Dear Editor

A prolific and major music entertainer in the person of BRAD LUNDY meets his untimely demise in a violent hit and run traffic accident on Tonique Williams-Darling Highway and the media reports the incident as if an unidentified person, a “John Doe” of sorts, is the latest victim of a hit and run traffic accident.

A native of the big yard, Mr. Lundy was known as the ANDROS JERRY BUTLER. Dapper in his dress, a gentleman in his demeanor and deportment, and energetic in his live performances, Brad graced the stages in night clubs and concert halls all across the USA, Canada and the Caribbean, crooning his way into the hearts of thousands of adoring fans very much the way luminaries such as Freddy Munnings Jr. and the incomparable Smokey 007 did in their prime during the 1970’s and 80’s.

Notwithstanding Brad’s enormous contributions to the cultural development of The Bahamas, the main stream media, I dare say “the working press,” managed to ignore this iconic personality in Bahamian music in death. One is left to wonder and ask if scandal, shame and the political blame game together with any assortment of sensational tales are the requisite themes to perk the interest of the sordid agenda, though transparent, of “the working press?”

So ridiculously evasive is the thinking cap of the media, that Lundy’s tragic death takes the formulaic prose of hit and runs, and monotonous traffic reportage.

Give the press the sensationalism of drugs, crime, rape and fire arms “and murder she wrote” and a headline story is all but guaranteed.

Brad headlined so many local shows and was no stranger to newsrooms.

Denied dignity by identity omission in death just as he was amplified as a headliner and celebrated in life, the reporting of his death by a negligent and indifferent local press corps is noticeably ironic. This neglect by omission only underscores the wanton deficiencies in investigative reporting, journalistic discipline and reporting priorities in today’s newsrooms.

There is an urgent need to ensure that the whole community is edified and made more responsibly and intelligently aware of current affairs and how these events affect us, connect us to each other, the global community and our history every time an edition rolls hot off the press. What we get today are newspapers overloaded with lucrative commercialism and a deficient news content, seldom ever in synch with bulwarking a nation and strengthening all of the sinews of a society in a unified and cohesive national tapestry.

Where have and why have “The Wonder Years” of Eileen Carron, Wendell Jones, Arthur Foulkes, Shane Barnet, Dorothy Panza, Mike Lothian, Gordon Lowe, Sharon Albury, Mark Beckford, Mark Symonette, Wendy Miller Newbold, Jeanne Gibson, Jerome Sawyer, Athena Damianos, Lynda Crawley Gibson, Kirk Davis, Kirk Smith, Anthony Forbes, Earlin Williams, Darold Miller, Carlton Smith and Steve McKinney been laid to waste by the pretentious and over-zealous, gossip-seeking, sensationalism-driven do nothing current press corps? They have not advanced and elevated this honourable profession one iota from “The Wonder Years.”

I and many others still long for the days and editorial wit and the intellectual curiosity and stimulation of the industry’s luminaries like Sir Ettiene Dupuch, Cyril Stevenson, Sir Arthur Foulkes (the first Bahamian editor of the Tribune), Kenneth “Six” Francis, Sir Henry Milton (who established the Hansard), the Honourable Fred Mitchell (former news director of ZNS); the Honorable Obediah Hercules Wilchcombe (who proactively ran the ZNS newsroom like a well oiled machine); Calsey Johnson, Eldred Bethel, Mike Smith and Al Dillette. Within the pantheon of journalism, why haven’t the current Generation “X” and “Y” sat at the feet of the aforementioned baby boomers and properly learned the art and discipline of journalism and the ethical standards intrinsically tied to this time honoured and noble profession. For better or for worse, they have moved on and I wish them well in their current dispensation whether it’s in this life or in the spiritual realm.

It took this small omission on Brad Lundy to open our eyes to the easily verifiable facts that today’s journalists need to get their own professional priorities in order if they wish to maintain that hard fought and formidable legacy of principle, ethics, respect and credibility that their institution, the fourth estate, has rightfully earned as the gate keepers within this ordered and civil society.

May the soul of the illustrious Brad Lundy, rest in peace.

Yours etc.;
Alexander Laroda