Who celebrated in 2017

Junior Monarch

Lemar 'De Irish Kid' Irish of the St John's Academy in Portsmouth made winning crowns a habit by winning his 4th crown in four years. And guess what- the title of De Kid's winning song was "You Can Depend On Me"; it was written by Livingston Cassel, the former calypsonian named "Spenser".

The Junior Monarch competition was held at the Eddie Andre Festival City in Pottersville on Friday 17 February 2017.

But De Irish Kid, then 16, would not have a chance to make it five in a row. This was his last competition at that stage.

Senior Monarch

If anyone could dethrone Dice, the 2016 Calypso King, in search of his unprecedented ninth crown, it would have been Karassah. And he did-by slamming Dice into a tied second place with Daddy Chess. Webb placed fourth.

On Saturday February 26, hundreds packed into the Eddie Andre Carnival City at the Pottersville savannah to witness the possibility of Dice's history-making crowning. But Karassah stole the show taking the Calypso crown out of Roseau, to Marigot, for the 4th time.

When the final results were announced, De Webb paced 4th, De Bobb lived to fight another day for his elusive first crown and Tasha P may try to be Dominica's female monarch number two in 2018. She was the first.

Hey, Jade!

"Emerald" Jade Romain stormed the stage at the Carnival Queen pageant to become Miss Dominica 2017. No surprise!

Jade had to be Miss Dominica 2017 after she blew away the other six competitors at the Eddie Andre Carnival City in the early hours of Saturday, February 25, 2017.

She bagged the awards for Best Swimwear, Best in Swimwear, Best Evening Wear and Best in Costume. Let Jade wear her crown-she earned it.

Jade, an employee of the National Cooperative Credit Union (NCCU) said afterwards that she had no prior experience in pageantry and since she "worked so hard" she was very proud of herself.

"I know the other young ladies are very intelligent and talented and so it could have been anybody's crown because they all performed very well," she said. "I intend to continue to play my role as an ambassador to my

Karla Henry placed second; she received awards for Best in Evening Wear, Best Response to Questions and Miss Photogenic. The Second Runner-up was Terisa Lewis, a teacher at the Goodwill Secondary School and the daughter of the late Clifton "Coco Tea" Lewis who lost his life during the ravages of Tropical Storm Erika in 2015.

The other award winners were Miss Amity-Easter Francis; Leadership Award for Best Community Project-Gabrielle Abraham; Best Costume-Zethra Baron and Best Performing Talent-Gabrielle Abraham.

Later in the year Jade won her first regional pageant, the 2017 Miss Caribbean Culture Queen Pageant in Nevis.

Others who celebrated in 2017

-At the elections held at the Fort Young Hotel on May 18, 2017, retired ICC cricket umpire, Billy Doctrove became the new president of the Dominica Olympic Committee (DOC). Doctrove defeated the incumbent Felix Wilson 8 votes to five.

• St. Martin's School left the other schools many miles behind when it boasted of four of the top five students in the 2017 Grade Six Exams. They students were: Adeola Xavier, Nailah Alexis, Kerelle Joseph and Carlisa George.

-Isabella Prentice, a former student, teacher and deputy principal at the school, was appointed principal of the Convent High School, one of the major secondary schools in Dominica, following the retirement of Josephine Dublin.

• Lady V and Sye shared the 2017 Road March prize. As if it was under the spell of Lady V's "Spirit" or being manipulated by Sye's "Cartoon Cabinet", the Dominica Calypso Association (DCA) took what looked like an eternity to decide on the road march, traditionally, the song that was played the most during the Monday and Tuesday road parade. The counting was probably difficult.