MONA Hammond, one of the first black actors to make a mark on British television, died in London on July 4 at age 91.

Hammond, who was from Clarendon, was a fixture on British television and stages for over 50 years. She appeared as Blossom Jackson in EastEnders, the long-running soap opera from 1994 to 1997.

Prior to that role she played Susu in Desmond’s, a half-hour sitcom based at a West Indian barber shop in London, that ran for four years starting in 1990.

Hammond was born Mavis Chin to a Chinese father and Jamaican mother. She was among the thousands of Jamaicans who migrated to the United Kingdom during the 1950s.

After graduating from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 1964 she found steady work on television in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s.

Along with fellow Jamaican Yvonne Brewster and Carmen Munroe of Guyana, she founded the Tallawa Theatre Company in 1985. They mounted a number of Afro-centric productions including The Black Jacobins.

One of her proteges was veteran actress/singer Sharon D Clarke, who appeared in the Talawa Theatre Company’s staging of O Babylon! In 1988. She paid tribute to Hammond in an editorial published by The Guardian newspaper.

“She was always generous with her time and her wisdom. To be in a room with her, witnessing her craft every day, was a masterclass and pure joy. She had a gentleness that also said ‘Don’t mess with me.’ On stage she could ground you with her stillness, then unleash a hurricane with her ferocity,” wrote Clarke.

Mona Hammond was awarded the Order of the British Empire in 2005. She is survived by a son and grandchild.