THE lead up to the 400th Anniversary celebrations is a time for reflection and the retelling of Bermudians' collective history. With stories of the island's fortuitous beginnings, long-standing traditions and influential historical characters, Bermuda's 400th year anniversary will be full of imagery and celebration. To help bring history alive, William S Zuill, Sr., former Editor of The Royal Gazette and long-time Director of The Bermuda National Trust has compiled several short historical dramas in his new book Footsteps in the Sand. Meant to be read by three people, each reading intertwines historical events and characters with the language and spelling of the day to conjure up images of long-forgotten times. Mr. Zuill sat down with Mid-Ocean News reporter Lindsay Kelly and photographer Mark Tatem to chat about the new book, his favourite story and his interesting life as a journalist and historical preservationist.

Q. What inspired you to do this particular book?

A. With 2009 and the 400th Anniversary of the founding of Bermuda coming up, I was encouraged to turn the short historical dramas I've written over the years into a book.

And, I thought the time had come to create a collection as a small contribution to the year so I asked The Bermuda National Trust if they would publish them, as they were all written for the Trust and read during the St. George's Christmas evening parties now known as the National Trust Walkabout.

They agreed and with the help of the very good team at the Trust we managed to produce the book. They managed to get it out and check my facts very carefully and lay it out very nicely.

Q. How long have you been working on the stories included in the book?

A. I started in 1973 when I wrote the first story for the St. George's Christmas evening. The following year I wrote another one and so on. In the beginning, the stories were often connected with Trust properties. The first story in the book is about the Globe Hotel that was built by Governor Samuel Day and the stories progress chronologically from there.

Q. Any stories in particular that you enjoy the most?

A. There are several that I really quite like and think read very well partly because there are some splendid passages in them.

The last reading in the book, Gunpowder in the East, has a wonderful passage, I think, about the eruption of the powder magazine on Hen Island in St. George's Harbour.

The story of Mary Prince has some very dramatic passages in it as well. So does the story of (refugee American slave future US Congressman) Joseph Haine Rainey and his opposite number in Bermuda at the same time, Mrs. Norman Walker (wife of the Confederate representative here). Her wit and nasty remarks make it an interesting read.

Q. In the book you note that a character by the name of Christopher Carter is a likely ancestor of many Bermudians - why?

A. Carter arrived in Bermuda on the Sea Venture and when the others all left to go to Virginia he did not, he stayed behind with another person.

Many months later the vessel Patience came back with Sir George on board and when Sir George died, his nephew, Matthew, decided to take the ship back to England rather than going to Virginia with supplies as he was supposed to do.

Our Carter stayed behind again so I regard him as the first inhabitant of Bermuda and lived here pretty much the rest of his life.

That's why I think he must have been the ancestor of an awful lot of us. One of earliest Bermuda histories by Governor Butler (The Historye of the Somer Islands) certainly relied on Carter's eyewitness accounts.

Q. The Minister of Culture and Social Rehabilitation, the Hon. Dale Butler wrote the preface of the book. How important was it that he was willing to do so?

A. I felt it was very important. I'm very proud of the fact that the Hon.Dale Butler, MP, agreed to write the preface for the book.

Dale has done a good deal of writing himself on Bermudian historical subjects. He also has published a great many things on Bermuda history so I felt that as a fellow worker in this field he might be willing to do to the preface and he very kindly did. He wrote a really very nice one indeed.

Q. The Zuill family has been in Bermuda for centuries. How many generations of Zuill's have there been on the island?

A. The first recorded Zuill arrived here in 1750. At some point we married into the Hayward family and thus we can claim descent from Christopher Carter, the first Bermudian.

It is my personal suspicion that a vast number of Bermudians are descended from Carter if one considers the population at the time, 2,000 or 3,000 people. He was obviously one of the first groups of men that were here and I'm sure his seed spread itself.

Q. You have had a long-standing career in journalism. Were you always interested in writing?

A. Yes, I've been interested in writing for most of my life. I thought that if I wanted to pursue writing that I'd probably have to work for the paper. I did a brief stint at the Bermuda Bookstore but found I didn't like being a part of the retail side and missed the occasional excitement of journalism.

Q. How many years did you work at the paper?

A. I believe I started writing for the paper in 1954 or 1955 and worked until 1972 having been editor of the paper. Then I picked a new challenge and became the director of the Bermuda National Trust for the next 18 to 20 years.

Q. Is there an event during your career as a journalist that you remember most?

A. I do vividly remember reporting on the Theatre Boycott in 1959. In my opinion, I think that moment broke the dam of segregation in Bermuda. After that the colour walls came tumbling down.

I can also remember reporting the dock strike that same year, when the Riot Act was literally read as the police and the dockworkers confronted each other on Front Street. Led by Mr. (Porkchop) Mills, that incident was a major moment in Bermuda's modern history, a watershed event in terms of the emergence of the labour movement.

I also went out to report on the Reina del Pacifico, an ocean liner that sailed regularly between England and the coast of South America stopping at ports like Bermuda along the way.

She had ran onto the reef headed out the North Channel. It must have been in the 1950s. I stood on the rocks beside the ship and got photographed for the paper. I boarded the ship without asking permission and when they finally caught me wandering around the ship talking to passengers they pulled me up before the Captain and he informed me that I wasn't supposed to be on the ship without his permission and I was to get off and I said, "How can I get off?"

Q. What other books have you written?

A. I've written a history called the The Story of Bermuda and Her People and I completed that in 1970 in time for Christmas. It's been re-published since then. I also wrote A History of St. Marks Church.

Q. Which book is your favourite out of the three?

A. Certainly the most important one is The Story of Bermuda and Her People. The third edition, which came out in 1998 and contains an account of the Progressive Labour Party victory at that year's election. For a long time it was the only complete history of Bermuda available on sale, however, Rosemary Jones has written a comprehensive history of Bermuda as well in recent years.

Copies of Footsteps in the Sand are now on sale at the Bermuda Bookstore in Hamilton and at The Bermuda National Trust shops as well. The Phoenix Bookstore will have the book on sale over the next few weeks.