Eglah Blake – creating a lasting legacy over 100 years
Published:Saturday | June 1, 2024 | 12:08 AMChristopher Thomas/Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
The community of Accompong, St Elizabeth has a decades-old legacy of kindness and family values embodied in Eglah Blake, a 100-year-old resident who recently celebrated her milestone birthday and is currently the oldest living resident of the famed Maroon district.
Relatives, neighbours, and friends spoke glowingly to The Gleaner about Blake, who was born on May 24, 1924, and of the impact she has made on those privileged to know her over her long years of life, including her nine children (two deceased), 23 grandchildren, 50 great-grandchildren, and 20 great-great-grandchildren.
Although unable to speak for herself due to the lasting effects of a stroke, and despite being deaf and unable to move without assistance, the elderly Blake, affectionately called ‘Miss Marri’, was still quite attentive to everything in her line of sight even as her family members gathered at her home, a few minutes’ walk from Accompong’s community square, to reminisce about her reputation for love, discipline, and order.
“My mother took care of me, and I really love and respect my mother. She come to 100 years old now, and I’m glad to see that, and I wouldn’t mind to see her come to a couple more years,” son Roy Blake declared with great affection.
Great-grandson Peter Simpson, likewise praising the family matriarch, stated: “The love she has for her children, her grand and great grandchildren, it is outstanding. It is memorable; she is such a nice lady. She has ever been nice and is still nice up to this day.”
Born to parents Albert McLean and Mulvina Cross in 1924, Eglah Blake married her now-deceased husband Alvin Blake in 1949, and together they sired eight of her nine children, one having been the product of a previous relationship. The couple were married for 65 years until Alvin Blake’s passing in 2014.
Nine years after tying the knot with her husband, she became a founding member of the community’s Ta-Ta Denue Assembly Church of God in 1958, after having previously attended the Accompong New Testament Church of God. She served the Ta-Ta Denue Assembly congregation for many years as its treasurer and also filled in other roles where needed, while her husband served as a deacon.
‘Always happy’
Julius Cross, the current head deacon of the Ta-Ta Denue Assembly, outlined Blake’s honest service as the church treasurer and her multi-faceted work for the congregation, which sometimes included preaching whenever it was called for.
“With every pastor that comes at our church, she is the treasurer. She always kept a good book, and she was honest, a nice woman, honest, caring, and happy. I never see Ms Marri vex yet; all I try to see it, I never see her look vex, all the while she was always happy,” said Cross.
“She always did the devotional part of the service at church, and she love to sing; she didn’t have a singing voice like that, but she loved to sing,” Cross continued. “She wasn’t too regular with the preaching, but if you had to call on her, she wouldn’t turn down anything. Anything you call her to do for the church, she would do it.”
Hyacinth Blake-Rebow, one of the centenarian’s daughters, recounted how her mother maintained a tradition of ensuring her children attended church on a weekly basis, then preparing a sumptuous dinner for them afterward.
“Every Sunday morning, her children had to go to Sunday School, and after Sunday School, we had to go to the day-church. Then after the day-church, we had to go to Bible class, and after Bible class we had to go to the night service,” Blake-Rebow recalled.
“My mother would cook the nice rice and peas and the common fowl on Sunday for our dinner, and she would bake the potato pudding and the cornmeal pudding and the bammy for us, and the great-grands and other friends and family. Her food was so sweet and nice,” Blake-Rebow continued.
Legacy of kindness
According to Blake-Rebow, even after a stroke and accompanying ill health resulted in her mother having to receive care at home, the elder Blake’s love for and gratitude to God shone through even during her birthday celebration on May 24, as she attempted more than once to say ‘hallelujah’ despite her infirmity.
“She cannot hear, and she cannot walk, so we have to ‘arms’ her up to get her out here on the verandah. She cannot talk either, because she had a stroke, and it affected her. The day we had the celebration, she wanted to say hallelujah, but it couldn’t come out, so she could only say ‘hallelu, hallelu,’” Blake-Rebow pointed out.
The elder Blake’s legacy of kindness and discipline has even extended to beyond her immediate relatives, impacting Accompong’s very Maroon hierarchy, as former Maroon colonel-in-chief Ferron Williams confidently told The Gleaner.
“Ms Marri and her husband would be described as people who held to African tradition, and she is the type of person who believed in the statement ‘it takes a community to raise a child’. If any of us as children growing up should give a ‘cross’ or do anything which is not right, you can rest assured she would be one of the persons to inform our parents that we went across the line that we should not have done,” said Williams.
“Ms Marri, she was the type of person who, if she had one ackee and cook it and you were passing, she would be the first person, without you even asking, to call and ask if you want to come and partake of her meal. Whenever time we as children should walk to Whitehall district for mail, you could rest assured that you could go to Ms Marri for even a drink of water and you would get it,” Williams continued. “She don’t play church, she is a Christian, and maybe that is the reason she has lived so long. I am looking forward to when she reach 110, to be at her 110th celebration.”