– Leonard Fredericks

By Faizool Deo
When Leonard Hubert Fredericks reached Great Falls (up the Demerara River) in September of 1979, he wanted to turn back. The school, which he was employed to teach at, was a little shed at the river bank, and the community was desolate and miles away from the civilised world.

In fact, getting to Linden, without help, meant paddling for days in a canoe. By the end of his first class, Fredericks forgot all that was wrong about the community. Nineteen curious little faces had actually begged him to teach beyond the cut off time of 15:00h and he was hooked.
“They were eager to learn, and I felt sad to leave them.”
In the years that followed, his input in Great Falls helped numerous students into secondary schools in Linden and Georgetown.
Fredericks was born into teaching and when he finally retired in 2010, he had accumulated over 40 years in the profession.
Born in Santa Rosa, Moruca in 1941, Fredericks got his formal education from the Santa Rosa RC School. He had no knowledge about his father, but his mother was a teacher and she had a reputation of being good at her profession. As a single mother, she taught the Caribs in the Barama River. When she married, the Roman Catholic Church sent her to Kopinang, North Pakaraimas to open a school there.
His mother started classes in 1952 and four years later, at the age of 15, Fredericks began to teach, but on a voluntary basis. As the school numbers increased, the need for another full-time teacher became obvious and in 1963 he was hired in an interim position. During this time, he became big brother to four brothers and five sisters.
When his mother died (during child birth) at the age of 40 in 1964, he took over as acting headmaster until 1967. He then returned to his grandmother’s home in Santa Rosa. For an entire year he did farming before he agreed to teach at the Kamwatta RC School in 1968.
Since Fredericks was unqualified, his teaching career came to an abrupt end when it was announced by the government that all teachers should be qualified. He had responsibilities and needed to take care of his family—college was not on his radar at that time.
In 1969, he ventured into Linden looking for work, but it proved difficult and he eventually reached a village in the interior called Malali (approximately 50 miles from Linden), where he did postal work from 1970-73.
Fredericks then did woodcutting for a timber company down river. Since he wanted to send money home, he decided to write a letter to his boss, who was shocked at his level of education.
“Buckman (the colloquial expression for Amerindians) don’t write like this,” he said, before offering Fredericks a job in bookkeeping.

A few years later, an education officer in Linden was looking for someone to teach in Great Falls. In 1979, after some effort, he convinced Fredericks to take up the post as acting headmaster.
In the years that followed Fredericks worked hard with the students. They even battled through a flood which damaged the school in 1981.
In 1983, a young Afro-Guyanese girl went to the community to teach and she was enthralled by the education level of the students. She convinced the acting HM to sign up six of them to write Common Entrance. They were all successful. One child got a scholarship to North Georgetown Secondary School, while the others got schools in Linden.
The education department was so impressed that in 1985 they sent Fredericks to the Linden branch of the Cyril Potter College of Education. While at college, he taught at the One Mile Primary School.
At the age of 46 Fredericks became a qualified teacher. And he just did not pass, he did exceedingly well, among his grades was a distinction in social studies/history.
Fredericks returned to Great Falls, but in 1990, upon the request of the ministry, he left to open a new school at 47 Miles on the Mabura Road. Until his retirement in 2010 (initially 1996, but he was asked to stay on) he divided his time between the two schools and the 58 Miles Mabura Mission Primary Annex.
Fredericks never got married, but he does have a son who lives in Georgetown.
In 2012, Great Falls school was left without a tutor after both of its teachers were due for maternal leave. Fredericks returned to the school on a voluntary basis and worked until he was replaced last year.
Now at the age of 74 (75 in November) he is looking forward to helping the next batch of youngsters who will write the exam in 2017.