In the 1950s, Larry’s father moved his family to Tampa, Florida. The move provided better educational opportunities than those available in Roatan at the time. Larry graduated from the University of South Florida and went on to serve in the U.S. Air Force. He was stationed at MacDill Air Force Base and also served in Alaska. After completing his service, Larry had many career paths open to him. In the end, his love for his native Roatan was stronger than any opportunity abroad, and he chose to return home.

Shortly after returning, Larry met an American named Paul Adams, who purchased land and developed Anthony’s Key Resort. Larry helped build the hotel and served as the resort’s manager for several years. He played a key role in helping many foreign investors who came to Roatan develop tourism-related projects. Larry also became a founding member of the Rotary Club.

In 1980, Larry opened McLaughlin Lumber and Supplies, a hardware store and lumberyard in Coxen Hole. His store became a well-known local business and operated successfully until 2010.

Larry also was deeply involved in politics. He was a proud member of the National Political Party and eventually became president of the National Party in the Bay Islands from 1993 to 2018. He was respected by government officials from both parties.

Larry also served as head of customs for four years and was a personal friend of President Rafael Callejas. On one of our campaign trips to Utila in the spring of 1992, at about 7 p.m. that night, on the return trip to Roatan, we broke down halfway between the two islands. We were adrift sideways in choppy seas with 6- to 8-foot waves. We could see the lighthouse on West End Point, and I took a bearing on the compass using that position. We were radioing for help on emergency Channel 16 when someone unidentified came on the radio and told us to get off that channel because it was for emergencies only.

Julio Galindo was advised that we were radioing for help, and he was on his radio when he heard this remark. Julio told the unidentified person that if this was not an emergency, he didn’t know what else would be: a boat that had broken down at sea with five of the leading men from French Harbour, plus the vice president and acting president of Honduras at the time, Jacobo Hernández. Using the bearing that I took on the compass from the lighthouse, I could tell John McNab, Carl McNab and Jerry Hynds exactly where we were, and they came to render assistance and towed us back to Roatan.

In 1989, when Fantasy Island Beach Resort launched its annual fishing tournament, Larry served as the principal judge. He was assisted by Bobby Gough and Clint Bodden. Larry helped organize and judge 10 tournaments from 1989 to 1999, contributing greatly to their success.

Personal friend of President Rafael Callejas.

Larry was a lifelong bachelor and very popular with the ladies. His next-door neighbor, who had watched him grow up, often teased him about finding a wife, getting married and having children to take care of him in his old age. Larry would laugh and reply that there would be no wife for him, but that he was “working on the children” and hoped to save enough money so they could take care of him later in life.

In the end, his wish came true. When Larry became too ill to manage his affairs, his brother, Luey, stepped in to handle his finances. His daughter, Lakisha Wood, took responsibility for his care and hired a wonderful woman, Corina Martínez, who treated him with kindness and dedication. Larry was lovingly cared for by his family and had the means to live comfortably in his later years.

I have many fond memories of my friend Larry: campaigning, fishing and partying across the three main Bay Islands. One weekend stands out clearly in my mind. We started partying at Fantasy Island on Friday, then traveled on to Bonacca and Utila, finally returning home late Sunday night.

That weekend, Ole Lar had a beautiful lady with him. The following Tuesday morning, I went to Coxen Hole with my friend Blanco, who needed to conduct business at the bank. Afterward, Blanco said, “We can’t come to Coxen Hole without stopping to see Ole Lar.” I admit I was curious to see the beautiful woman again — this time sober — to find out whether she was as beautiful as I remembered.

Ole Lar came downstairs dressed in white shorts and a blue shirt, looking as bright as a ray of sunshine on a cloudy day. I asked him, “Ole Lar, where is the beautiful lady you had with you over the weekend?” He smiled and replied, “She’s gone. I don’t want any woman around me for more than three days.”

Whenever Ole Lar left his house to go partying, he was always well-prepared. He carried a bag with a couple of bottles of his favorite drink — but just as important, he carried another bag filled with toiletries. Before getting out of his truck, he would “freshen up,” as he called it. He always said he never knew whom he might meet, and he wanted to look good and smell even better.

Larry spent his last years of life with family and friends at home in Coxen Hole. He died on December 22, 2025, in La Ceiba. He was buried in the family grave at the Sandy Bay Cemetery.

The Helenians have had a hard time making a living from farming since they first arrived in the 1830s, much like the island’s earlier inhabitants, the Payan Indians. Fishing, turtling, lobstering and conching at a subsistence level were—and still are—an integral part of Helene culture. Each man had his small holding, or “ground,” where he would grow a couple hundred plantain suckers, dozens of holes of cassava and watermelons in season.

Much of this economic activity and these survival methods were commonplace across the Bay Islands. Two exceptions were lobstering and conching, which were developed extensively in St. Helene, mainly due to the island’s proximity to the extensive reefs surrounding Barbarat, Morat and Helene itself.

In the 1950s and ’60s — and long before that — lobsters and conchs were abundant. A short walk along the shallow bar at any given time could provide a family-sized meal. Wealthy people in the thriving city of La Ceiba, a six- to eight-hour sail away, learned of this and opened a window of opportunity for the Helenians by buying all the conch and lobster they could get.

There was one problem — the lobsters had to be kept alive. Catching them was the first task. Scuba diving was not even mainstream in the First World, let alone on a small, Third World island. Rudimentary diving equipment — mask, snorkel and fins — was unheard of, so small, open wooden boxes with glass bottoms were built and inserted into the water, allowing the lobster fishermen to see the antennae, or “whips,” of the lobsters extending from the rocks.

