With a sad heart I respectfully pay tribute to my Classmate, friend, and brother, Norman Victor Carless, more sincerely known to us, his close and beloved friends and fellow Hermits, as "Tubby", or Tubos, or Mother "T" - no Joke. The brotherhood and I were very close friends with Victor.

Victor, my classmate, attended Kingston College, Kingston, Jamaica from January1961 to June 1968. I attended KC January 1962 until June 1968, Jamaica’s year of Independence. He came from West Kingston. I am from East Kingston. Roy Addie was his first true friend from January 1961 at Kingston College.

Victor worked for one year after leaving KC and then enrolled at UWI St. Augustine Campus School of Engineering in October 1969. I worked for two years, and I enrolled in October 1970. That is Where Victor received his name “Tubby” in his grub week October 1969, he told me.

Our Hall, Canada Hall or Dorm was referred to as Alcatraz by the students before us. That is where the great friendship between Jamaicans from the many different high schools, and the students from the many different Caribbean countries blossomed.

It was during that 1970 - 1971, period that a group of us Jamaicans formed the Core Original HERMITS.- Victor “Tubby” Carless, Granville “Furry” Campbell, Winston “Chester” Cameron, Michael “Bower” Powell, Richard “Tilly” Tyrell, Raymond “Joshua” Hammond, Roy “Taphill” Gayle, Robert “Bobby” Miller, Herbert “Purdom” Edwards, and many others slowly joined, It was said then that the Hermits on campus had no local girlfriends on campus in Trinidad. You were allowed to not be a hermit when you returned to Jamaica for Christmas, Easter or Summer Break.

We have an original Hermits WhatsApp group that we use to share stories about our families. We have been told that the Hermit’s brotherhood or Hermitage still exists and continues on campus after some 54 years.

After almost 60 years of friendship and brotherhood, these are some of the qualities that I know Victor displayed and possessed.

His LOVE for his late Mother, his love for Janette and his two daughters; his love for his five brothers and his late father whom I met once at the Airport in 1971 in Jamaica. Janette’s 49 1/2yrs of marriage. Tubby took Flowers to his mother’s graveside every Thanksgiving for 18 Continuous years until he got sick in 2019, and he moved up to Connecticut. He had stopped driving 80 miles one way from PA to NJ.

He is super honest and hardworking. He loved his Job. He pulls the cart he would say. He is a trusted friend and confidant. He never used foul language. He was a perfectionist. I call him Joe Perfect sometimes and he dubbed me the Risk-Taker.

He loved his music and spoke often about expensive "Bose Speakers" that he loved to spend on.

He was a member of the KC Choir for many years and was also a member of the Cadet unit.

Tubby had high moral standards. He could be trusted. He shared a lot of information. He was progressive and held deep spiritual beliefs. He read the bible more than 10 times; he told me.

He loved cooking and we gave him the name Mother "T", Mother Tubby because of the cooking he did on campus during Easter and Christmas breaks.

He Loved "old talk", stories and jives.

He will be missed dearly. " Tubby” you have fought the good fight. You have finished the Race. You have Kept the faith.

See you on the other side.