The Tribune

By Morgan Adderley

Tribune Staff Reporter

madderley@tribunemedia.net

AFTER his home caught fire last week Thursday, local street philosopher “Potcake” is appealing to the public for assistance.

The 65-year-old, whose real name is Locksley Thompson, says the incident has left him sleeping on cardboard.

The cost to rebuild a smaller structure on the same lot could be as much as $28,000.

“Last week Thursday (at) two in the afternoon I was sitting right here on this wall and one of my neighbours in Balls Alley…drive here and say: ‘Potcake ya house on fire,’” Mr Thompson told The Tribune.

“I took my trolley and I park it in the back of (a) parish and I catch a jitney up home.

“When I reach there, I met two fire engines and a crowd in the road. They was extinguishing the fire.”

Mr Thompson said this was not the first house fire he has experienced.

He said: “That fire (must have been) about three years ago I think. In that fire, I lost plenty of my clothes. I like radio, so some of my radios got burn up.

“My lil’ portable stove…my lil’ furniture, my lil’ bed and stuff…all of them get destroyed in that first fire in (2015).”

Mr Thompson also experienced significant losses in last week’s fire.

He told The Tribune: “Everything – the whole roof, completely gone. All the bathroom, all the face bowl, the bathroom sink, all that down to rock.

“I lose my bed, my warm comfortable bed.

“It’s a big house, an eight-room house… Only thing left in the house is a little portion in the back.”

Mr Thompson said he now has to sleep on cardboard in a room as “small as a lil’ toilet.”

“It’s a small lil’ room in the back, way in the back. And last night…I put cardboard on the floor to sleep.

“And by the windows them that the fire blow out, I have cardboard over them and some curtains to keep the draught out.”

Mr Thompson continued: “And I sleeping on the cardboard because some of my family members brought me blankets and a pillow.

“So, I (have) everything just with cardboard all around it, just one room (that’s) just as small as a lil’ toilet. That’s how the room is.”

He added: “I just married my daughter last year November, (I lost) my new coat suit and other clothes I had, my new tennis, my bureau with all my underwear.

“On my bureau, I had just buy a lucky teddy bear for good luck. All that burn. I had two Bibles, the two Bibles burn up.”

Despite the tragedies, Mr Thompson is determined to rebuild on the same lot, citing familial connection to the land.

He said: “I have to rebuild it because that’s generation property. My great-grandfather, Nathan Thompson from Deep Creek, Eleuthera (built that house).”

The estimated cost to rebuild is approximately $28,000, according to Mr Thompson’s brother.

“My brother is a contractor,” Mr Thompson said.

“He wants to build a small… one bedroom (structure), with a lil’ kitchen and bathroom. Just a small lil’ efficiency. This his intention in case I get some donations.

“He gone break down the rest of the house and just build something where I could sleep out of the rain and out of the hurricane.

“You know the hurricane come every November…and then all the cold. Then the rainy season start ‘round June and July.

“And then where I sleeping now I just gin get drown in the rain.

“So my sister and brother (are trying to) help me, because I’m (one of the elder) siblings.”

When asked if there is anything he wishes to say to the public, Mr Thompson said: “Yes, I really need help man. I really need (it).”