Once the lobster was spotted, a long wooden pole with a wire snare on it was slowly lowered. The lobster was carefully teased out of its hole and snared. This sounds easy, but imagine doing all of this while holding the small wooden dory steady over the rock in question

Lobster was carefully teased out of its hole.

The struggle didn’t end there. To keep the lobster alive, instead of pulling it into the dory, they were placed in onion sacks that allowed water to circulate and were towed alongside the dory. It was not worth making the odyssey to La Ceiba for just a handful of lobsters, so a trip there would represent several days’ worth of lobstering.

Where were the lobsters kept after they were snared and towed alongside the dory, you might ask? They were kept in a pen, or corral, that was built using palmetto logs. The lobsters traveled over to La Ceiba in onion sacks. Imagine all this work, and the lobsters used to fetch 10 cents. In those days, a single dollar could buy quite a bit. The lobster fishermen bought goods with the proceeds. Those included small luxuries like yellow cheese that they could bring to sell back home.

In the 1970s and 1980s, enterprising islanders who had gone to work on shrimp boats in the Gulf of Mexico with U.S. fleets came back with investors. They started seafood packing plants, and the Bay Islands’ shrimping and later lobster-trapping and diving fleets sprang up.

A couple of enterprising Helenians, Norin and Iverson Bodden, followed by Victor James, obtained kerosene-powered freezers and began purchasing lobster tails for export to the U.S. market. That made the process much easier. With demand rising, the lobsters slowly moved deeper to avoid the increasing number of eager divers. Lobsters could no longer be reached with the old wooden pole and snare.

The free diving era began in earnest and general stores in Oak Ridge— such as Gough’s and Lem Ebanks — started carrying masks, snorkels and fins. Those who had relatives working on steamships overseas would have diving equipment brought down. Hook sticks became a popular tool for catching lobster, and free diving became increasingly popular. Besides being a way to make a living, it was also a sport. Helenians developed techniques to expand their lungs before diving, allowing them to go deeper and stay down longer.

Islanders learned ear-clearing techniques to allow the divers to go deeper without having to pause to equalize. At the height of the freediving subculture in the mid-1980s, successful freedivers were capable of diving to depths of 12 to 14 fathoms, with ‘fathom’ being the popular term used by Helenians to gauge depth.

Islanders would dive on Honduran banks or reefs such as Alligator Reef, Coxcomb Reef and the Hobbies, and farther away in Colombian waters. These were magical places, days away from Helene, such as Quita Sueño, Serranilla and Serrana banks, and farther south into Sandinista waters to the Martínez Reefs.

The Convenience of Cell Towers Also Brings Health Risks

While some people are sensitive to radiation emitted by electronic devices, most can feel negative effects only after years of exposure.

One example of a community affected by living and working within 100-200 meters of cell towers are those who live in Colonia Winston Smith, just west of Tres Flores. According to Pablo Echeverría, teacher and Colonia Smith Patronato vice president, the colonia’s residents have an abnormal incidence of birth defects. Children are born with cleft lip, many mothers have miscarriages, and there is a high incidence of tumors. According to Echeverría, five children were born with cleft lips in the colonia. Expectant mothers also suffered an abnormal number of spontaneous abortions, which Echeverría said could be attributed to the strong frequency signals emitted by the cell towers.

While proximity to the tower is one issue, another is the strength of the signal emitted by the tower’s equipment. Echeverría says that having trees or other objects between the cell tower and a home helps reduce constant exposure to the frequencies.

What made things complicated for Colonia Smith residents was that the towers predated the housing community. “The towers were here before we came,” Echeverría said.

Since the late 1990s, there was a tower on the site, and eventually both Claro and Tigo cell service companies operated towers on the tall hill. Those towers provided cell service to Los Fuertes, Palmetto Bay and Crawfish Rock. Since 2011, the colonia’s residents have been building their homes and raising their children in the shadow of two cell towers.

Things changed in 2024 when American investor James Baum bought land just north of Colonia Smith with a Tigo tower on it. Baum plans to turn his land into a high-end development featuring attractive views
of the sea to both the north and south. Cell towers are incompatible with high-end developments, so he decided to discontinue the lease with Tigo, which had operated the tower there for around 20 years.

Then there is the issue, common knowledge in fact, that cell towers negatively affect property values. Given a choice, people simply don’t want to live looking at cell towers, even if they want to see five bars on their smart phones. According to William Gati of the New York Real Estate Journal, real estate values can decrease by as much as 20%.

While living near cell phone towers can be dangerous in the long term, working on the towers can also be deadly. On April 15, a worker died in an accident dismantling the Tigo tower at Colonia Smith. After losing its lease near Colonia Smith, Tigo located a much shorter, temporary cell tower just 200 meters to the east, next to an existing home.

Working on the towers can also be deadly.

After a few more weeks, the work was complete and the original Tigo tower was finally disassembled. Colonia Smith residents breathed a sigh of relief. The only tower currently functioning there is an internet tower, which receives signals from La Ceiba and transfers them to fiber optic cables.

Some island communications professionals admit there are issues with cell towers and health. “Cell towers use spectrum and frequencies just as any household device. (…) The vibrating waves of spectrum resonate on different levels and can be both harmful and beneficial depending on the individual’s body and how close that person is to the device,” said Duane McNab, owner of MaxCom.

Balancing the convenience and health dangers of cell tower signals is a tricky issue. There is also an inherent conflict of interest among stakeholders in the cell tower business and residents. Telecommunications firms, technology companies and real estate industry players have vested interests in minimizing information about the health dangers of signals emitted from cell towers. They make their living from the convenience and prevalence of the cell towers providing those signals.

