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Wujal Wujal is an Aboriginal community located in FNQ, originally known as Bloomfield and later the Bloomfield River Mission. Wujal Wujal, meaning ‘many falls’, is part of the traditional homelands of the Eastern Kuku Yalanji nation. The waterfalls are a women’s place and very sacred to the community. The public can only access one of the waterfalls, which is clearly signed. The first recorded European to visit the Bloomfield River was British Royal Navy Lieutenant Commander Frederick Bedwell, who accompanied Captain Phillip Parker King on board the HMS Mermaid on a hydrological survey of the east coast of Australia. Gold was discovered in the region in the early 1870s and resulted in a gold rush with thousands of miners setting up camp in the Palmer River area. A tin mining industry was also established in the area. Tensions between miners and pioneer settlers moving into Kuku-Yalanji territories resulted in violent clashes. The establishment of the Bloomfield River Mission was a Queensland Government initiative. It was announced that a reserve on the Bloomfield River had been set aside, 45 miles south of Cooktown in the mid-1880s. The trigger was the rapid development of the region by settlers establishing sugar cane plantations and cattle stations. The Queensland Government declined to make a financial commitment beyond the first year of the Mission’s operation. Instead, the Queensland Government offered the running of Bloomfield River Mission to the Lutherans. The Bloomfield Mission was considered a failure and government subsidies were withdrawn. In August 1900 it was decided that the Mission be wound down. Source: banayirrijiart.com.au/history/

Came to a tragic end after sinking after a collision with another warship in the Mediterranean on 22 June 1893.

VICTORIA was the flagship of the Commander in Chief Mediterranean Vice Admiral Sir George Tryon in 1893. During Officer of the Watch Manoeuvres off Tripoli, VICTORIA was struck by HMS CAMPERDOWN owing to a mentality amongst commanders in those days that demanded a slavish obedience to the orders, even when the orders were incorrect and unsafe. CAMPERDOWN's armoured bow caused massive damage to VICTORIA and she went to the bottom in minutes, taking with her some 358 members of her Ship's Company including Admiral Tryon. Amongst the survivors was her Second in Command, Commander, later Admiral of the Fleet, John Jellicoe who was trapped in his cabin and was only rescued when a young Midshipman recognised he was missing and helped him out. His experience of this incident was instrumental in the way that Jellicoe later handled the Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland.

Taxidermy is the art of preserving an animal's body via mounting (over an armature) or stuffing, for the purpose of display or study. Animals are often, but not always, portrayed in a lifelike state. The word taxidermy describes the process of preserving the animal, but the word is also used to describe the end product, which are called taxidermy mounts or referred to simply as "taxidermy". The word taxidermy is derived from the Greek words taxis and derma.[1] Taxis means "arrangement", and derma means "skin" (the dermis).[1] The word taxidermy translates to "arrangement of skin".[1] Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxidermy

Boomerangs are an internationally recognised symbol of Australia. For Aboriginal people the boomerang is as old as creation and a symbol of the enduring strength of Aboriginal culture. The boomerang has also been a popular symbol for tourism and travel, with notions of visitors returning ‘like a boomerang’. The boomerang is a symbol of cultural endurance and a tangible link to the long presence of Aboriginal people on the continent. Boomerangs have many uses for First Nations people, including as a weapon and a tool, for hunting and digging, and in ceremonies. Some are designed to return to the thrower but the vast majority are not. For many thousands of years, Aboriginal groups exchanged boomerangs across the continent. Trade in boomerangs continued after 1788. European fascination with the boomerang, especially the returning variety, meant that early barter with settlers, and then tourists, led Aboriginal people to create an industry making boomerangs. That trade continues today. Source: www.nma.gov.au/exhibitions/defining-symbols-australia/boo...

Fashion is reversible. Ones Europeans tried to dress Aboriginal people, today Aboriginal traditional elements are wining the fashion look of Europeans.

Indigenous Australians have influenced modern Australian dress since first contact. From possum skin cloaks and booka kangaroo capes to shell necklaces in Tasmania, Europeans have been fascinated with Indigenous materials, skills and aesthetics. They have stolen, purchased, borrowed and worn them for more than 200 years. In turn, Indigenous Australians have at times enjoyed wearing soldiers’ red jackets as battle spoils and possibly mocked the Europeans by wearing their top hats cockily in the early streets of Sydney. Later, as First Australians were dispossessed from their lands and herded into reserves and missions, clothing was imposed on them, ranging from shapeless “mother Hubbard” dresses for women to shabby but respectable woolen two-piece suits for men. Traditional dress practices, along with the ceremony, language and music-making, were often banned by the colonisers. Missionaries often taught western-style leatherwork to men and needlecraft to women – yet powerful hybrids of the self-determined dress also emerged, expressing subversive gestures and quiet resistance. In the mid 20th century, missionary nuns in Far North Australia began to allow Indigenous women to craft their own textiles. Brightly coloured fabrics were the result, with unusual combinations of motifs. For some time, Indigenous Australian art was often seen as the future of a distinctively Australian design, as evident in the 1970s energy of Jenny Kee and Linda Jackson, but on the whole, Indigenous design was not recognised in its own right. This is now changing - Indigenous fashion design today is being shaped by First Nations people at every level. Source: theconversation.com/how-indigenous-fashion-designers-are-...