital’s intensive care unit but never regained consciousness.
He was in the US capital to participate in a fund-raising gala for the University of the West Indies.
Comment