Coming Home at Last

Michael is the oldest of nine children of Vindel Elizabeth Collins, from Thatch Point, and Isaac Abraham Thomas, a carpenter born on the island of Montserrat. Isaac Thomas left Montserrat in 1914 for Cuba to work at a sugar plantation. He eventually made his way to Trujillo, Honduras, and at some point in the 1930s, arrived on Roatan.

In 1961, the judge in Coxen Hole wanted to deport Isaac, who still held only a British Passport.
His entire family presented themselves in support, and things settled down. Isaac died on Roatan, and was buried in a cemetery in Coxen Hole.

Michael’s first memory is from when he was 11 years old and used a machete to cut down bananas. He was taught six grades of English and math in a Coxen Hole private school by teacher Elfrida Brooks.

Michael remembers 1950s Thatch Point and Coconut Garden as filled with thousands of coconut trees. Coxen Hole still had coconut storage houses filled with coconuts waiting to be picked up by boats heading for La Ceiba or Tampa. Those small houses were built in the water to make easy access for the boats and keep rats away.

A life of adventure and the wide open world tempted Michael in his early years. When he was 18, he travelled to Tampa where he found work on boats moving cargo around the Caribbean, earning him $50 a month. He soon found a better-paying position as ship’s assistant cook for $100 a month. Eventually, he learned to be a cook, and his salary increased still. “That was the best job you could get,” says Michael.

He moved all over the US, but never acquired proper residency papers. He lived in Miami, Los Angeles, and the far off Glacier Bay, Alaska . Every year, he would visit Roatan and stay for a month or two.

Michael fathered 14 children, but remained an eternal bachelor. Seven of his children live on Roatan, with 36 of his grandchildren. A saying goes that a seaman has a girlfriend in every port – “or more than that, I tell you that,” said Michael.

After suffering a stroke in 2010, Michael finally came back to Roatan for good. He settled in a small wooden house at the Punta of Coxen Hole, once called Black Creek and full of mangroves.

Michael’s ankles are swollen, and he likes to sit on a blue plastic chair facing a tamarind tree. He can see and hear the airplanes landing just 100 feet away. He is tall and soft spoken, and his eyes have a tint of blue in them.

He can see airplanes landing just 100 feet away.

Now he plays dominoes with friends, and reminisces on the old good times. He also visits his aunt, who is 94 and lives just a few meters away. “The family learns to live with what they have and they also share it with each other,” says Michel.

Michael never received any pensions from his american employers, so life is sometimes a struggle. He attends the Methodist Church in Coxen Hole. “Regrets, I had a few. I don’t like to even talk about it,” says Michael.

The Mighty Trees of Roatan

Island communities centered their lives around trees for generations. Sometimes villages bordered forests, built homes in the shade of mango trees and planted coconuts to stabilize soil and earn income. The islanders’ relationship with trees was complex and ever evolving. “A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in,” goes the anonymous Greek proverb.
As they grew, children played games in the shade of these trees. Some island teachers conducted classes under large trees in their communities. When a community didn’t have the resources to build a school building, classes would be held under the canopies of old, impressive mangoes, ceibas, guanacastes, or rain trees. Island folks would also have parties, hold meetings, and conduct church services in the shade of the trees.

The trees marked important and mundane events. “You would never take that tree down, because it was the center of the community,” said Helen Murphy, an island expat horticulturist. The trees would also be a shelter from the sun and the rain.
Some islanders would bury the placenta of their children underneath a tree in their garden. That connected them both to the earth under their feet and trees above their heads. People’s memories intertwined with the memory of the trees as live, present participants in their lives.
Roatan has many places on the island named after trees. There is Oak Ridge, Mango Creek, Calabash Bight and Mangrove Bight. There is the Oak Hill area where in 1878 the cemetery was created in French Harbour. The entire area was covered by oak trees, but now only the name remains. Trees have shaped the island since before Paya Indians set foot on the ground here about 1,000 years ago.

Norfolk Island Pines Leaning West

While there are a couple of pine species growing on the island, the Norfolk Island pine is not one of them; it is a species of conifer. “It’s not a true pine tree, because it doesn’t produce a cone or even pine,” said Bill Brady, a U.S. expat who has lived on the island since the 1970s. “The Norfolk Island pine would be a bit too flexible to be used as a mast.”

The row of 23 Norfolk Island pines (Araucaria heterophylla) is impressive by many standards. They have grown to an impressive height, lining the road in French Cay, right across from the children’s playground in French Cay. Julie Guerra’s husband planted those trees in 1980. He was José Amilcar Guerra, and he was the island’s emigration officer for decades.

He came to work at Coxen Hole’s immigration office from Tegucigalpa and stayed on the island and had a family. The pines are now 45 years old. A handful of them didn’t make it, but the ones that did are tall, strong and majestic. The tallest trees are about 25 meters tall and leaning to the west. The steady eastern trade winds marked them in such a way.

Memories intertwined with the memory of the trees.

The pines were shipped from La Ceiba, and great care was given to not only plant them, but to keep them alive and growing in the harsh sun and salty air. They had to bring water in 55-gallon drums to water them. “Early every morning,” remembers Julie Guerra, recalling the years of watering the northern Pines. “We lost one or two, but he did replace them.”

Chester Guerra, Julie and José Guerra’s son, had an idea: he decided to come back from the US to his island and start a business, “La Hacienda del Cielo”. In early 2025, he built a petting farm, a marketplace, an aviary and a tropical tree garden. Chester then returned to his native island. “It came from an idea of building a small parrot cage for his two children,” said Guerra.

