Times of the Islands Spring 2021

In the 1960s before development started on
Providenciales, the TCI Government had a work program
run by the district constables. This made it possible for
some of the residents to earn money. At that time, most
families made a living farming the land and fishing the
sea, but cash was needed to buy a few staples—flour, oil,
sugar, for instance.
In Blue Hills the main work was to build a road in front
of the settlement tracing the beach. Rocks were carried
from the bush and placed in the sand. Other rocks were
broken up into smaller pieces using a hammer, then
placed in the voids between the larger rocks. After that,
sand was hauled up in buckets from the beach and sprinkled
over the rock base to make a smooth surface.
Another work project had been to build a 700-foot
long airstrip located in the valley where Kew Town is
today. The bushes were cleared and the largest rocks
removed.
In 1966, Fritz Ludington formed Provident Limited
and made a lease purchase agreement with the TCI
Government to develop 4,000 acres on the eastern part
of Providenciales. In October 1966 Fritz, together with
his friend Tommy Coleman and me arrived by boat on
Providenciales to start the development. The boat was a
65 foot workboat named the Seven Dwarves. I was hired
as a surveyor/engineer but the true job description was
more like “to do anything that was needed.”
Fritz understood that to have an efficient operation,
we needed to be able to come and go in a faster way
than by boat. We took a look at the 700 feet that had
been cleared and Fritz decided that his wife’s plane could
probably be used to land there, even if the surface was
pretty rough. Chris Ludington’s plane was a Cessna 180
with US registration number 74C, “74 Charlie” in pilot
lingo. Fritz needed to get back to the mainland and a few
days later 74 Charlie showed up for the historical landing.
(I was told that one or two airplanes had landed on the
strip prior to our arrival on Providenciales. I could never
get that confirmed so I don’t know if we were watching a
“first” landing or not.)
For the next six months we used the air strip quite
a lot. I think Chris wound up with the short end of the
stick because Provident more and more took over the use
of her plane. During this time Fritz hired Embry Rucker
as a pilot (among other things). Embry recently published
a book, Coming in for a Landing, where he tells
about flying in the Islands in the early days. The book is
available on Amazon and is also for sale at the Turks &
Caicos National Museum. (See https://www.timespub.
tc/2019/03/up-up-and-away/).
Fritz Ludington himself was an experienced pilot,
as were many others in the Provident group. Aviation
was very important in the early development of
Providenciales.
When the heavy equipment arrived in April 1967,
the first priority was to improve on the existing airstrip.
Provident had chartered Margaret of Exuma, a self propelled
barge fully loaded with heavy equipment. The
Bahamian captain entered through Sellar’s Cut, then zigzagged
between the coral heads up to the beach where
This 1966 image shows “74 Charlie” on take-off from the original 700-foot airstrip.
18 www.timespub.tc