Roatan’s Beauty, Truth & Wisdom

Mrs. Clara’s Youthful Eyes

Mrs. Clara has a direct, piercing look and a wide smile. She rolls her graying hair between her fingers. Mrs. Clara looks well less than her 90 years. Mrs. Clara Elzame McLaughlin Laurence was born on November 18, 1930 at the “Jim Johnson swamp” place in Diamond Rock. Her father was Elai McLaughlin and her mom was Toña Hinds.

She married Hamilton James and they had a son together named Robert. Mrs. Clara is the mother of two other children, Candia and Liliana.

She was a very social person, and travelled to many places around Bay Islands and all over Honduras. She was a housekeeper and a cook in many places on the mainland –San Pedro, Tegucigalpa, and La Ceiba.– “I worked like a man,” says Mrs. Clara. “I worked hard.”

She used to farm vegetables late into her life. The numbness in her fingers prevented her from continuing to do so.

Since the mid 1980s Mrs. Clara has lived in the home of her daughter Candia, in a concrete, blue hose perched on a hill in Diamond Rock. Her home is just west of the Czech development in Diamond Rock looking at Roatan’s highest hill, Mount Picacho.

I worked hard.