ESBIR’s Guanacaste

The four Guanacaste (Enterolobium cyclocarpum) trees at Coxen Hole’s ESBIR school entrance have been there for four decades. They were there before the Coxen Hole school was built. They are 120 feet tall and provide great shade for the parking lot at the school.

The Guanacaste trees were planted by Sheryl Galindo, the school’s owner, in the early 1990s. One of ESBIR’s Guanacastes was struck by lightning, and its fallen trunk was made into furniture. One of those furniture pieces is a stunning meeting table used by the ESBIR teachers in the school.

ESBIR’s Guanacaste was struck by lightning.

Guanacaste and Ceiba trees are the biggest island trees by volume of trunk and size of their canopy. Their canopies span 30 meters across, and they, if circumstances allow, grow as tall as 30 meters. “Guanacaste has got all that great seedpod that drops to the ground entirely so the birds are not carrying that around,” says Murphy.

Almond Trees

In the 1970s, ‘80s and ‘90s in Sandy Bay, everyone would gather on Friday to watch a cow being slaughtered and its meat being cut and prepared for sale. This was done just east of AKR, on Mr. Dyke Grant’s property.

A giant almond tree (Terminalia catappa) served that purpose. The butcher would hoist the carcass of the cow up by one of the almond tree’s limbs. This was a regular, weekly Sandy Bay spectacle and a chance for locals to meet, laugh and gossip. In the mid-2000s, the almond tree was cut down to make room for a house.

Sea Grape Survivors

Sea grape (Coccoloba uvifera) trees are valuable resources and contribute to the longevity of the island’s natural ecosystem. Sea grapes are the most personable trees on the island, with specimens hundreds of years old. Their roots stabilize beach sand, preventing erosion.

These incredible survivors can be taken down by storms and hurricanes but manage to hold on to life. They turn their downward branches into roots and their upward branches into trunks, continuing to live and produce fruit.

The fruits of the sea grape, as they turn from green to purple, are harvested and fermented to make island wine. Their sweet-tasting grapes are sometimes used to make jams and jellies.

Some builders ensure they preserve as many trees as they can. The Watercolors development project in West Bay features sea grapes that are large, old, and full of character. “What also has surprised me is how much visitors and tourists like and appreciate the fact that I am preserving the trees and incorporating them into my project,” said Murphy, who worked on the landscaping of that West Bay project. “My advice to all developers is you will attract a lot more buyers by preserving your trees. Make sure you protect them carefully during your construction.”

Giant Coconut King

The tallest coconut on the island was the king coconut that towered above all others on the beach at Palmetto Bay. It was visible from the water from 200 meters away. In 2023, this coconut giant died and the beach lost its old landmark.

The coconut was more than 80 feet tall, it survived Hurricane Mitch and was likely around 100 years old when it withered and died. It was perhaps the tallest coconut on the island. “I came to the island in 1996; it was already very tall,” said Gary Chamer, a resident of Palmetto Bay Plantation since 1998.

Diseases like White Fly and Lethal Yellowing decimated the coconut groves all over the island. Thousands of coconuts died in the 1990s. “Their name was Jamaican tall; they grew 200 feet tall and would sway side to side. They had hundreds of them in West Bay,” says Brady.

Their roots stabilize beach sand.

A few of the king coconuts survived on Roatan here and there. Some of them were lucky, and some had better genetics and were more resistant to Lethal Yellowing. According to Murphy, maybe 5% of the Jamaican Talls coconuts made it unscathed. They were tall, handsome, and all-around good-for-everything providers. The King coconut is a great all-around tree. “They are good for everything. They are good for water, for milk, for making oil, for all of it,” says Murphy.

This wasn’t the first time the disease pillaged across the region. Lethal Yellowing was already noted in Grand Cayman in 1834 and in Jamaica in 1884. Lethal Yellowing symptoms include premature nut fall, yellowing of the leaves, and defoliation. It affects not only the coconut palms but many palm species.

To remedy the decimation of coconuts in Honduras, in the early 2000s, Standard Fruit and Tela Railroad Company started to bring in coconuts from many different places. They imported a couple of containers of coconuts from Costa Rica — Malaysian Shorts and Pacific Talls. The Malaysian produces a yellow, elongated coconut fruit, and the Pacific Talls is stunningly tall and elongated.

Cemetery Acacias

Royal Poinciana (Delonix regia) Trees compete for resources: water, good soil, sun and air. They angle themselves at precarious angles to take in the sun, even if this means growing at 45 degrees and away from taller trees above them.

The Royal Poinciana acacia, when it blooms with its red flowers, is arguably the most attractive tree on the island. Its red flowers are a beacon of beauty that appears in places all around the island. A couple of them grow by the French Harbour cemetery.

Rubber Fig Tree of AKR

The Anthony’s Key Resort fig (Ficus elastica) is a tree to behold. Four grown men would need to wrap their hands around it. This particular tree was planted by Julio Galindo, AKR’s owner, in 1973 or 1974.

The fig tree is full of surprises. “It’s a rubber tree. Some of the old people would call it the ‘walking tree’ because it spreads so big,” says Galindo. This tree is native to South Asia, can grow to be 150 feet tall, and its trunk maxes out at seven feet in diameter. The tree is getting bigger and grows right next to a bathroom building at the resort. “It busts everything apart — the concrete, the wood,” says Galindo. “We constantly have to expand that every couple of years.”

To live near this type of fig is a challenge, and not everyone likes these giants. “There is nothing good about them,” says Murphy. “They are super messy. The roots are invasive. It is not a pleasure to trim them or cut them.” Indeed, their roots are opportunistic at locating any moisture in the ground. They travel 30 to 40 meters, and their brown, hard roots find their way into the smallest cracks of piping.

