More than a century after slavery was abolished in Bermuda, white privilege lived on in the form of segregation in hotels, theatres, restaurants and schools.

Dissatisfaction was shown from time to time, including Georgine Hill's picketing of Bermudiana Theatre Club in response to its whites-only policy in 1951. But it wasn't until 1959 that the Island's establishment was rocked by a demonstration large enough to create the kind of social change seen elsewhere in the world but not until that point in Bermuda.

The 1959 Theatre Boycott, orchestrated by a secret team called the Progressive Group, was initially dubbed a 'storm in a teacup' by a white MP when it began on June 16. In reality, two weeks of peaceful rallies outside Bermuda's theatres at which protesters got their message out by distributing leaflets and using talented orators on soapboxes, had a massive effect.

By the end of the boycott on July 1, the back of Bermuda's officially sanctioned segregation policy had been broken. It led to desegregation in theatres, followed by the lifting of the colour bar in hotels, restaurants and schools, while progress continued through Roosevelt Brown's Universal Adult Suffrage movement, bringing the vote to all Bermuda's citizens. Such was the climate of intimidation, most of the names of the Theatre Boycott leaders were kept hidden for some 40 years.

The original Progressive Group, whose bravery was finally acknowledged in 1999, were: Vera and Rudolph Commissiong, Izola and Gerald Harvey, William Francis, Florenz and Clifford Maxwell, Stanley Ratteray, Marva Phillips, Esme and Lancelot Swan, Erskine Simmons, Clifford Wade, Eduord and Rosalind Williams, Coolridge Williams, Eugene Woods and William Walwyn.