Norvell Fredericks – the innovative force behind Linden’s Town Day/Week

May 18, 2014 News

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By Enid Joaquin

Linden celebrated its 44th anniversary as a Town, recently, with the now customary week of activities. Lindeners and visitors alike converged in the streets, exhibited their goods, art and craft, vended, limed, partied, shopped, visited places and persons of interest, and on the whole, had ‘a whale of a time’.
Town Day/Week, which was first introduced in 1996, had celebrated its eighteenth year.

Today the Town Day/Week concept is no longer ‘just a Linden thing’; the concept has grown far and wide as citizens throughout Guyana and further afield have adopted it.
But of the thousands who celebrate Town Days/Weeks, across Guyana, only a few know the whole story behind this event, that has become so popular.
Permit me, therefore, to introduce the man behind the concept, Mr Norvell Claudius Fredericks. This man is the proverbial ‘Jack of all trades’, but contrary to that popular parlance, here is a ‘Jack’ that has mastered many of those trades.

CHILDHOOD MEMORIES
Fredericks who is well known across the Linden community as Fredco, became a household name after the advent of Town Day/week, a concept he introduced, based on a similar venture he witnessed while in St Lucia.
He was born at Mackenzie but spent his childhood living with his mother and grandmother at Poker Street, Wismar, on the opposite side of the Demerara River. His parents, he said, had separated while he was very young.
“My grandmother, who was of Amerindian and Caucasian ethnicity, had the greatest influence on my childhood life; she was a great cook, storyteller and teacher…There wasn’t a dish she couldn’t cook or bake, and I learnt a lot growing up in her kitchen. I helped her with Christmas dishes, wedding cakes, pastries and more,’’ he fondly reminisces.
Fredericks attended Christianburg Primary School but wrote the common entrance at a private class at the Telford High School (Linden Foundation High). He subsequently attended the Wismar/Christianburg Secondary School (Multi)
He would however curtail his studies there at the end of the fourth form to attend the Guymine Technical Training Complex (now LTI).
There he pursued studies in the automotive field. It was while there, that this budding entrepreneur would put the culinary skills that he had acquired from his grandmother into profitable practice, by making and selling pholourie, channa and cassava puffs. The proceeds of these delicacies greatly augmented his weekly ‘pocket piece’.
He would later venture further afield, when his mother migrated to Trinidad.
There he landed a job at an international company, which he said paid him ‘a decent’ salary, but was then faced with the work permit issue and so had to venture elsewhere.
He would then settle for work in the furniture factories, excelling in that area, and becoming one of the best joiners.
After spending some time in Trinidad, Fredericks later travelled to St Lucia (his father’s birth country).
“There I was encouraged to apply for a police job since I was legally a citizen, but that didn’t work out, so I whipped up the skill I acquired in Trinidad and became the best joiner/furniture maker, revered as (La Ti Guyanese) “The Little Guyanese”.
“While there I built furniture for many of international acclaim, while I took in as much of my father’s culture as possible. One Sunday a friend invited me to a “village day” in the countryside. I was most impressed at the uniqueness of the individual village culture on display and the volume of visitors from other villages who came to celebrate. Thus began my interest in my French-Creole (Kweyol) heritage and tourism concepts. The essence of Kweyol still runs deep in my veins and connects me to my ancestry.”

RETURN TO GUYANA; BUSINESSES INITIATIVES
Fredericks returned to Guyana in 1994 and established “Fredco Furniture”, a small modern furniture factory in 1995, specializing in antique-styled and modern contemporary designs. He supplied Courts furniture stores and made exclusive pieces for the likes of several noteworthy personalities. Some of those pieces are still standing and in use after more than 18 years.
He also introduced “Polyglass”, an ultra modern, unbreakable portrait framing style that still captivates the masses.
In 2001, Fredericks ventured into one of his childhood passions, the field of photography and opened “Fredco Photo Studio”.
He later established Linden’s first ever Digital Photo processing Lab (Fredco Digi-Lab) offering various sizes of photo prints. Unfortunately, Fredco Furniture, Polyglass and Digi-Lab were short lived due to circumstances outside of his control.
Today, he however still maintains Fredco Photo Studio with a scaled-down version of his Digi-lab, on Republic Avenue, Linden.
But taking precedence these days, is his newest venture, “Freddy’s Wings n’ Wedges,” at the same location, where he demonstrates his now perfectly honed culinary skills to the delight of many, as the unique flavour is boasted of even in the Diaspora. Freddy’s Wings n’ Wedges was introduced two years ago, and has since become a household name.
Fredericks is adamant that his special brand of chicken is comparable to any, anywhere in Guyana.