Long-Living Oak Trees

There is an impressive, old oak tree (Quercus oleoides) behind the plant nursery in Carniagro in French Harbour. Oaks are a tree species that is more abundant on the southern slopes of Roatan. They thrive in dry forests and pasturelands from Mexico to Costa Rica and reach 50 feet in height.

Their pale gray leaves are evergreen.
Live oaks stay green all the time. They are not deciduous; they don’t drop their leaves all at the same time like other types of oak trees sometimes do. As a consequence, their leaves are very acidic, and this acid prevents grass from growing underneath them. “You can’t really grow a lawn underneath an oak tree,” says Murphy.

The availability of oak made Roatan attractive to pirates in the 17th and 18th centuries. They needed hardwood for ship repairs, and they had plenty in Port Royal. “Hard to work with, but strong,” Murphy said about this lumber.

These oaks are some of the oldest trees we see on the island. They are easily 120 to 150, even 200 years old. Some of the older ones were here when the first Cayman Islander settlers came to the island in the 1830s. “I used to see entire rows of 200-year-old oak trees,” says Mr. Brady. “They used them for masts. It was a strong wood.”

Oak made Roatan attractive to pirates.

Oak lumber was a valuable resource for boat builders in Oak Ridge and French Cay who appreciated the hardness of the lumber that came from oak. “Ceibas, oaks, sea grape, figs and Santa Marias that used to be abundant were used by the boat builders,” said Julio Galindo.

Crawfish Rock Mangos

The mango trees [Mangifera indica] of Crawfish Rock are the center of the community. This is a place to pick up a snack, play football, chat with a neighbor or have a community meeting. You always found people talking in the shade of a mango. “Mango trees were sacred,” said Murphy. “They loved their mango so much.”

The Creole mangoes are abundant and abundantly fruitful. Haden mango is the second most popular mango tree on Roatan. There is even a mango festival in West End organized by Susie Ebanks. “My dad Keiffer Ebanks planted eight papaya mango trees in the mid-1970s,” said Ebanks who remembers making mango jam with her mother. “For many, many years; we were the only ones who had them in West End.”

Old Mangrove of Coxen Hole

White mangrove trees (Avicennia marina) were a part of Coxen Hole since the 1830s, when Cayman Islanders came here to settle. As Coxen Hole becomes more and more urban, the island’s biggest settlement is running high on cement and low on trees. “Anyone who had a private home, they always had plants and trees,” Murphy remembers of Coxen Hole in the 1980s. “Everybody had a lime tree.”

While the white mangrove tree across from the old municipal building in Coxen Hole is probably not the biggest mangrove on the island, it has plenty of character and plenty of size. It has been giving shade to cars parked underneath its branches. The parking fee is Lps. 20 an hour.

The site of the old tree is just a stone’s throw from the old municipal dock, just three or four feet above sea level. It is right in front of the Cooper Building and not far from the old Roatan Municipality. It looks like a tired, venerable giant. One of its giant branches fell to the ground and lifted itself up again — like a resting colossus.

This particular white mangrove looks like it has been in that spot well over 100 years. It looks like a fallen soldier in battle. It is 20 meters tall, and it has a beautiful and weathered trunk: a faded black color.

It has openings and crevices in its weathered trunk. A local builder has abandoned some construction wood next to it, and eight cars can park under its shade easily.

This old mangrove is flanked by almond trees and sea grape trees, not quite as old as the mangrove. The soil is sandy and compact. It has a lot of character. Some of its branches have been sawn off.

Ceibon of La Colonia Higuerito

La ceiba (Ceiba pentandra) is a giant tree that gave its name to Roatan’s maritime gateway on the Honduran mainland. There are a few ceibas on the island, but a particularly impressive specimen grows right across the street from Colonia’s Ramírez Supermarket in Sandy Bay.

When the Sandy Bay colonia canal was dredged out, some tree lovers worried whether the tree would survive. “I was worried they were going to damage the roots of that tree,” said Helen Murphy. “But it seems to be a survivor.”

Heavy construction and disruption of the soil have not helped the tree, which has become a reference point for locals and a bit of a landmark with its giant size. “It is hanging between life and death. Sometimes you see it with leaves,” says Mr. Bill Brady.

The ceiba is now 25 meters tall, and its canopy is over 30 meters across, but that is not the end. “They [ceibas] are medium-fast growers,” says Murphy. “It is 70 to 80, maybe 100 years old, so it’s worth saving.” While some of the Roatan ceibas are big and old, the biggest specimens can be found right across the water in La Ceiba, named after the tree. One of the largest specimens is in the Higuerito neighborhood. “It would take four people to surround it and touch hands,” says Murphy.

His first memory as a child was a church celebration. As Methodist’ Church in Coxen Hole celebrated its harvest festival, children were carrying gifts. “I had my offering, and when they came to get it, I didn’t want to give it. They said: ‘He’s going to be a mean fellow,’” said Mr. Sam.

When his mother begun working at Vincente D’Antoni Hospital in La Ceiba, the young Sam followed her there in 1947. “All the doctors came from the States, so they couldn’t speak Spanish. They would hire young ladies from the islands who could speak English,” remembers Mr. Sam. While on Roatan, he received tutoring classes. He had four years of schooling at Methodist School in La Ceiba.

In 1952, he went out to sea as an OS (Ordinary Sailor) and graduated to AB (Able Sailor). Then he went to work in the pump room. In 1955, he had saved enough money to enroll in a technical course in diesel, at a technical school in Chicago. “I always was yearning to further my education,” remembers Mr. Sam.

