Wyvolyn Gager (left), Editor-in-Chief of The Gleaner, chatting yesterday with Elinor Forbes-Martin (right) and Faith Linton, after presenting both women with Silver Pen Awards for June and July, respectively, at the newspaper's offices 7 North Street, Kingston. - Rudolph Brown ELINOR FORBES-MARTIN and Faith Linton were yesterday presented with The Gleaner's Silver Pen Award for June and July, respectively.
Mrs Forbes-Martin was rewarded for encouraging Jamaicans to rely more on self-help rather than on government or others. The former banker's letter, titled "Munro College -- a leader in self-help", scored 19 of a possible 30 points, two more than that of Patrick A. Gallimore, the second-place winner, with "Teacher ultimatum unfortunate".
She highlighted the achievement of Munro College in its construction of an all-purpose auditorium costing $60 million with only a $43,000 contribution from government. The effort had started 20 years earlier in 1980 when a teacher at the school bequeathed $7,000 towards the auditorium.
Mrs. Forbes-Martin chided the media for not doing enough to publicise the feat of the Munro Old Boys, pointing out in her letter that "raising $60 million with minimal help from government...is no mean feat and a Herculean endeavour".
Mrs. Forbes-Martin is married to Garth Martin, a regular writer of letters to the editor, and they have three children.
Mrs. Linton, July's winner, was clear in her mind about the root cause of Jamaica's many social ills.
She traced the deterioration of social values, and the resultant increase in crime and violence, to the breakdown of family life in the country.
"The breakdown of the male-female relationships spawns more evils than we realise. It seriously compromises the development of the child's character and personality," Mrs. Linton wrote in her prize-winning letter. "We need to go back to the drawing board where family is concerned."
Mrs. Linton, the mother of two sons and a daughter, won the Silver Pen Award for her letter to the editor, titled: "Reclaiming marriage and family" which was published in The Gleaner on July 15. In the letter she argued also that even as young men were encouraged to become more involved in their children's lives, they should be encouraged also to enter into stable unions with the future mothers of their offspring.
A retired teacher, Mrs. Linton said she had been thinking about writing the letter for a very long time. She said she had seen several students over many years whose deprivation of a stable family life had affected them both academically and psychologically.
"We need to be careful that we don't get too panicky about symptoms...because in many cases in Jamaica, our problems stem from a breakdown in family," Mrs. Linton said in an interview after receiving her award at The Gleaner's North Street offices, central Kingston.
She said she was elated at winning the award and pledged to continue writing to The Gleaner.
