George Odlum and My Visit to Bristol University

On planning my 2023 international book tour, I just knew I had to visit Bristol University because, after all, it was a tour of my latest book, They Called Him Brother George: Portrait of a Caribbean Politician, of which George Odlum was the protagonist and an alma mater of Bristol University, which in 2004 named a room in the Student Union in his honor. I had to visit the Odlum Room!

However, to be honest, part of what made me think that once in London a visit to Bristol University was a no-brainer was that I thought it was within the vicinity of London, my UK base. But to my surprise, it was a three-hour London tube transit and national rail commute from Hackney, where I was residing.  It was then that I understood why Bristol University said they couldn’t spare the personnel to attend and provide remarks at my London St. Lucia High Commission book launch but instead settled for a Zoom book interview, which was published on the university’s website, and congratulatory remarks in the form of a video clip for viewing at the launch.

Nonetheless, besides cost, I wasn’t overly perturbed because I love long train rides, and I had been itching to see the UK countryside, for in my two previous visits, I was stuck in London, and all I saw was a never-ending “concrete jungle.”

The rolling (mostly farmland) landscape I encountered on my way to Bristol contrasted sharply with the city’s hilly terrain. So it came as no surprise when later I read that Bristol was built on seven hills (a city of seven hills, I would say) and that it has the steepest residential road in the country.

Bristol, with its aged architecture, like many other parts of the UK, conjured up history.  And with carefree students up and about, Bristol University reminded me of my college days and impressed upon me that university campus life isn’t much different no matter where you go.

I met my university guide, Ms. Joanna McGarry, a director of marketing and communications of the school’s alumni program, outside the Richmond Building where the Students’ Union is housed. Naturally, our first stop was the Odlum Room. It is a study room the size of a small classroom, seating thirty to forty, with windows on one side. A plaque next to the entrance read:

This room is named after

GEORGE ODLUM

In the late 1950s George Odlum (1934-2003) came from St. Lucia to study English at the University of Bristol. Odlum quickly became an active member of the University community, partaking in numerous societies including DramSoc and the Debating Society before elected to become the first black President at the Union in 1958.

After leaving Bristol, Odlum went on to study Politics and Economics at Oxford University and continued to act as well as playing in the football and cricket teams.

Odlum returned to St. Lucia in 1961, where he became a popular and compelling voice for the “new left movement” in Caribbean politics, holding the position of Deputy Prime Minister in the 1970s and Ambassador to the United Nations in 1990s.

Our next stop was the main campus library, where with the help of two librarians we located archived materials on George Odlum. We viewed photos of a rare Queen Elizabeth II visit to Bristol University in 1958 with George Odlum in attendance. Browsing a September 1958 issue of the Student Union Newspaper, Nonesuch News, we found a feature on George Odlum as the President of the Student Union, alongside his co-president, Marjorie Loud. The caption under Odlum’s photo read:

George, from St. Lucia, British West Indies, is a third-year English student. He is a keen sportsman (1st XI cricket, 2nd XI football) and an outstanding debater, reaching the semi-finals of the N.U.S. Debating Tournament last year. He has also appeared in Revunions and Dram. Soc. productions.

One of the librarians drew our attention to page 344 of the Student Union Handbook where “Mr. George Odlum” (along with two other presidents) was listed as a President of the Student Union (1958-1959), and then to page 372 where Odlum appeared in the honors list as the recipient of a Second Class (Division II) bachelor’s degree in English. Next, she directed us to a more recent publication, the university newsletter of 12 December 1991, which featured George Odlum, the first black Student Union President, making a return to Bristol and meeting then the current President, Rob Mitchell. Speaking of Odlum, the article said,

He is now a leading politician in St. Lucia and is planning a reunion of some of his old fellow students at Bristol in St. Lucia next year. He hopes to have more opportunities to renew his links with the University in the future.