He saved for three years to afford a course that offered opportunities for advancement. He went to a school in Chicago that offered six months intensive courses in “diesel” technology.

After the course, Mr. Sam came back to Roatan and began working at Casa Warren, Coxen Hole’s biggest supermarket. In 1961, he met his wife, Myrel Anderson from Sandy Bay through work. “I had been running for a long time,” says Mr. Sam. The couple tied the knot and began their long life together.

He was a personable, intelligent young man, and some people were surprised to see him living on a small island. A casual acquaintance – an American doctor visiting from Oklahoma – helped Mr. Sam secure a work visa in the United States. “That is why it’s good to have a little diploma,” remembers Mr. Sam.

When he arrived in the US, he immediately applied for a job at Ford Motor Company in New Jersey. Before long, he was working in Manhattan. Mr. Sam sent for his wife to join him, and before long he was enjoying what was one of the greatest boom decades in US history – 1961-1964 – in New York City.

Eventually, island life called, and Mr. Sam came back to Roatan. “I promised him I would come back,” said Mr. Sam. He worked at Casa Warren in Coxen Hole, the island’s biggest grocery store.

The island was small, but growing, and opportunities were all around. The airline industry was connecting major locations around Honduras, and Roatan was one of them. When an airline came calling to open a regular connection with Roatan, Mr. Sam was there.

The first airline that came to the island with a connection to La Ceiba, in 1947, was Transportes Aéreos Nacionales. Soon after, LANSA came in with their service between Roatan and the coast, and Mr. Sam became its Roatan agent.

Mr. Sam remembers Bill Earle, the owner of LANSA who knew a man named Robert Webster, a licensed pilot from Guanaja, and the two went into business together. “They buckled up together and became partners,” said Mr. Grant.

He saved for three years to afford a course.

The airline needed at least one passenger to stay profitable on the Roatan route, and Mr. Sam made sure there was always someone wanting to visit la Ceiba. He worked out of his desk at Casa Warren selling the Roatan-La Ceiba tickets for 12 Lempiras (82 cents). “Within six months, we had five planes,” remembers Mr. Grant.

Mr. Sam recalls the original landing strip located on the side of the road just east of Coxen Hole. “On one side, there were coconuts, on the other, there was a road. (…) The cows, the cats, and the dogs were all running,” remembers Mr. Grant. Eventually, the nearby “Church hill” – part of the Methodist Mission – and graveyard were both leveled in order to enlarge the landing strip. “The terminal was out of thatched roof,” remembers Mr. Sam.

There were some setbacks with the airlines as well. There was an accident with a 10-seater plane coming from Cayman Islands, stopping over on Roatan on its way to Tegucigalpa. It dropped to the sea in Dixon Cove. “They just ran out of fuel. It was an error by the pilots,” remembers Mr. Sam. Two pilots and two passengers died in the crash.

Mr. Grant knew three Americans that saw Roatan’s potential and invested their money in land and projects that benefited the island. “The government didn’t start tourism here, the foreigners did,” remembers Mr. Sam. In 1960 there were three Americans that were pioneers. There was Mr. Roy Anderson on the east side of Roatan, Paul Adams on the west end of the island, and John Henley, from Birmingham, Alabama, who focused his efforts on the middle of Roatan. “He went into leasing instead of buying, and the government changed the law and foreigners couldn’t [invest any longer],” remembers Mr. Grant.

The first tourist hotels appeared on the island soon thereafter – Spyglass Hill in Punta Gorda was the first, AKR the second, and CocoView the third. As the island grew, it also found itself in the path of three powerful Hurricanes in less than a decade: Francelia in 1969, Fifi in 1974, and Greta in 1978.

The terminal was out of the thatched roof.

In 1990 Mr. Sam began working at the Roatan Municipality with Mayor Allan Hyde as his “number two man, [that] now it is called vice-alcalde… or ‘official mayor’,” remembers Mr. Sam. “I would work for him under one condition: I would work under one boss – Allan Hyde,” said Mr. Sam. “I didn’t take ‘mordida,’ I didn’t want any handout.”

The Roatan municipal budget was small, but sufficient to finance some badly needed construction projects. Mr. Sam helped to build a Coxen Hole municipal market and new City hall building. “The last one didn’t even have a good bathroom, no conference table,” said Mr. Sam.

The Roatan municipal budget was small, but sufficient to finance some badly needed construction projects. Mr. Sam helped to build a Coxen Hole municipal market and new City hall building. “The last one didn’t even have a good bathroom, no conference table,” said Mr. Sam.

He continued to preach on the island and look after his five children. Looking back, Mr. Sam sees that the biggest difference he made was that of following the true and narrow path of life. “’Let the people remember you for good, not walls, not statues,’ this is what my mother told me, and now I understand it,” says Mr. Grant.

An Affordable Community that Runs Itself

In 2004, Santamaría was studying at the Pedagogical University in La Ceiba and already teaching on Roatan. While renting an apartment on the island, he asked himself if it would be possible to build an affordable home there. He contacted FUNDEVI, an NGO that focuses on assisting Honduran families without any homes, or land to build homes. The FUNDEVIS initial answer was that the land was too expensive; Santamaría persisted and obliged himself to find land, and coordinated all the construction for the future homes.

He persisted, and in 2006 the 10 acre development of 138 homes broke ground. Its residents decided to name the colonia after Elmer’s last name. “Santa María is a blessed place,” said Elmer Santamaría. “Thanks God and FUNDEVI we could have purchased the land [lots] for Lps. 50,000.” That was around $3,000 back then, and now those 10×12 meter lots with houses sell for Lps. 700,000 and more.