LINDEN TOWN DAY/WEEK
But let’s go back a bit and look at the whole idea behind the Linden Town Day/ Week.
Answering Linden’s cry for involvement in “Visit Guyana Year 1996,” Fredericks proposed the “Linden Town Day” concept. The idea behind the “Town Day”, he says, was to ‘mend our torn economic and social fabric’.
After its introduction, he would preside over the event for the first five years.
”This was the beginning of today’s phenomenal event that has taken root throughout Guyana and has expanded to 10 days, and is now referred to as “Linden Town Week”.
Fredco said that the concept of “Linden Town Day” was first proposed on December 8th 1995 at a meeting of concerned citizens called by then president of the Linden Chamber of Commerce and councilor of the M&TC Mr. Orland Copeland, to discuss any involvement of Linden in the “Visit Guyana Year 1996”. “This meeting was held in council chamber of the M&TC and attended by Mr. Abdul Kadir – then mayor of Linden and Mr. Donald Sinclair – then chairman of the Tourism Advisory Bureau who was the feature speaker.
Nearing the conclusion of this meeting I argued that tourism is based on pride in oneself and community and put forward about ten different points on how Linden could be involved in tourism.
Some of those proposals were discussed by Mr. Copeland, Mr. Kadir, Mr. Wilfred Simmons and Mr. Donald Sinclair – who said that the proposal of a “town day” seemed most favourable and instructed me to put my idea on paper and have discussions on the way forward.”
“On December 13th I circulated my concept document entitled ”Brief plan – Visit Guyana year 1996 (Linden Town Day)” and foot-noted (* submitted by Norvell Fredericks – to be discussed at meeting). This document was typed by Ms. Sharon Yearwood – now Mrs. Persaud (then secretary of Crescent Foods Inc. Coop Crescent Linden).
On 18th January 1996, Mr. Copeland convened another meeting at the M&TC jointly chaired by Mayor Kadir and himself (Mr. Copeland) at which Mr. Kadir read out the concept document, sought comments and moved a vote to wholly adopt my concept as Linden’s input for Visit Guyana year ‘96.
Mr. Kadir then asked for volunteers and installed a committee of which he appointed me as chairman since it was my concept and he felt that I was best able to execute it.”
The Linden Tourism Committee was established to plan and execute the Linden Town Day, and the committee members included: Norvell Fredericks -chairman, W Simmons – vice chairman, the late Gillian Persaud – organising secretary, R.A Mc Rae – treasurer, and Janet Allen, Lynn Lawrence, Sharon Yearwood, Mark Allicock, Sandra Adams and others as committee members
Gillian Persaud, the organising secretary, was most instrumental in getting the first “Town Day” off the ground, as she used all her resources at hand to pull off what was to become the springboard for a significant domestic tourism event.
Linden Town Day 1996 was successfully executed and Linden was showcased in grand style with the largest product/produce exhibition ever seen in these parts. The same held true for 1997.
“In 1998, Gillian Persaud and most of the other members boycotted the committee, leaving only Lynn Lawrence and Janet Allen to my assistance. I closed my furniture business for eight weeks and ran Town Day from my home office using my own start up finances (prior to vending revenue and sponsorship).
Lynn and I worked up to sixteen hours per day in my office and on the road while Janet collected revenue at her place of employment.
With our limited resources we were able to transform the Town Day into a three-day festival with seven events, of which six were successful, we introduced  the “Queen of the Town Pageant”, the farmers’ exhibition, gospel-fest, Bamia welcome lime, Wismar night (failed) and clash of the champs football. We raised the vending revenue from $19,000 and $34,000 in the two subsequent years to $210,500 and donated twenty garbage bins to the M&TC.
“In 1998 and 1999 my furniture business suffered bankruptcy as a result of my dedication to “Town Day” and I was forced to close. I held face and continued to chair the committee until after “Town Day” 2000 when personality clashes and the need to focus on my livelihood forced me to quit after five years.
Today, I’m proud to see my idea spread throughout the country (even without honour) from Main Street to New Amsterdam to Bartica and Lethem and my present and growing photography business benefiting from the Linden Town Day.
I’m also happy to see others take up the challenge to take the “Town Day/ Town Week” to another level where I as well as others can benefit even more.
I’m indeed happy to have made such a great contribution to Linden and Guyana as a whole with this phenomenal concept, but I am saddened by the rapid decline of Linden’s event, where the focus has been shifted to various parties, the selling out, to out-of-town and overseas interests and the limited promotion of Linden’s true potential. We now see a reversed economic trend, since the visitors are vending and the Lindeners are spending.”

CREOLE-FEST
In 2004 Fredco once again ventured into the event concept, with the hosting of “Fredco Creole-Fest”, an event which was aimed at stemming the decline of our Guyanese culture by bringing together in one showplace, as much as possible, the things we have known to be traditionally Guyanese. He is optimistic that he’ll be able to run this event again in 2015, after an eleven-year hiatus.
For now, he continues to focus, write and propose developmental concepts for the betterment of Linden, and hopes that one day the true potential of Linden could be realized. His most recent work is the “Trans-Caribe-Amazonia Travel and Trade”, a concept aimed at making Linden a vital link between the Caribbean and Brazil.

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