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Welcome to Strictly Facts, a guide to Caribbean history and culture hosted by me, alexandria Miller. Strictly Facts teaches the history, politics and activism of the Caribbean and connects these themes to contemporary music and popular culture. Hello, hello everyone. I'm Alexandria, your host of Strictly Facts, a guide to Caribbean history and culture. Back again to celebrate more Caribbean history with you on this fabulous Strictly Facts Wednesday.

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Our most recent episode on Aruba did a great job of bridging and connecting our boundaries and our movements and how they impact our histories things like our names to how we identify or even how people identify us, especially when we spoke about political leaders like Prime Minister of Grenada, sir Eric Gehry, who was born in Grenada and moved to Aruba for several years to work in an oil refinery, moved to Aruba for several years to work in an oil refinery, as well as his successor, new Jewel Movement leader and staunch Marxist, maurice Bishop, who was actually born in Aruba after his Grenadian parents moved there to work in Aruba's oil refinery and returned to Grenada when he was six years old. It led me to thinking about how much circumstances play a role in identity and the myriad other ways we could talk about migrations and movement from the perspective of solely being in the region, and, of course, this led me down the rabbit hole of thinking about what other famous Caribbean people were born on the islands different from the ones we traditionally connect them to, and, of course, on the islands different from the ones we traditionally connect them to, and, of course, how the close proximity between the islands allows for these movements. So, without further ado, adding to this list in addition to Bishop and Gary, first I will talk about Rita Marley, noteworthy singer, songwriter, staunch businesswoman and philanthropist, and the widow of Bob Marley, who was actually born in Santiago de Cuba, in Cuba, in 1946. Briefly talks about the experiences, saying that her mother was Cuban and that she was raised briefly by her Cuban maternal grandmother until her father decided all his children should live together with him, thus relocating Rita and her brother to Jamaica's music capital, trenchtown, to live with him and her aunt.

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Second on the list may surprise some of our Calypso lovers on the show. The Calypso king of the world himself, slinger Francisco, otherwise known as Mighty Sparrow, was actually born in Grenada in 1935. He moved a year later with his mother to Trinidad and it would be shortly thereafter, at age 14, that he would go on to join a steel pen band until he got his big break five years later, performing as a carnival singer for the very first time in 1954. And, as we know it, the rest is history.

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Next, for any of our kingstonians tuning into the show who may have attended events at the ronnie williams entertainmentono, randolph Williams, otherwise known as Masran, was an infamous comedian, dramatist and truly a titan of Jamaican theater. Among some of his accomplishments include being selected by fellow Jamaican activist, marcus Garvey, to be part of an entertainment group, writing and starring in national pantomime productions and hosting the Lou and Ronnie show with one of my personal favorites, louise Miss Lou Bennett Coverley, on the Jamaican Broadcasting Corporation's radio show. Williams was actually born in Cologne, panama, in 1912, to Jamaican parents who returned to Jamaica with him when he was six years old, and while much isn't known about his parents necessarily, I did wonder if his parents moved to Panama to help build the canal which, as we definitely know from earlier episodes, was very popular at the time. Next, for anybody who might be familiar with 70s Jamaican tourist board posters and things of that sort, I know there were certainly versions of this poster in my family members' houses growing up. Still Trinidadian model and entrepreneur Citra Bronte, who in 1972, just happened to be at the right place at the right time, when the Jamaican tourist board was hosting a model casting call for their upcoming marketing campaign at the Pegasus Hotel in Kingston, where Bronte happened to be staying at the time. Ironically, you know, given her trinity roots, bronte is the woman behind the iconic tourist board poster that year, emerging out of the water in a very clingy and close-fitting red t-shirt that says Jamaica across her chest. And so, again, I think that's one that definitely surprises people because is an iconic poster, symbolic of Jamaica, jamaican travel, especially at the time. But it's actually a Trinidadian woman behind the poster, and so so you know.

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Of course our list could continue from here. I will turn it over to you, lovely members of the Strictly Facts family, to let me know who are some of your favorite folks, born in one part of the region but highly recognized for their achievements and contributions on another island or nation. Do let me know in DMs or send us a text message in that link in the show notes. I hope this conversation brings about new considerations and the complexities of migration and diaspora and, as always you know, look forward to your thoughts, so be sure to drop them to us on social media. I hope you are doing well taking care of yourselves, especially at the end of this year. As the year winds down, we have some great features lined up for the end of the year, some of which are definitely in line with our conversation today. So till then, we hope you enjoyed Little More is Strictly Facts. Visit strictlyfactspodcastcom for more information from each episode. Follow us at Strictly Facts Pod on Instagram and Facebook and at Strictly Facts PD on Twitter.