Yvonne Ba­boolal

A num­ber of promi­nent na­tion­als joined the long list of peo­ple who died last year. To­day, the T&T Guardian pays trib­ute to 12 in­di­vid­u­als who left their mark on so­ci­ety through their tire­less ef­forts to ed­u­cate and help oth­ers in their own way.

Jan­u­ary 16–Fr Hen­ry Charles

The well-known Ro­man Catholic priest died at 69 af­ter a mas­sive heart at­tack at St Mary's Church in St James.De­scribed by his peers as one of the bright­est minds, he was al­so qual­i­fied in law. Charles, how­ev­er, was heav­i­ly crit­i­cised dur­ing his very brief stint as head of the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion in 2009.

His ap­point­ment came un­der threat af­ter news­pa­per colum­nist Kevin Baldeosingh ac­cused the priest of pla­gia­rism, claim­ing there was a marked re­sem­blance be­tween two news­pa­per columns writ­ten by Charles and two ar­ti­cles pub­lished in the New York Times and Na­tion­al Catholic Week­ly in the US.Days af­ter the ac­cu­sa­tion, Charles ad­mit­ted to the mis­take and re­signed his po­si­tion with the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion, stat­ing that there was an over­sight on his part.

March 14–Taj­mool Ho­sein

Queen's Coun­sel Taj­mool Ho­sein passed on in March. He was 92. Ho­sein was a mem­ber of the del­e­ga­tion that at­tend­ed the Marl­bor­ough House con­fer­ence in Eng­land in 1962 to for­mu­late the Con­sti­tu­tion in prepa­ra­tion for T&T's In­de­pen­dence in 1962. Born in Williamsville, Ho­sein be­came a lawyer in 1946 and was known for his ex­per­tise in con­sti­tu­tion­al law.

He was al­so a politi­cian: he joined the De­mo­c­ra­t­ic Labour Par­ty in 1961 and was a can­di­date for Ch­agua­nas in the gen­er­al elec­tion that year. He won the seat and served as MP for Ch­agua­nas be­tween 1961 and 1966.He was one of the pro­po­nents of the Prin­ci­ples of Fair­ness draft Con­sti­tu­tion in 2006.Ho­sein was award­ed silk in 1964 and the Trin­i­ty Cross in 1982, but de­clined of­fers to be­come chief jus­tice and pres­i­dent of the Caribbean Court of Jus­tice, those close to him said.

March 19–John Don­ald­son

The for­mer Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) gov­ern­ment min­is­ter and ex­ec­u­tive mem­ber died at the St Clair Med­ical Cen­tre in Port-of-Spain af­ter a long bat­tle with can­cer. He was 76.Don­ald­son served as min­is­ter of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty from 1976 to 1985 and min­is­ter of for­eign af­fairs and am­bas­sador plenipo­ten­tiary un­der for­mer PNM ad­min­is­tra­tions.He al­so held the post of chair­man of the par­ty.

April 19–Luise Kimme

Born in Ger­many in 1939, Kimme be­came a res­i­dent of To­ba­go in 1979. She died peace­ful­ly at her To­ba­go home at the age of 74. She was a renowned artist, known for her wood­en sculp­tures re­flect­ing African Or­isha art and es­tab­lished a sculp­ture mu­se­um, known in To­ba­go as the Cas­tle.Be­fore ar­riv­ing in To­ba­go, she spent years study­ing, teach­ing, cre­at­ing and win­ning ac­claim in Berlin, Lon­don, Rhode Is­land, New York and Cal­i­for­nia.

Ju­ly 19–Wen­dell Kan­ga­loo

Ap­peal Court judge Kan­ga­loo, 57, suc­cumbed to se­vere head in­juries he sus­tained in an ear­ly morn­ing car crash on the Churchill Roo­sevelt High­way in May 2012. Four peo­ple were killed in the crash.His death was de­scribed as "trag­ic and sense­less" and sent shock­waves through­out the le­gal fra­ter­ni­ty. Kan­ga­loo, broth­er of for­mer PNM min­is­ter Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo, spent sev­er­al months in the US un­der­go­ing re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion.

His fu­ner­al was at­tend­ed by a num­ber of promi­nent peo­ple, in­clud­ing for­mer prime min­is­ter Bas­deo Pan­day, Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley, Pub­lic Ad­min­is­tra­tion Min­is­ter Car­olyn Seep­er­sad-Bachan and for­mer na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter Jack Warn­er.

