SANTA CRUZ, St Elizabeth — A sombre mood gradually evolved to laughter and good cheer as board members, local staff, clients and friends of the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA) gathered last Wednesday to share memories of the late agriculture minister Roger Clarke.

He died in Florida on August 28, apparently of a heart attack. Clarke was at the airport awaiting a flight to Jamaica when he collapsed. He had spent weeks in Florida recovering from back surgery.

Clarke will be accorded an official funeral in Westmoreland on September 13.

Former Member of Parliament for South-East St Elizabeth, Derrick Rochester, a close friend of Clarke and chairman of RADA’s advisory board in St Elizabeth said the “get-together” at the RADA office in Santa Cruz had been organised to “celebrate the life of a great man”.

Rochester said Clarke, a former member of parliament for North-East St Elizabeth and a former Mayor of Black River, had served his country “with honesty, integrity and great distinction”.

Several others, all close friends of the late Cabinet minister, spoke of his service to the country, especially in agriculture. They also spoke of his fun-loving approach, his extraordinary capacity to make friends in every walk of life, to see the humorous side of every issue and to laugh at himself.

The speeches were followed by informal “socialising” as Clarke’s friends quietly told anecdotes and “Roger stories” over drinks, mannish water and sandwiches.

Retired banker Ewan Stephenson shared with the Jamaica Observer Central a tale of Clarke walking into a robbery at a pharmacy in Kingston.

The late agriculture minister had gone to the door of the pharmacy only to find it locked. His persistence in knocking resulted in a man opening up.

No sooner had Clarke entered than the man produced a gun, locked the door behind him and told him, “This is a hold-up … give me everything in your pocket.”

Clarke obliged by emptying his pockets. But then the armed criminal threatened to kill him.

“Don’t kill me,” Clarke is said to have pleaded, “if you don’t kill me, you can see me again, hold me up again and empty me pocket again.”

The gunman was said to be still laughing when he left the pharmacy, leaving Clarke and other victims of the robbery locked up inside, deprived of cash and valuables but otherwise unharmed.