When the project broke ground, Dixon Cove was a place few people knew about. Santamaría seemed far away, not only as far as location on the main road, it was also two hundred meters up a dirt road in then typical island bush. “There was nothing around our homes, just forests,” remembers Santamaría. In those times there was no Mahogany Bay, no Galaxy Wave, and no Dixon Cove Municipal Building. These all came in the years following the establishment of the housing development.

Everyone paid off their homes. They are free.

The cay in constructing Santamaría was keeping costs to the minimum. The workers for the project came from Yoro, the house’s doors also came from Yoro, and cement came from La Ceiba. “We were buying sand from the mainland. We were buying from hardware store in Colón to save money,” remembers the construction phase Elmer Santamaría.

The home owners had 10 years to pay off their loans. “FUNDEVI gave us the keys to our homes and we started paying. Now everyone paid off their homes. They are free,” said Elmer.

As time went on and their families grew, many Santamaría residents took out additional loans to fund the expansion of their homes. Especially popular with the small lenders were lending institutions such as IMPREMA and Banco de los Trabajadores.

The homeowners created a patronato, and set a system at keeping their community safe and attractive. The community focused on sobriety and family values in order to assure safety. There are four pulpería stores at Santa María, and every one of them signed a pledge not to sell alcoholic beverages. “We don’t allow sell of alcoholic drinks here, we don’t permit billiard halls,” says Elmer.

As Elmer Santamaría is the founder of the community, everyone knows him here and says hello as he walks by. Elmer is currently the treasurer of the Santa María patronato and in the afternoons he works at José Santos Guardiola High School. He has a large farm near La Ceiba that produces rambutan fruit plantains, citrus, and cacao. He exports rambutan to USA via El Salvador.

According to Elmer Santamaría, 2,500 people now live in the Dixon Cove area. Directly to the north of Santa María there is Colonia Dulce María, and the future public hospital is a walk away to the west.

Santa María is home to an eclectic mixture of mainlanders.

Today, Santa María is home to an eclectic mixture of mainlanders who came to the island in the last 20 years. Prof. Miguel Angel Mathias, 76, who has lived across the street from the Colonia say it is a safe place. Prof Mathis lives next door to the Catholic Church and has the keys to the buildings. The Colonia has also two evangelical prayer halls and a Seventh Day Adventist Church.

The community has eight streets running east to west. Several of them are soon to be paved. Santa María has a football field, a children’s playground, and a two-story school building. The school is named after Graciela Ofelia Ramos and it houses a kindergarten, a grade school, and a high school. Some colonia projects are built with funds from water fees, as every house in the Colonia pays Lps. 250 for water access.

It is still very difficult to organize and construct a low income housing community on Roatan. Almost twenty years no other FUNDEVI project has been done on the island. Elmer believes it could be done, but it needs someone who will be the driving force behind the entire effort.

At the Forefront of Casa Warren’s Legacy

Ivy’s siblings were Timothy, Cheryl, Kirby, and Esther. Mrs. Ivy’s first memory is drinking from an oat meal glass on the kitchen table that usually contained peppers, mutton peppers and onions. The glass had only had vinegar, and the young Ivy, maybe three years old, drunk the vinegar form the glass.

She did her ABCs to sixth grade using Royal Readers English textbooks. “As small children, we had to do both Spanish [public] school and English school,” remembers Mrs. Ivy. At eight, she begun taking music lessons from her aunt, married to Paul Ebanks.

The 15th of September was a very important date in Roatan’s calendar. School children from all over Roatan would gather in the island’s capital to march and celebrate Honduras’ Independence Day. “Our teacher taught us: ‘Honduras es mi patria,’” remembers Mrs. Ivy. At seven o’clock in the morning the children would await a boat send by the municipality.

In order to go to a store or attend church service Mrs. Ivy walked from West End to Coxen Hole. “That was a little, narrow road, that you buckled your ankles if you didn’t watch it,” remembers Mrs. Ivy, The foot and horse path that runs between West End across the hills to Flowers Bay. “We had ticks, uuuuu, loads of ticks,” remembers Mrs. Ivy. The walk to Coxen Hole would take two hours and some rode horses to save time, but Mrs. Ivy was afraid of horses.

The last day of the week was a special time for the entire family. “We went to West Bay almost every Sunday afternoon. We ate a lot of coco plums and grapes, they were wild. Jim Díaz, Foster Díaz’s grandfather, used to live in a little house in West Bay.” These were bucolic days for Roatan and for many children that grew up on the island. “There were a lot of crabs. They were clean,” remembers Mrs. Ivy. “We would pick them by the sack, take them home and boil them. We still love the crabs.”

In 1952 the Warren family moved from West End to La Ceiba so children could receive more formal education. The family was there for four years to take advantage the city’s schools and colleges.

In 1950s there was only one municipality on the island, and Coxen Hole was its capital. It was a busy town and it had thriving general store. Mr. Warren had an opportunity to buy a building that became Casa Warren, Warren’s Supermarket and now is Eldon’s Supermarket in Coxen Hole.

Warren Hotel with its seven rooms was the first hotel in the Bay Islands.

In January of 1955 the Warren family traveled on “Colonel Cruz” boat leaving La Ceiba banana company dock at midnight at arriving at the Coxen Hole municipal dock at 6am. “It was always a pretty rough ride.”

Mrs. Ivy’s father purchased a two story wooden building that also had a few rooms to rent and a space that could be used for a store. In fact Casa Warren Hotel with its seven rooms was the first hotel in the Bay Islands. “Judges and governors were the staying there, renting the month, and “lot’s of gringos,” said Mrs. Ivy. John C. Henley III from Alabama and his sister Edmunia Henley were guests and early investors on Roatan leasing land from locals.

