Transcript: Charles Challenger part one
[00:00] Hi. My name is Charles Challenger, and I am 70 years of age. I arrived here in the UK in 1968 and I presently run a shipping and export business. I also act as the chair of the Suffolk Windrush Committee, which… we staged the National Windrush Day event every year in the town centre at the Cornhill.
[00:40] Well, my first impression was that, obviously, I've always had an interest in history and geography. And history being, obviously, at school, considering that I came here when I was… I arrived in the UK when I was 12, so I had that great interest in history, and it was very interesting to know why the US bases were here and the… so obviously the servicemen and the bases. So my… in my interests extended via my social gathering. My social gathering normally on a Friday night, as a you know, a young person leaving school at the age of 16 - 17, before I went on to college. And like every young person, you're sort of out there, and you're socialising, which… the Manor Ballroom was a focal point for the majority of Caribbean youth, and also it was a focal gathering point for Black members from the US bases, especially Woodbridge and… and Bentwaters around here. So it opens the door for the Black Caribbean youth and American personnel, Black, who then, obviously, through time, built relationship through socialising at, normally, the Manor Ballroom and St Matthews Baths, which is now been converted into a Tesco Express.
[02:28] So that is where my knowledge and inquisitivity came about. Why were they here? And the scale of the base, which draws me to wanting was to build a relationship, to get a wider understanding of the history. It was mainly through the Manor Ballroom and St Matthew Baths, which, as I mentioned earlier on, at that time they held various social events at the… at both venues. So that was my main, main connection point with the US personnels.
[03:16] Their afro at that time, like I said around the James, the James, sorry, the James Brown time, their afro was really admirable. I mean, the hair care was so perfect. And you know, we just, for me, it was important to… to have my… my hair looking like theirs. So obviously like everything else, you connect with an individual and I presume at that time you kind of, I would say, you try to build relationship with individuals through social connections and because they had the products available to them, it was then very important for me to make that connection with the individuals.
[04:16] It was very exciting. I mean, it's, it's no, it's a bit like you going in to any social event, a club in London. I mean, Manor Ballroom was the club for Ipswich. I mean, both Black Americans, Black Caribbean, and back then you were talking about the skinheads. So the skinheads also used to socialise. In some cases we… it wasn't, it wasn't, there wasn't a division but naturally, people socialise in their own groups.
[04:52] So naturally you had the far end away from the main entrance, you would have the Caribbean grouping, then you had, like the centre bit, you would then have maybe the Americans, and then the far end generally, you may then have, say the English guys, which would have gone around the skinhead. And the skinhead guys used to cross over because they were… because obviously ska music mainly came out of the Caribbean, and they very much love, you know, the reggae music and the ska music, like the London Shuffle, you know, those type of dance. So it was really, I would say, it's amazing how it all just melted in together around that social environment. So, yeah, you know, whatever dance came on individuals just connect, really. The dance move was because, yes, they were very smooth and… and groove.
[06:00] When it came to the soul scene because, obviously, back then, you know, you had your Diana Ross, you had the Temptations, along with the traditional Bunnie Wailer from the reggae scene and some of the well known reggae artists at that time.
[06:21] So yeah, the fashion also, they were very much on the fashion scene. And let's not forget the magazine Ebony, which was… One of the key things that I wanted was to be able to obtain and purchase the Ebony magazine so you could really look at fashion coming out of the US. You could also look on the different hair care products and also the accessories that came out, like the afro pick and the various combs that came with the fashion at that time.
[06:56] You also had an area where for the Caribbean side of things, the Caribbean - the Black Caribbean, we used to have like the Gatsby look so, and the skinheads similar - the bovver boots. So there's quite a few Black Caribbean guys who used to wear the braces, for instance, that goes with that look. And I think, you know, the skinheads saying that, go back on the racist side of it but they all were not, because what they managed to do was to bring their dress, the skinhead, the bovver boots, the braces, along with… they were more keen to be learning the dance and saw how important it was to feel very much in touch and feeling fashionable and cool along the times that we were all socialising in.
