After spending May 1 affirming the best qualities of humanity, which are manifested as solidarity, my buoyant mood was challenged as Bermuda awoke 24 hours later to tragic news. These contrasting scenarios brought tears to my eyes.

Paradoxically, the sense of our community in crisis has evoked a grave sense of solidarity across the island.

On May Day, the Thursday, there was a sense of solidarity among our 20-strong group that joined the Bermuda Trade Union Congress’s welcome for workers at the Crow Lane Roundabout on that morning with a chorus of “Happy Labour Day”. This evoked smiles from many of the diverse commuters on their way to work, as well as a cacophony of beeps in response.

Additionally, there was warm satisfaction that afternoon in the beautifully adorned Victoria Park. A small group of us, including Victor Fishenden and Wendell Hollis, gathered for a media conference that spoke to the significance of May 1, 1981 in affirming local solidarity.

Fishenden, as the president of the Bermuda Industrial Union’s BTC Division, recalled the morning of May 1, 1981, when some 200 fellow employees had gathered in that park. There they discussed joining in solidarity with the BIU’s hospital and government workers’ strike, having just received a Supreme Court injunction against doing so. At this crossroads, those workers decided on a win-win solution — a team would remain at the telephone facility to ensure that vital services were maintained, while the majority would proceed to Union Square.

Arriving at Union Square 44 years ago, they were met by a few grassroots activists — including Jerome Perinchief, Mac Innis Looby and myself — who encouraged them to join a spontaneous solidarity procession through Hamilton, marking May Day with the goal of releasing the mounting tension across the community. Notably, unknown to us at the time, there had been an unsuccessful firebomb attempt on Hamilton Police Station early that morning.

Synchronicity was obviously at play, as police sergeant Campbell Simons happened on the scene on his motorcycle and spontaneously led the peaceful procession through the City.

Wendell Hollis, veteran lawyer that he is, made his case that history shows that May 1, 1981 has proved to be a critical part of a paradigm shift in Bermuda. Hollis was serving as the Royal Bermuda Regiment captain who led a platoon that was assigned to Hamilton that day and assembled “quietly” in No 1 Shed on Front Street.

When the solidarity procession came down Front Street, Hollis reports that he made sure that the soldiers remained unseen in the shed, but that when the peaceful protesters went past, the soldiers clapped in support. For the former regiment captain, it was obvious that the sense of solidarity was being manifested across all sectors of the community.

Hollis notes that while there were a number of riots in Bermuda, through the late Sixties and Seventies, there have been none since 1981.

That said, Friday morning’s headlines have our attention.

Given the challenges of 2025, how can we leverage the best of our shared heritage to move us forward? Let me suggest that we first seek to affirm the sense of solidarity across our whole community.

The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr put it this way: we are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Examples include:

• Iconic abolitionist Frederick Douglass, who benefited from the solidarity of Ireland supporting the US Abolition of Slavery Campaign

• Our own Mary Prince received key support from the Abolition Campaign in London as a result of solidarity

• Eustace Cann connected with Gladys Morrell on the women’s vote, providing momentum that E.F. Gordon leveraged with the Bermuda Workers Association and beginning Bermuda’s transformation

• Edwin Skinner served as the principal of a segregated school until his retirement and subsequently provided an essential opening for many who were blocked by a form of apartheid — opening for future icons such as Roosevelt Brown (Pauulu Kamarakafego), Ottiwell Simmons and Sir John Swan

These examples of the potency of nurturing a sense of solidarity across all boxes of our, or any, community offers guidance as this recent tragic event has reminded each of us that there is work still to be done.

• Glenn Fubler represents Imagine Bermuda