Ms ONA GLINTON...CIVIC LEADER AND EDUCATOR of the TCI

I will always remember Ona Glinton as a warm, bubbly well spoken fascinating lady. The day I sat down with her in Grand Turk she made me a cup of tea and shared a sponge cake as she recounted tales of growing up in Grand Turk and Salt Cay.



Charming Home in Grand Turk

Her mother was a short bright skinned lady by the name of Angelina Lightbourne who according to Ms Ona was a wonderful seamstress, taught crochet from her house overback and was a good vocalist in the Methodist church. Her mother was a strict disciplinarian and married the son of Mary Lightbourne, Nathaniel who was a seafaring man and a pilot navigating the boats in and out of the docks in Grand Turk….

Boats that would often be laden down with salt. Her grandfather who she never knew, was like her daddy a skilled pilot but one day met his demise and was drowned in a terrible storm that swept the coast of of Grand Turk.

Front Street Grand Turk

Times were hard and so for much of her youth she was raised by her grandmother Mary and her godfather Richard Been, a Government officer from Salt Cay. who sent her to a private school the ‘Cecil Earl Crawford School’.Her teacher was the founder of the school, Mr Cecil Earl Crawford, a well educated man from Barbados and her godfather she remembers paid 10 shillings for the fees required for attending the school and paying for the uniforms.
He had an old upstairs house on a alley near Glens shop..he was a tall black, black man who always wore glasses.

Ms, Ona loved her godpa and remembered him as a kind man who lived in a big house on Salt Cay coming from South.” He had at least three wives” Ms Onna said “ and was the best taylor on all the island”.

CHAIN STITCH

Ms Ona loved to crotchet and her mother taught her how to “chain’, “treble” and’ half treble” and how to make patterns.She was also taught further in her sewing skills by a good natured white lady by the name of Ms BC Frith who lived in Palm Grove in a rock stone house. . BC, she recalls would take crochet orders from the States and with the help of her servants Ms Minerva Williams and Ms Jesse Wyns they would crochet all sorts of things especially large bedspreads and tablecloths.”These fingers I can tell you, they are good” ,Ms. Ona chuckled.


It was in 1946 ,that she married the Wilfred Glinton, from Salt Cay and had two children – Frederick and raised two adopted children Earl Glinton and Estelle Pinder.

Story to be continued......If you have any information at all please forward to piratequeen3@hotmail.com so that we can continue the cultural heritage of these Turks and Caicos Islands...THX