Windrush Era and Beyond: Kim Jack-Riley

I am North Londoner who also then lived in the US for a long time and in returning back to the UK chose Brighton to relocate with my family. So, I am a Brighton resident and very happy about that!

I mentioned I was born and raised in North London but my parents… made the decision to move to the US. And in those days, so now we’re talking about the late 70s into the early 80s in terms of decade, what your parents said they were going to do you sort of went along with it.

You know, I don’t actually even recall them even asking me if I wanted to go to America. It was just – ‘This is what we’re doing’. And my dad, a bit of a complex story… But my dad did have a brother who lived there already and was enticing him to bring us over during the great recession in the UK.

But the point actually is that upon arriving to the US I was of uni age and even though it’s a long and winding road of a story of my feelings about America, not particularly great ones, but I would say that one of the really great things that occurred from that migration (or immigration) was that I chose to attend Howard University.

So, for context Howard University is definitely the largest and most famous of what we call the ‘historically Black’ colleges and universities – so HBCUs. Meaning it is a whole university that is owned and operated and run by and attended by Black people. So, without having five hours to discuss what that was like going from North London over to the US and suddenly being immersed into an entire sort of village that was all operated by Black educators was really quite an incredible experience…

That’s where I started to study journalism which, in itself exposed me to books and authors that were of people of colour and African descent that I absolutely can’t image I would have discovered if I had in fact remained in the UK… even in London. That university experience was quite unique.

I think as I have become older, that I have recognised that I have been fortunate to have been fed loads and loads of information and had loads of touch points about my own heritage. So, starting with… back to growing up in North London.

My dad was from Trinidad and Tobago, and he left Trinidad and Tobago with his best friend at the age of seventeen and came to London… Married my mum who was white British so then came along me which becomes a mixed race child. What I look back on and am so appreciative… It’s two things to do with that…

My father was a huge advocate of telling the story of Trinidad, the Caribbean and culture in general as it relates to Black people. So, he was doing all sorts of things in London. His network had to do with the arts… the arts and the culture of Trinidad. He was heavily involved in that in London. But also parallel to that, which I find to be quite fascinating, is that my mum (who was white) was one of five children and three of the women (including herself) three of the women out of her five, married Black men.

So, amongst my circle, my inner circle, being mixed… And I would add to that I think naturally when you have a child you start making friends with your child’s friends’ parents. So, from that, my circle of friends and family and social life was this amazingly large network of mixed race and interracial marriage families. So that was very normal to me and when I look back on photo albums… In fact, I’ve got one that I treasure and had it enlarged and sits on our wall when you walk in the house and it’s this wedding photo of my aunty (who’s white) who married a Jamaican who was in the air force and there’s this wedding party picture and it’s like ‘Black white Black white Black white’ and I really love capturing the reaction to people who come in the door… some of them… it’s like an instant connection because I think they may have had this interactional situation in their own house or family… some of them are holding back the shock and awe… you know that’s maybe from the olden days… It’s a fascinating experiment actually. And then when I add to that they’ll sort of say ‘well… who are these people? How is it so diverse?’… and it’s like that’s my family! ‘Oh!’ You know.