aboriginalculture

Doomadgee is a largely Indigenous community located in the Gulf of Carpentaria, approximately 140km from the Northern Territory border and 93km west of Burketown. The community is positioned alongside the Nicholson River and provides access to the coast, freshwater rivers, and Lawn Hill National Park, one of the Gulf’s most popular natural tourist attractions. The Waanyi and Gangalidda people are recognized as the Traditional Owners of the region surrounding Doomadgee. The original mission, known as ‘Old Doomadgee’, was established in 1933 by a non-Indigenous family, the Akehurst family, with the support of the Christian Brethren Assemblies and Chief Protector of Aboriginals[2]. The mission was located at ‘Dumaji’ at Bayley Point Aboriginal reserve, on Gangalidda land. Archival records and personal accounts by residents describe the restrictive and difficult conditions at Doomadgee. In 1950, a government report severely criticized practices in use in the dormitory. At the time, mission policy required that all children over 6 years old lived in dormitories[14]. Boys left the dormitory around the age of 14 to take up station work. Girls were trained in domestic duties and often remained in the dormitories until they married. By the late 1950s, many residents left Doomadgee and went to the Mornington Island mission, where the practice of separating children from parents in dormitories had been abandoned. During the 1960s, older, unmarried girls began returning to their parents[16]. The dormitories closed at some point in the late 1960s. Source: www.qld.gov.au/firstnations/cultural-awareness-heritage-a...

Gracemere is a rural town and locality in the Rockhampton Region, Queensland, Australia. The area was first explored by Europeans in 1853, when the Archer brothers arrived looking for pastures for their sheep. They settled by a small lake, originally called "Farris" or Padgole lagoon which was named Gracemere in 1855. The name Gracemere comes from "Grace", the name of Thomas Archer's wife, and "mere" which is a Scottish term for the lake.[2][3] They also located a suitable landing point for supplies on the nearby Fitzroy River, which later became Rockhampton. In July 1855, Charles and Thomas Archer with around 30 other people including four Native Police troopers, four Aboriginal men from the Burnett River, and their wives, left the Archer's Eidsvold pastoral station in order to construct the Gracemere run. The Commissioner for Crown Lands in the Leichhardt region, William Wiseman, joined them to help locate the most appropriate area, and in August 1855 they determined the area next to the current Gracemere lagoon was best. The local Aboriginals led by "King Harold" wished to obtain peaceful conditions with the Archer brothers and in return for allowing the indigenous people to live in the area, the Archer brothers utilized Harold's people to aid in forcibly "restraining the outside blacks" who were resisting British occupation. Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gracemere,_Queensland#:~:text=The%2....

‘On the Albert – 1893 – A day out with tribe and King – with Hon. C. Lambert’. Group, including Cyril Lambert (standing at rear), Polly Boyd nursing her daughter Milly, Jimmy Boyd, Sarah Clarke, Jackey Jackey, Billy Gallen, and Kipper Tommy Andrews. Albert River, 1893. Photograph by Will Stark. Who was Jackey Jackey? The man that is well documented in several photographs wearing the breastplate inscribed ‘Jackey Jackey – King of the Logan and Pimpama’ lived in the region of south-east Queensland near where the town of Beenleigh now stands on the lower Logan River. While a record identifying his birth has yet to be found, we estimate from his appearance in photographs in the years just prior to his death, as well as when his daughter Emily was born around 1853, 17 that he was born around 1820. He lived in the region from before the first European settlers arrived in the Beenleigh district in the 1860s until his death in around 1900. Source: press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/n9914/pdf/01_aird_...