The Remnant, the DAAS, and the Duty of Stewardship
By Gabriel J Christian Esquire
Co-founder of the Dominica Academy of Arts ,& Sciences
This is a call to the conscience of all Dominicans, at home and abroad, to rise above division, indifference, and fatigue, and to unite in common purposefor the preservation and prosperity of our small republic.
Dominica stands at a defining crossroads. The nation entrusted to us—shaped by sacrifice, cooperation, and reverence for law—is being placed in grave peril by lawlessness, avarice, and a style of leadership increasingly marked by blind ego and contempt for accountability. Such leadership refuses submission to the rule of law and fails to show genuine respect for Dominica, her institutions, or her people.
Nowhere is this failure more evident than in the assault on our natural environment—our forests, rivers, coastlines, and fragile ecosystems—ravaged on the altar of short-term gain and unchecked power. This destruction is not merely environmental; it is moral, cultural, and existential. Dominica’s natural heritage is not the possession of any government, party, or individual. It is a sacred trust, held for future generations.
To understand how we arrived here—and how we might yet recover—we must reflect on the lives and example of those who embodied a different ethic: service before self, duty before ambition, country before party.
The Cadet Ethic and the Post-War Remnant
Both and were shaped early by the Dominica Grammar School Cadet Corps, which they joined in their early teens. They were value-engineered in a noble creed—honor, duty, discipline, service, and love of country—at a time when civic formation was considered essential to national survival.
They were students of the Dominica Grammar School in 1951, a year of profound historical significance: the year Dominicans first exercised universal adult suffrage, voting without regard to property ownership and electing our own internal government. That moment marked the political coming-of-age of the Dominican people, and it coincided with the moral formation of a generation schooled in restraint, integrity, and public service.
This was the post-World War II remnant—men and women shaped by global sacrifice, scarcity, and discipline—who understood that freedom without responsibility is decay, and leadership without character is ruin. From this remnant came teachers, civil servants, scientists, nurses, farmers, cooperators, and nation-builders who believed instinctively in koudmen, cooperation, and voluntary service.
Today, that remnant is nearly gone.
What remains of it survives not in nostalgia, but in institutions that still carry its moral DNA: the Cubs, Boy Scouts, Cadets, Girl Guides, Red Cross Society, and in exemplary civic organizations such as Rebuild Dominica (www.rebuilddominica.org) , the Dominica Academy of Arts & Sciences (DAAS), and the many noble Dominican diaspora organizations and community groups at home and abroad that continue to practice volunteerism, cooperation, and service without fanfare.
Dr. Clayton Arthur Shillingford: Scholar, Cadet, Steward
The late Dr. Clayton Arthur Shillingford—President Emeritus of the DAAS—was a living embodiment of this tradition. A cadet, athlete, and scholar of the Dominica Grammar School, he went on to graduate with honors in Mathematics and Botany from the University College of the West Indies, earn a Master’s degree from King’s College London, and receive a PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign.
As a senior plant scientist at DuPont Laboratories in Delaware, he achieved distinction abroad, yet remained anchored to Dominica. His scientific career was inseparable from his environmental conscience; he understood that land, science, and sovereignty are intertwined. He gave decades of voluntary service to the South Florida Dominica Association, Rebuild Dominica, and most notably, to the DAAS, serving as its first President from 2001 to 2010.
Dr. Shillingford believed deeply in statecraft—wisdom in the management of public affairs—and in collaboration across political lines for the national good. His quiet leadership gave moral legitimacy to the DAAS and demonstrated that true patriotism is disciplined, patient, and principled.
Raglan Riviere: Cadet of the Digital Republic
If Dr. Shillingford provided the scholarly conscience of the DAAS, Raglan Riviere provided its infrastructure and connective tissue. Also a product of the DGS Cadet Corps ethos, Riviere was soft-spoken, modest, and tireless. He labored quietly behind a computer screen to build www.da-academy.org,( now www.thedominica-academy.org) long before digital nation-building became commonplace.
He understood intuitively that a small, scattered people could still function as one national mind if given a shared platform. Under his stewardship, the DAAS website became a virtual civic square, enabling collaboration in education, youth development, science, culture, and environmental preservation.
Among his most far-sighted contributions was the creation of the Dominica Botanic Gardens website in 2005. This was not a sentimental project. It was strategic.
The Botanic Gardens as National Memory and Development Laboratory
The Dominica Botanic Gardens—established in 1890 as part of the global Kew Gardens network—were once a center of scientific excellence. As history demonstrates, great civilizations are not built by brute force alone, but by organized intelligence, teamwork, and applied science. Botanical science fueled agricultural productivity, public health, and economic resilience across the world.
Riviere understood that in an era when Dominica’s forests and rivers are imperiled by recklessness and greed, the Gardens must again be seen as a development laboratory—a place where conservation, research, education, and national planning converge. Digitizing and preserving this legacy was an act of stewardship and foresight.
Memory as Mandate: A Call to the Living
The lives of Clayton Shillingford and Raglan Riviere remind us that great civilizations are built by citizens who accept discipline, embrace duty, and serve quietly. They stand in stark contrast to the lawlessness, ecological vandalism, and moral carelessness that now threaten our republic.
They were part of a remnant that believed institutions matter, that land must be protected, that service is honorable, and that citizenship carries obligation.
That remnant is fading—but it is not extinct.
It lives wherever Dominicans still practice koudmen; wherever volunteers serve without applause; wherever civic organizations place country above ego; wherever the environment is defended as sacred inheritance rather than exploited as spoil.
This, then, is the summons to our generation:
Protect the land.
Defend the rule of law.
Revive civic discipline.
Strengthen institutions.
Unite across borders.
Serve without vanity.
Small nations do not endure by the will of strongmen, but by the collective conscience of disciplined citizens. If Dominica is to be saved—and to prosper with dignity—we must now become worthy heirs of those who came before us.
Silence is not an option.
Stewardship is our inheritance.
Unity is our duty.
Sincerely yours,
Gabriel J. Christian, Esquire