Au­gust 3–Jef­frey Chock

Chock, a lead­ing pho­tog­ra­ph­er, died at 70 at his Bel­mont home. He was best known for his doc­u­men­ta­tion of Car­ni­val and dance.His pic­tures were de­scribed as nar­ra­tives which told a sto­ry. In 2006, Chock pub­lished Trinidad Car­ni­val: Pho­tographs by Jef­frey Chock.

Au­gust 28–Ed­ward Her­nan­dez

Her­nan­dez, known for his work in the field of her­itage preser­va­tion, died two days af­ter jour­nal­ist and his­to­ri­an Louis B Homer.Her­nan­dez cu­rat­ed the To­ba­go Mu­se­um at Fort King George and was in­volved in the cul­tur­al life of To­ba­go for many years, co-or­di­nat­ing ac­tiv­i­ties for the To­ba­go Her­itage Fes­ti­val, Car­ifes­ta, and ar­chae­o­log­i­cal field work­shops for vis­it­ing uni­ver­si­ty stu­dents. He al­so rep­re­sent­ed To­ba­go at sev­er­al sem­i­nars spon­sored by Un­esco, re­gion­al bod­ies and the In­ter­na­tion­al Coun­cil of Mu­se­ums.

Oc­to­ber 4–Ul­ric Cross

World ac­claimed World War II hero Philip Louis Ul­ric Cross passed away peace­ful­ly at 96 at his home in Port-of-Spain, on Oc­to­ber 4.Born in 1917, he served as a squadron leader in the Roy­al Air Force at a time when this coun­try was still a colony of Britain.

His hero­ic ex­ploits in at­tack­ing Adolf Hitler's Ger­man army earned him the soubri­quet "Black Hor­net." He be­came the most high­ly dec­o­rat­ed avi­a­tor in the Caribbean and in­spired au­thor Ken Fol­lett to make him the mod­el for the char­ac­ter Charles Ford in his nov­el Hor­net Flight. Cross was al­so an in­ter­na­tion­al ju­rist.

De­cem­ber 5–Michael Als

The trade union pi­o­neer died af­ter a pro­longed ill­ness. He was the founder of the Bank­ing, In­sur­ance and Gen­er­al Work­ers Union when it was known as the Bank Work­ers Trade Union.Als led the Young Pow­er Move­ment in the 1960s which in­flu­enced the 1970 Black Pow­er Rev­o­lu­tion, and played an im­por­tant role in the de­vel­op­ment of the trade union move­ment af­ter In­de­pen­dence. He was a po­lit­i­cal de­tainee dur­ing the state of emer­gency in 1970 and 1971.

He was al­so a teacher, po­et, writer, cul­tur­al and po­lit­i­cal ac­tivist. His book Is Slav­ery Again traced the his­to­ry of the work­ing class. In his lat­er years Als was in­volved in work­ing with young peo­ple in To­co.

De­cem­ber 6–Em­manuel Mc­Don­ald Bai­ley

The for­mer top sprint­er died peace­ful­ly at 93 with his fam­i­ly at his side.Bai­ley was born on De­cem­ber 8, 1920, and won an Olympic bronze medal in the men's 100 me­tres event at the Helsin­ki Olympics in 1952.In 1946, he cre­at­ed his­to­ry when he won both the 100 and 220 yards at the British Open Am­a­teur Ath­let­ics As­so­ci­a­tion Cham­pi­onships, amass­ing 15 AAA na­tion­al ti­tles.

De­cem­ber 26–Is­sac McLeod

Busi­ness­man and phil­an­thropist Is­sac McLeod died on Box­ing Day at the age of 74. He was known to his friends as "IT" and was a well-known quan­ti­ty sur­vey­or and promi­nent busi­ness­man. McLeod had pro­vid­ed schol­ar­ships for many peo­ple to study abroad, as well as re­sources for re­searchers in­ter­est­ed in his home is­land of To­ba­go. He was al­so an avid art col­lec­tor, a crick­et en­thu­si­ast and a wine lover.

De­cem­ber 30–Akeem Adams

The for­mer T&T Youth World Cup de­fend­er died at hos­pi­tal in Hun­gary af­ter suf­fer­ing a mas­sive stroke. Adams had been pre­vi­ous­ly hos­pi­talised there af­ter suf­fer­ing a heart at­tack in Sep­tem­ber hours af­ter train­ing with his club­mates at pro­fes­sion­al club Fer­enc­varos, and nev­er ful­ly re­cov­ered.