[07:53] Most of the women, they were mainly, they were either teachers, obviously, because, you know, they had to… the American base provide the whole well, I suppose most service operations they would have, you know, the various other personnel like teachers and doctors and so on. So, no, there wasn't, there was mainly teachers. But they never really came out.
[08:21] The female never really came out. It was mainly the men, because naturally, from the Black community side, and I presume from the English side, the men were more coming off the base to meet and to develop friendship with the younger women from Caribbean and English.
[08:38] There was very, very few American… the only American woman I know, and I up to this day I remember, so she was, her name was Barbara, and she was a teacher. She was, you know, they were not just, they couldn't have, well, she was, Barbara, was just a teacher. She was very good at what she did. So there was not a lot of women personnel at that time.
[09:00] Not that I know of, yeah, and the only one that I knew, even, I mean, Barbara became a very close friend with my sister, my elder sister, and obviously, my sister, because she was a nurse, she and Barbara gelled very, very much. They've gelled very good, very well. So in some cases, we used to go to Barbara's for Sunday dinner, because, you know, Barbara was here on her own. I suppose she was seconded as a teacher in the military. And obviously this is where Barbara used to also came and visit my mom. And she saw my mom as a mother because she had no real family here. Some of the some of the females who were either doctors or teachers or dentists or whatever other professions, you know, the military service have. If they and if they were female, they didn't really venture out in that social environment like the male did.
[10:07] The male was more looking for female company, whether it was the local English girl or whether it's a Caribbean at the time. I know… and predominantly at that time, it was just mainly either the English girls, or the Black Caribbean, which, you know, yeah.
[10:24] Again, one my sister was very close with Barbara, who was a teacher, and Barbara used to visit my mom, so Barbara saw us as a, as I said, a family that she could connect with, and Barbara would help with anything that we needed in the hair care and any accessories that we need in the in the Black hair care. Barbara was… was the one that we went to, and she would do… when she shopped she would also shop for whatever hair care products we needed. The same like, when I… the same like you will build relationship with, in my case, I built relationship with some of the male because then I wanted, I mean, some booze, or booze was very cheap on the base.
[11:19] So when it comes to beer, it comes to rum, it came to any form of liquor, you would buy those off… and wines - you would buy those off the base but what you needed was to have a friendship with a male to be able to. Especially where it came for the… to have our haircuts, because we just didn't have any hair salon that catered for the Black community at that time here in Ipswich. So it was, for me, it was very important to connect. Hence is where I then develop the idea looking for a supplier in the UK, who could have… I could purchase quantity hair care products, because obviously the base I was very limited, very, very limited, and it was mainly for my own personal use.
[12:14] So the opportunity, seeing that the vast array of products and the range right across to the skincare. It then inspired me to say, look, London is where this stuff is… is in more abundance. And I then seek the various wholesalers in the London area. In actual fact, going back a bit, my mother went to the US, and I did ask her was to investigate, try and get my family in the States, to try and investigate how I could become an importer. And in actual fact, I did write to Johnsons and Johnsons, but they wrote back and said they already had a distributor in the UK.
[12:58] So from me being…From me developing a relationship with American personnel, able me to get the odd couple of jars, couple of shampoos and things like cocoa butter cream for your skin but it was very, small quantity. So, so I then had to really step it up and look outside of that, that social relationship, which then helped me to be able to start then retail to the wider… to the wider Caribbean community. It was the start of me selling the Black products in my… in my teens.
[13:44] I was around, what 17 - 18, and obviously back then, one was very, I would say it was very difficult to try and get part time work. So the alternative for me was to create my own business so that I could have then create the funds that I needed to help me to socialise and to go to college. So, you know, yes, that's basically what I did. So, you know, I wasn't really a sports person so rather than me involving football and all the other things that, generally, younger people might think of doing. I venture down the line of creating a hair care business, going from door-to-door to try and sell the products, which then gave me the income to buy me the fashion clothes that I needed, and to help me, in actual fact, to take my first trip back to the Caribbean.
