Enid Hall was a resident of La Boca when it was a town in the Canal Zone inhabited predominately by West Indians (known as a Silver town or a Local-Rate town). When the town was removed in the mid-1950s, she and the other residents were relocated to other towns in the Canal Zone. Years later, she started a project to document her memories of La Boca as she knew it. She made lists of residents in each building as well as lists of employees and members of organizations. She used a 1943 map of La Boca to confirm building numbers. She also gathered a few other resources including a Thanksgiving Musical Program with information about some of the people and activities.
We have created an online pilot project based on her notebooks and materials: https://pcmc.uflib.ufl.edu/laboca/.
In addition to viewing the online project, all of Enid Hall's materials have been scanned and the images are available online.
A student assistant transcribed Enid's notes, and the transcriptions are available in spreadsheets. You can search for personal/family names in these spreadsheets.
For example, if you want to use Notebook 2, you can view the scanned images and you can view the transcription by opening the file named "Enid Hall-Notebook 2.xlsx".
When viewing the notebook spreadsheets, be aware that they include tabs at the bottom of the for each section of the spreadsheet. For example, Notebook 2 includes tabs for Building Numbers, Commissary, Clubhouse, Schools, etc., which are the various lists Enid Hall recorded in that notebook.
As part of this Enid Hall project, we have scanned maps and photos here at UF and identifying images in other archives (e.g., the National Archives or NARA) relating to La Boca circa 1910s-1950s. Some of these photos are from the National Archives, Photographs Related to the Operation and Development of the Panama Canal Zone, 1938 - 1960 https://catalog.archives.gov/id/535442. If you click on the "Search within this series" link on the NARA page you can search for "La Boca" or other search terms within this set of photos.
This online exhibit (https://arcg.is/0TminL) tells the largely unknown story of the life and accomplishments of Milton Duncan Garvey. Garvey immigrated as a young man from Barbados to Panama during the Canal construction and began working as a steward in the Tivoli Hotel and was a star cricket player. He later became an influential playwright in Panama and gained national recognition.
His granddaughter, Nydia Thomas, has brought his story to light as part of her research into her family history. Ms. Thomas is the daughter of two Panamanians of West Indian descent who migrated to Texas. She is a lawyer who has dedicated her career to juvenile justice.
According to Ms. Thomas, she "has used genealogical research to embrace and elevate the little-known story of her maternal grandfather, theatrical playwright Milton Garvey, and the lived experiences of her Barbadian-Panamanian ancestors to highlight the rich culture and heritage of the Caribbean diaspora."
This digital scholarship project was created using StoryMaps by a team of students in Professor Leah Rosenberg's graduate seminar at UF, Digitizing the Archive of Migration and Resistance, in 2022. The students are Dinalo Chakma, Sayantika Chakraborty, Chandler Mordecai, Noah Mullens, Jacob Senory, Sasha Wells, Brooke Whitaker.
Pan Caribbean Sankofa YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@pancaribbeansankofa
Includes videos on special topics, excerpts from oral history interviews, and a recording of the 2021 webinar, Pan-Caribbean Voices: Connecting People and Sharing Stories Relating to the Panama Canal. Also includes recorded streams from a 2022 webinar, Memory Lane.
The Story of Rose Grimes: https://www.dloc.com/AA00082284/00001/citation
A video created by the family of Rose Grimes for the 2021 online webinar, Pan-Caribbean Voices: Connecting People and Sharing Stories Relating to the Panama Canal. The video tells the story of Rose Grimes based on her own memoirs.
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