Do we need any more stories about the humanitarian catastrophe that is Haiti? Or, can I tell you one about human victory and collectivism that extends all the way from Haiti to the East End of Long Island?
It begins with a Haitian building engineer who lives in the capital of Port-au-Prince. He needs to remain nameless here because his life is in danger. His family has already been kidnapped once and he had to take out a second mortgage to pay off the ransom. Still, this man continues to evade armed gangs and drives regularly from the capital city to Ranquitte, a village in the foothills of the Massif du Nord mountain range. He puts on tattered clothing and gets into a beaten-up truck so as not to attract attention, and makes the three-hour drive to deliver building supplies to the Wings Over Haiti School in Ranquitte. He will keep doing this, he promises, until the school is big enough to admit all the children who live in the village.
“He helped us when construction began in 2018 and he’s still doing it, putting himself in so much danger as we expanded last year,” said Magalie Theodore, a Haitian-American whose family donated the Ranquitte land to Wings Over Haiti, a nonprofit founded by Sag Harbor’s Jonathan Glynn.
Before the heroic engineer returns to Port-au-Prince, he sends a quick text in Haitian Creole to Ms. Theodore, who works in finance in Manhattan.
“Machandiz yo finalman rive.” Finally made it after all the drama.
This bit of good news is then relayed to Mr. Glynn and his trusty cohort on the East End, who help run operations, including securing funds for the building supplies and construction.
Alfred Tuff, the owner and founder of A.P. Tuff & Co., a building and real estate development business in East Hampton, helped Mr. Glynn build the first school in Port-au-Prince following the 2010 earthquake, and continues to lend his expertise to the Ranquitte project. Mr. Tuff is blunt with his ask for this year: a $50,000 donation is needed to install an atmospheric water generator that harvests moisture from the air, purifies and then delivers it as potable water to the people of Ranquitte.
“You see these spindly-legged women walking a quarter of a mile to the stream, filling five-gallon buckets of water and carrying them all the way back. They do that three or four times a day for cooking and keeping the kids clean,” said Mr. Tuff, who visits Ranquitte twice a year to oversee the construction. “Then, they wake up the next morning and do it all over again.”
After Arthur Bijur, a retired advertising executive and full-time Amagansett resident, signed on as the organization’s co-director in 2018, he visited Ranquitte, a place of rolling hills and savannas, a part of the country with a beauty that rarely exists in the global imagination. What he saw, however, was deeply saddening: the 400-plus kids in the village had no school to attend.
“Basically, a pile of rubble,” said Mr. Bijur, describing the remains of the village school, razed by the 2010 earthquake and never rebuilt. He remembered goats wandering around the debris and children with sunken faces and charged eyes.
“They were hungry so we got them burgers that came in styrofoam containers, but they wouldn’t eat them,” he said. “Because their parents told them that they had to share whatever food they got with their siblings back home.”
But, as promised, this really is a story of hope, a note of grace in dark times. So, fast-forward eight years to the present day.
The Wings Over Haiti School in Ranquitte stands two stories high, with eight classrooms and 130 students who follow a STEM-based curriculum. Every child receives a daily nutritious daily meal and they now smile a lot, said Mr. Bijur. They’re social, playful, look smart in their uniforms, and are eager to impress visitors with the English they’ve learned. Most important, they have dreams -- like kids everywhere -- of being doctors, architects, teachers, and artists.
The school’s expansion was largely facilitated by generous donations two years ago from Senator Elizabeth Dole and Jamie Dimon, the chairman and C.E.O. of JPMorgan Chase. In addition to the new classrooms, solar panels are being installed to power the school’s 12 computers in its new computer lab (now reliant on a generator), with Starlink internet to teach vital digital skills. A soccer field has been created, to help foster healthy habits and build teamwork. Who knows, maybe a future star will be born here -- a dream that has undoubtedly captured Haitian children after the country qualified for the ongoing FIFA World Cup, the first time in 53 years.
Additional funding is usually raised during the annual Wings Over Haiti benefit, which features a Hamptons Artists For Haiti art auction, curated by Coco Myers of folioeast, showcasing donated works from over 60 artists. More heroes.
This spring, there was yet more sprinkling of East End magic dust in Ranquitte, when John Wickersham, a Sag Harbor resident and part of the Wings Over Haiti group, helped secure the Rosenblum Photography Project that offers Ranquitte students photography lessons, equipment, and assignments designed to inspire creativity. The first of its kind in Haiti, the program was fully funded by Nina and Lisa Rosenblum, East Hampton residents and daughters of Naomi Rosenblum, an eminent photographic historian, and Walter Rosenblum, an influential photographer of the 20th century.
In an email to The Star, the Rosenblum family wrote, “We are proud to empower a new generation of Haitian photographers and storytellers by partnering with the Wings Over Haiti School to provide the photographic tools, resources, and encouragement young Haitian students need to bring their unique vision to life. Walter Rosenblum had deep respect and love for the Haitian people, whose lives he documented. By supporting photographic education, we honor his legacy and the power of visual storytelling for future generations.”
Any progress in Haiti these days is mind boggling. That so much has been accomplished while violence and evil stalk the land underscores the resilience of this unlikely human chain that yokes Haiti and the East End.
One of the group’s biggest obstacles, according to Mr. Glynn, is convincing those who say that helping Haiti is like shouting into a void. Still, the team will continue to shout. There’s more work to do, more children to educate, more lives to lift; precious water to be harvested from the air.
On July 18, the eighth annual Hamptons Artists for Haiti benefit will be held at the Bridgehampton Museum’s Tractor Barn, from 5:30 to 8 p.m. Up for grabs at the art auction: the work of 68 East End artists. Plus, music, food, drinks, and dancing. I will be there, too, as a volunteer, celebrating human pluck, joy, art, beauty, and connection.
“The benefit reminds us that this work is alive,” said Ms. Theodore. “It’s not just a fund-raiser in the Hamptons. It’s a living relationship between people who care on the East End and children who are growing, learning, and dreaming in Haiti.”
Tickets cost $225 at wingsoverhaiti.net.
