Recently we did a feature on the visit of US Congressman George K. Butterfield to Bermuda, his ancestral home, and birthplace of his father, Dr. George Kenneth Butterfield.

Dr. George was one of the 12 children of James Peter Butterfield, a tailor by profession and his wife Ann Harriett Giles Butterfield of St. George’s. Young George, born in 1900, migrated to Florida seeking broader horizons at age 16. He enlisted in the US Army, fought as an Artilleryman in World War One, and went to college upon his discharge, receiving a dental degree from Meharry Medical School.

At college he met and married his American wife and settled in her hometown, Wilson, North Carolina. He was a political activist and became the first black elected official in his city’s council, and the fourth in the whole of North Carolina.

The Congressman was born and raised in Wilson; studied law, became a Superior Court Judge and in 2004 was elected to Congress, representing the First District of North Carolina.

Rep. Butterfield was fully acquainted with the Butterfield side of the family and his many cousins in Bermuda, among them Norris Pearman and family who own and operate the People’s Pharmacy.

He admitted he did not know very much about his grandmother’s side, the Giles side of the family, especially George Giles, after whom his father and himself were named. He seemed interested in knowing more.

Thanks to the special issue of the now defunct Bermuda Recorder newspaper published in July 22, 1935 we have from my own archives, this profile on George Giles, written by Elton E. Beane in his weekly Recorder column, “So This is New York.”

THERE are many Bermudians abroad who have done well in professional, business and other lines of activity. But it has been our good fortune and pleasure to have met and to have lived in the same neighbourhood with a gentleman who was the most alert, progressive and enterprising Bermuda businessman we have ever known or heard of, either in Bermuda or elsewhere.

This person was Mr. George Giles, a native of St. George’s, and a brother of the late Mrs. Harriett Butterfield of St. George’s.

We will endeavour to give a brief summary of the achievements of this wonderful, dynamic son of Bermuda.

Some 40-odd years ago George Giles found his way to the little island town of Ocala, Florida, about 120 miles south of Jacksonville. He was an expert carpenter and found plenty of work there. He was quick to observe the possibilities for business in this locality and decided to settle there.

With resources accumulated he opened a grocery store. His genial, friendly manner gained for his business a large patronage. It was not long before he added a dry goods department.

Business grew by leaps and bounds. Looking around for further opportunities he opened a cotton-gin factory, and soon from miles around, farmers, both coloured and white, were seen driving their mule-drawn wagons laden with cotton to George Giles’ cotton factory, there to be ginned (separating fibre from seeds), baled and made ready for shipment.

Turning his attention to real estate Mr. Giles purchased several houses. He had observed that very few houses occupied by coloured people possessed a ceiling to them. He renovated these buildings, making them to look as houses should. He then went around and talked to many of the coloured businessmen of the town, on the subject of forming a real estate company.

It was not long before the Metropolitan Realty Company began business. Houses were bought in various parts of the town, then renovated and rented. In one deal a whole city block of houses was bought and improved. The company prospered.

Mr. Giles’ next move was to interest the same men in organising a bank, the Metropolitan Savings Bank of Ocala.

A three-storey building was erected with a frontage of 70 feet along each of the two streets. The bank, together with stores, occupied the main floor; offices were on the second floor and a large assembly or dance floor on the third.

In spite of the deep-seated race prejudice in this as in all other Southern communities, Mr. Giles had gained a great deal of respect from the white people because of his leadership and achievements.

He went to the officials of Ocala and told them that the coloured bank was an asset to the town, and that the authorities should make it a depository of some of the public funds which could be used to meet the pay cheques of large number of coloured employees on the country payroll.

Strange to relate, they agreed with his point of view and public funds were placed on deposit in this coloured owned, controlled, and managed bank, George Giles being the president thereof.

The next step of this man of energy, enterprise, and foresight, was to build a brick hotel containing 25 rooms on the upper floors, with barber shop and stores on the ground floor. The rooms were well-furnished, being on a par with many of the smaller hotels of Bermuda.

With these various enterprises successfully going, Mr. Giles then launched out into other fields. He sent to Atlanta, Georgia, for six knitting machines. These were installed in a large room that was formerly used as a store. An expert instructor was obtained from the factory to teach the young women hired by Mr. Giles, to operate the machines.

Three months later a brick building measuring 100 by 100 feet was erected and 75 persons were at work therein operating machines, making underwear for men, women and children.

About two months later we read in the Crisis magazine, then edited by Dr. W.E.B. Dubois, that a business firm in New York had placed on order $50,000 worth of underwear from the Metropolitan Knitting Mills of Ocala, Florida. Mr. Giles himself retained 51 per cent of the stock of the company, the rest being taken up by his business associates.

In spite of the many great achievements of George Giles, which had made Ocala widely-known throughout Florida and some of the adjoining states, he was still subjected to that ridiculous, unfair, ignorant deep-seated attitude of Southern race prejudice. He had done more to put Ocala on the map than any white man of the town had done, or appeared to have the energy or ability or ability to do.

When Mr. Giles wanted to attend a movie, he was obliged to enter a little door that led to seats in the gallery along with the lowliest little urchin, simply because he was coloured. To meet this discrimination against his people, Mr. Giles erected a movie theatre of about 200 capacity for the use of the coloured people.

Although forced to admit the wonderful ability of George Giles, many of the white people were loath to believe that he was a coloured man.

SOME of the white women employers told their coloured servants that no coloured man had as much brains as he did; that he came from Bermuda and the white people there were dark like he was.

In our many conversations he had often remarked that there were quite a number of enterprises that could be started and carried on in Bermuda, chief of which was the development of a canning industry of vegetables, fruit and fish.

He always asserted he did not believe in keeping money lying in the bank, but instead to put it out to work.

His personal holdings of real estate property were larger than that of any other coloured man in Ocala.

There is no Bermudian, white or coloured whose activities in the business world has placed him in prominent leadership in such varied enterprises.

During the height of his career, Mr. Giles was foremost in every line of business he entered. He was proprietor of a grocery and dry goods store, owner of a cotton-gin factory, possessor of large real estate holdings; proprietor of a hotel; president of the Metropolitan Realty Investment Company of Ocala; president of the Metropolitan Savings Bank of Ocala; president of the Metropolitan Knitting Mills of Ocala; and a leader in all civic and business movements for the advancement and betterment of his people.

When George Giles died about eight years ago (written in 1935) coloured people in general, and those of Ocala in particular lost a business leader of stature, and a brilliant exponent of what people of his race can accomplish. He left a wife, Mrs. Ruth Mozon Giles, a native of North Carolina, whose aid, advice and loyalty helped him greatly in achieving success, and two sons and a daughter.

It is our hope that some day some of our own young people in Bermuda may be moved by a spirit of ambitious enterprises to take the lead in launching and developing some industrial business movement, that will go far towards removing the fear of unemployment from our people in the homeland.

George Giles is a shining example worthy of emulation to anyone, who aspires to achievement in the world of business, trade, and commerce.