In what could have been an old tent revival meeting, friends (Friends of Roy, that is) turned out Thursday morning at Bluebeard Hotel's Towne Hall to hear former Gov. Roy L. Schneider deny criminal charges leveled against him earlier in the week by Attorney General Iver Stridiron.
The crowd, numbering more than 100, represented a political who's who of the territory.
Gov. Schneider was clearly touched by the outpouring of emotion. Among those he thanked by name was his wife, former first lady Barbara Schneider.
Others on hand to cheer him on included longtime friend Clive Banfield, St. Johnian and former senator Cleone Creque Maynard, Marylyn Stapleton (who turned her back as a Democratic official on her party to support Schneider for re-election), Edith Woods, Dorothy Elskoe, Malcolm Ford, Norma Samuel, sister-in-law and former Tourism official Judith Watson, Schneider's St. Thomas Administrator Levron "Pops" Sarauw, Gerald Nicholson, Victor Schneider and Ladd Richards, to name but a handful of the well-known faces present.
The Schneider loyalists created a decidedly upbeat mood, enthusiastically applauding the former governor and his attorneys and twice launching into the civil rights anthem, "We Shall Overcome."