After the library, we visited the Wills Memorial Tower, a neo-Gothic building established between 1915 and 1925. Standing at 215 feet, the Wills Tower (as it is popularly called) is the fourth-highest structure in Bristol and the University’s landmark building. Besides the Wills Tower’s awe-inspiring presence, I visited it to take a peep at the Drama Studio, which my host said was once housed in the Tower, and where George Odlum performed in the world premiere of Harold Pinter’s first play, The Room, in 1957. Since writing the play, Pinter went on to become one of Britain’s most renowned dramatists with several of his plays becoming classics. The studio is now used as just a store room, but photos next to the entrance recall when the room was put to more auspicious use.

The Wills Memorial Tower gave me an unexpected treat that was one of the highlights of my international book tour. The walls of its main auditorium are lined with portraits of former  Chancellors of the University—including that of Sir Winston Churchill, its longest-serving Chancellor (1929 -1965)—as well as portraits of distinguished alumni displaying a photo of the alumni who came before them and whom they most admire and look up to.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/n2QOqU_IoUs?feature=oembedInside Wills Memorial Tower

Alumni Olivette Otele, a renowned historian who was the first Black woman to be appointed to a professorial chair in History in the United Kingdom, held up a photo of Dame Pearlette Louisy as the alumni who had made such an impression on her. Part of the blurb accompanying the photo said,

Her extraordinary ability to thrive in very different education systems and environments demonstrates a remarkable facility for working well with others. In recognition of her contribution to education, the University of Bristol awarded her an honorary degree in Doctor of Laws in 1999, the same year she was awarded the Dame Grand Cross of the Most Distinguished Order of St. Michael and of St. George. Her ability to sustain academic excellence through publications in international journals while contributing to Creole studies has inspired generations of young women and men.

It was a special treat for me because I’m particularly proud of Dame Pearlette Louisy, the longest-serving governor-general of St. Lucia (1997 – 2017). She raised the cultural profile of St. Lucia, brought greater civility to the political process, made the governorship more accessible to ordinary St. Lucians, and, by example, helped foster a more civil and humane country.

During Odlum’s university days at Bristol, the UK was rife with discrimination, racism, and social inequality. Such hate slogans as “No French, No Irish, No Dogs, No Blacks” were commonplace. Coinciding with Odlum’s election to President of the Student Union, white youths instigated a race riot—the 1958 Notting Hill race riots—that led to 140 arrests. Six decades later, racial strife hasn’t completely dissipated. In recent years Bristol University has been embroiled in racial tensions. Black Lives Matter protestors toppled the university’s statue of the slave trader Edward Colston in June 2020. My host informed me that my visit coincided with the university’s grappling with the fallout of student protestors’ outcry against the Wills Memorial Tower, demanding the removal of the Wills name from the building because of the family’s role in enabling slavery.

Responding to the racial discord, the university commissioned a research inquiry led by Dame Pearlette Louisy’s great admirer, Professor Olivette Otele, into the university’s link to “the transatlantic trafficking of enslaved Africans,” and thus be better equipped to address issues regarding the “legacies of the past,” including the renaming of buildings that bear the names of persons with suspected links to slavery.  The findings of the inquiry, which were presented in a Legacies of Slavery Report, revealed that three of the family names—Wills, Fry, and Colston—embodied in the university’s crest are directly or indirectly linked to African enslavement. 

These results should have surprised no one because, as a port city in south-west England, Bristol played a major role in the transatlantic slave trade.  Its merchants were responsible for trading an estimated 500,000 enslaved Africans, and during the 1730-1745 fifteen-year period, it was the UK’s foremost slaving port.

Nonetheless, the findings placed administrators in a difficult and embarrassing position because the university owes its existence to the generous financial contributions of the Wills and Fry families. Attempting to stay on top of the controversy, the school followed the Legacies of Slavery Report with a year-long consultation among staff, students, and the wider Bristol community and beyond to address the issue of renaming seven buildings that bear the names of these benefactors.