[14:42] Yes, it was, it was a lot of money back then, because, don't forget, I mean, airfares back then was, what, 200 pounds? So compare to what it was to, you know, today. I mean, I'm looking around 1973 because when I was going 1973, 74, 75 going to those areas. And then I then piggyback on… on helping to formulate the Ipswich Caribbean Association. So I was very much out there, looking at lack of products for the Black community, Caribbean community. I was also looking at and speaking to individual of the lack of social engagement that we didn't have, and lack of representation in the Ipswich Borough Council. And hence, I then looked towards the elders, your Albert Grant, your Hamil, and Rudolph Grant, Tony Powlett, and Joe Arthur, Marjorie Williams, they were more, I would say, senior to me growing up. And obviously I sold to them on a weekly basis. So it was ideal for me to connect with those people piggybacking off the base.
[16:06] I literally had the Ipswich market, because back then I didn't have a car. So what I used to do, I used to go from estate to estate every Friday and Saturday, from nine o'clock or eight o'clock in the morning, when I get up, I would go off pack, maybe say six of each products, because the product range was pretty much, again, lack of I would say investment. I was limited to my out… output, my outsource of buying. So, in the evening, what I used to do, I used to have them pack me various boxes and put them on the express train, and then, obviously, I would pay for the, you know, the goods when they then arrive by… by British Rail.
[17:02] Right, they would be coming because, obviously, after I wrote to Johnsons and Johnsons and few other American manufacturers, predominantly Johnsons and Johnsons because they literally had controlled the market and they were, obviously, they were huge, so they were already… so they then just, they then divert me to their main distributors, which was Drake and Dryden. [Note: this is Dyke and Dryden]
[17:30] You have Afro Sheen. You had Ultra Sheen. There were just two different brands. And then obviously you had off that, you had all the hair sprays. So Ultra Sheen, Afro Sheen, which was very popular, I mean, especially the Afro Sheen in the black bottle, that also represent culture, where Ultra Sheen was more in a clear jar and it was green on the inside. Then you had also, so they were the… but then you had things like medicated shampoos. You also had what they call Blue Magic.
[18:13] Yeah, you also had a famous perfume but that famous Caribbean perfume came out of Jamaica. That was one of Jamaica's top brand at that time, and you could put that equivalent to some of the well known brands that are… that are sold in the stores today. And that was called Khus Khus. Most Black women, most Black women back in the, I would say, the… the 50s, 60s, coming out of Jamaica, the famous perfume would have been Khus Khus. Very, very much so. It was in a very small bottle, basic, basic bottle with a… with a red label. But you mentioned Khus Khus if you could, if I couldn't sell anything else, bring out the Khus Khus.
[19:04] If some… You knocked on someone's door and they said, “Oh, you know, I'm quite”… because, don't forget. I mean, a lot of people locally and throughout the UK, until the American brought the products into the UK, most people used to mix their own hair care or… or… or develop their own hair care. So people would basically buy basic coconut oil. Basic coconut oil, they'll add other oils to it, but Vaseline was the base, so they'll use the Vaseline as the base, and they'll add coconut oil, they will add, maybe, say, depending what type of hair care you're going into, whether you're trying to treat dandruff or whatever. But most people used to mix their own product to start off with, and then, obviously like… like, everything else, people then start buying Ultra Sheen, because again, you see what I used to do. I used to walk around with the Ebony Magazine.
[20:12] So the Ebony magazine will show a beautiful woman with her hair, and obviously all the products that the Americans would be using in those promotional magazines. Most people used to like I said manifact… created their own hair creams or their own hair products. So, so it was… it was… it was seen as fashionable to go to a store, just like you know, to go to a store, and products are made for you.
[20:50] Products has been researched into your hair type, yeah, or coconut oil…no, not coconut oil. You had things like cocoa butter. As you know, in this country, back then, people think, what is cocoa butter? But cocoa butter has so many different uses right across the board.
[21:11] So it was about, then, people enjoying or having… having the opportunity to go into a store and buy their… their cocoa butter cream for their skin, or purchasing their shampoo specifically been developed for their hair care. Conditioners, for instance, because don't forget, a lot of our hair… Well, you know, the real Black negro hair, would… can also be brittle, can't it? So it's to find the products to be able to give you that soft feel, that soft shield.
[21:52] Finish