Since the 1930s Jamaicans of all political persuasions have been welcome to Bromley, the imposing colonial home of Fiona Edwards in the village of Walkerswood, in the St Ann District of Jamaica. Standing on top of a hill, and surrounded by cattle commons and pastures, the house overlooks the village, a short drive south from Fern Gully and Jamaica’s northern tourist port of Ocho Rios.
From the 1970s Sir Howard Cooke, former Governor General of Jamaica, was a frequent visitor. He and others came there because of Bromley’s extraordinary reputation as a focus for interracial harmony, despite belonging to a family of Jamaica’s privileged 'plantocracy', the white plantation owning colonial settlers. 'I used to attack the privileged plantocracy,' commented Sir Howard, 'that they were not making themselves available to teach, to educate and, much more than that, to make land available. But Walkerswood was unique, in which the great house was very dominant in the life of the people, as a teaching point, as a point to create growth.'
During World War II, Fiona served as a corporal in the Auxiliary Territorial Service in England. She married John Edwards, a naval officer, in Wiltshire in1944. Their two sons, Johnathan and Roddy, inherited Fiona’s social and spiritual ethos. Johnathan helped to develop the Walkerswood Community Council, launched in 1973, whilst Roddy headed its unemployment committee. They were determined to create local jobs, Roddy declaring that, as a white Jamaican, he had benefitted from 'a grand theft from people who had not been paid properly for their part in the nation’s development'.
Supported by their mother, he, Johnathan and others from the community launched Cottage Industries on the Bromley estate in 1976. It became the first company to bottle and market Jamaica’s celebrated jerk seasoning, while creating new jobs.