The feedback on the renaming of the buildings was mixed. Not everyone was keen on the name purging. However, everyone was more concerned about the university’s continued legacy of “racial injustices and exclusion” and “systematic disadvantages in education,” than the renaming of buildings. Accordingly, considering that the Wills and Fry families were not directly involved in slavery (they did not own or traffic in slaves but dealt with goods produced with slave labor) and that without their generosity the university would not have existed, administrators decided against changing the buildings’ names.

Not so in the case of Edward Colston; not only was he directly involved in slavery as a trader, but he (died 200 years prior to the founding of the university) and his family made no contributions to Bristol University. Administrators thus decided to purge the university’s logo of the dolphin insignia representing the slave trader. And, of course, the Black Lives Matter protestors had saved them the trouble of dismantling his statue.

Additionally, the university decided to take steps to eliminate racism and exclusion, which, besides its existing Black Bristol Scholarship Programme, would include a £10m fund to address racial inequalities.

What would have been George Odlum’s take on the renaming of buildings? Odlum, with his theatrical flair and love of literature, understood the import of symbolism; he was a master of putting symbols to great effect. He would have had an appreciation of the symbolic effect of Bristol’s renaming of the buildings reverberating around the globe. He would, therefore, have urged for both the renaming of the buildings and the taking of steps to resolve racial disparities. And, of course, he would have told the stature toddlers, “Well done mates.”

Interestingly, despite the racism and racial tension that must have been swirling around him during his UK college days, I have never heard the vociferous Odlum (or anyone else) mention that he faced racism or was discriminated against. This is surprising because Odlum had confessed that part of what made him change scholarship from English and literature to politics and economics when he enrolled at Oxford after Bristol were events like the 1960 South Africa Sharpeville massacre and, I imagine, the 1958 Notting Hill race riots. I suspect Odlum’s aura—his humaneness, charisma, ability to endear people to him—created a bubble around him in which people had no choice but to be kindly disposed towards him.

Odlum was able to rise above racism or any other challenges he may have encountered.  So much so that he wasn’t only about academics; he was well integrated into other facets of campus life. He presided as president of the Students Union, played on the school’s cricket and soccer teams, and was a member of the debating team.

A quote/story that appeared in the Student Union about George Odlum gives a good indication of how well-adjusted he was to campus life.

George Odlum, the first black president of the Students’ Union, was kidnapped by Cardiff students in a RAG Week prank.

George was lured to Temple Meads station, where he was grabbed by five Cardiff students and hustled onto a train. He was then bound and carried in triumph along the main thoroughfare in Cardiff. It was three days before he was rescued.

George said: “I thought the kidnapping was a clever piece of work. I quite enjoyed it.” His revenge was to kidnap Cardiff’s RAG Queen, Nesta Davis, and bring her back to Bristol.”

And the March 25, 1958 issue of the Kingston Gleaner newspaper report on the Bristol University Student Unions’ presidential election, provides another indication of Odlum’s aura and his integration into University life.

The University’s 3600 students—including 200 coloured undergraduates—went to the polls yesterday to decide a five-sided contest for the presidency. And 23-year-old Odlum, a brilliant debater, all-round sportsman, limbo dancer and actor, came out on top with nearly 1200 votes. His nearest rival got 178.

Odlum, a second-year English student, told me he won the presidency on a “no manifesto, no promises” platform. He said, “Most of the candidates were out to reform something—even if it was only the canteen.”

A student said: “George impressed us as a very sincere man. Colour did not come into it.”

After our visit to the iconic Wills Memorial Tower, my host said her goodbyes and left to attend a meeting. But instead of hurrying back to London where I had to conduct a second book launch in a few days (this time at the Green Light Youth Club in the Bow district), to satisfy my hunger for food and my nostalgia for university student life, I had a meal at a nearby Chinese restaurant, drank expresso at Costa Coffee, visited a bookstore where I bought Literary Devices by Amy Jones, then hopped on a bus to the train station where I boarded the Great Western Railway that took me back to London.