At first it was Mrs. Ivy’s mother who runs the business as her father stayed behind in La Ceiba. “She run the kitchen, dining room area while the children run the store area,” says Mrs. Ivy. At 16 Mrs. Ivy was already working at the family store. Her parents lived upstairs and the children worked in the store downstairs. Her sister Janet helped out as well. The business depended on help from everyone. “My dad was off for two years and then he run the business with us,” says Mrs. Ivy.

There were just a few places on the island that one could call proper stores. “We had a store, McNabs had a store and Mr. Oswald had a store,” says Mrs. Ivy. While Roatan in 1950s and 60s had three large stores there were also many scattered through the island “Truchitas,” small stores selling sugar and a few high demand items.

Back then Roatan was a peaceful, quiet place, but the law always looked for some bad apples. “They would put you in jail for just about anything, especially stealing,” remembers Mrs. Ivy. There was not much crime on Roatan in 1950s. Most people left their doors open and there were few things a thief could steel. “In those days there was no much stealing going on. Not like today,” says Mrs. Ivy. “If you go onto someone’s plantation and steal their coconuts, they would walk you down the street with it on your back – shame you.”

Many people in jail ended up there because they would make their own moonshine. “People would make chicha; brew it down with corn. They would make strong alcohol,” said Mrs. Ivy. “They would take the cashew and make wine, they made berry wine, they make rice wine.”

Mrs. Ivy married at 18 to Walter Cooper. His father, Dr. Loyd Cooper, was the only dentist on Roatan for many years and young Walter helped his father at the clinic. The couple had two children and stayed married for 45 years. “You need to take care of yourself, eat right, lead a good clean life,” says Mrs. Ivy. As a Christian you learn how to do that.”

In 1970s her father decided to expand the store. The old wooden, two story building has outlived its usefulness and it was time for an upgrade. “I’m gonn’a make a supermarket,’ said my dad,” remembers Mrs. Ivy. “My dad was very visionary.” That is when Casa Warren went from being a wooden building to a cement building.

Casa Warren had a prime location in Roatan’s hub town. It was just a few meters west of the municipal dock and down the hill from Governor’s hill where the telegram office, a jail and a clock tower were. “Every 15 minutes it would sound off,” remembers the municipal clock Mrs. Ivy. “If you didn’t sleep well that keep you awake.” When sometime in 1980s Mr. Sam Welcome, the clock keeper died, no one took over the task of maintaining the clock. The clock Municipal clock stopped and people depended on their own time.

In 1984 Mrs. Ivy’s father died and the Casa Warren was left to Mrs. Ivy’s mother and children. “My dad was very strict. I had a good dad. He took care of us,” remembers her father with fondness Mrs. Ivy. “One thing our dad taught us is to share with one another. He taught us to take care of one another. We worked through differences, we worked through tough times.”

In 2010 Casa Warren was rented to Eldon Hyde, owner of Eldon’s Supermarket. In her 80s Mrs. Ivy lives on ground floor in a large cement home adjacent to old Casa Warren. She has the radio from morning until the early afternoon. Every Sunday she goes to the First Baptist Church where she plays the organ, or the piano. “That was my life: the store and the church,” says Mrs. Ivy. Now her life is mostly centered around the church and her family. Her two grandchildren live with her and look after her. “I had a good life,” she says.

Her days as a child were spaced by prayers that were done three times a day: at sunrise, noon and in the evening time. The life of families was concentrated around the church and religious obligations. Flowers Bay had Methodist, Baptist and Evangelical churches.

Little Dellis learned how to read, write and mathematics from Ebenezer Johnson, a schoolteacher who taught in Flowers Bay using English Royal Readers. Little Dellis completed knowledge of all six Royal Readers books.

The discipline in school was important and occasionally the teacher whipped unruly students. Mrs. Dellis remembers an April fool’s day where one of her companions “pinned a tail” on the back of the teacher and was punished. Another April fools day mischief involved taking a “note” to a faraway place.

In the 1930s, the Honduran government built a school on the point in Flowers Bay. The September of 1941 hurricane destroyed it completely. Mrs. Dellis remembers that “Nicaraguan Hurricane” well. The storm came without warning and brought high winds and a quickly rising tide endangering most of the Flowers Bay homes that were built very close to shore. “We were running in the rain, cold. We were frightened and hungry,” says Mrs. Dellis. When her family arrived at a home that was up the hill, they found it was already filled with fleeing neighbors.

Made flower arrangements for weddings.

Mrs. Dellis spent several years with her grandmother in Los Planes, a Standard Fruit community on the Cangrejal river outside of La Ceiba. She learned Spanish while studying at the local school there. In 1930s and 40s many islanders left to pursue jobs with banana companies on the mainland.

In 1950, at 21 Mrs. Dellis married Oliver Cromwell Bodden, a seaman from Flowers Bay. Mrs. Oliver worked on “The Daydream,” aboat that carried cargo between Roatan and Grand Cayman, Louisiana and Florida.

For several years the couple rented homes, but finally purchased a house lot in Flowers Bay. While taking care of the house Mrs. Dellis planted flowers and made flower arrangements for weddings and birthday bouquets. On Sundays she would sing hymns and recite bible verses at the Baptist church she joined. The couple had five boys and one girl.

In her ninth decade, Mrs. Dellis is very active and energetic. She spends her time visiting family and tending to her flower garden. She lives with her son in beautiful seashore home in Pensacola area of Flowers Bay.

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.