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Major Helen Ryan, founder and commandant of the Women's National Emergency Legion, formed m 1938, and how assisting the forces in various areas arrived in Cairns on an official visit yesterday. She spent a busy afternoon testing women's transport drivers who are anxious to assist in the war effort. Any woman interested in this form of service should communicate with Major Helen Ryan at Motor Transport Corps in Lake-street, Cairns. The service is voluntary, but allowances are made to workers who are not sent out of their own district unless they wish to transfer. Major Helen Ryan at present is in charge of the W.N.E.L. transport corps and clerical workers attached to the U.S. forces in North Queensland. She is the wife of Dr. William D. Ryan, of Brisbane and has spent the last five years preparing and training women for war work. She stated that she was thrilled to see how wholeheartedly the women of the North had responded to the call to assist in this national emergency. There could be no failure when the woman were so staunchly helping the men at the front. Source: Cairns Post 20 Feb 1943, P. 4 trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/42378834?browse=ndp%3A...

The children at the mission learned to read and write in Guugu Yimidhirr (which had been transcribed earlier by the missionaries), and the girls helped in the missionaries’ houses and in the garden. It was routine for the girls to be confined to a dormitory each night and to have limited access to their families. Initially, the missionary Wilhelm Poland supervised them closely at Elim while the senior missionary, Georg Heinrich Schwarz, attempted to establish a second station at Hope Valley. This arrangement was altered in 1890 after the older girls, including Mulun, secretly invited Guugu Yimidhirr boys into their dormitory at night. Thereafter the older girls were periodically sent to Hope Valley to stay with Schwarz. Source: ia.anu.edu.au/biography/mulun-magdalena-29712

Lutheran involvement in the Cooktown area began in 1885 when missionary Johann Flierl stopped off at Cooktown on his way to New Guinea. He later received government permission to start a mission station. The original mission sites were at Elim and Cape Bedford. Elim became known as Hope Valley, and later Hope Vale. The Immanuel Lutheran Synod in South Australia supported work amongst the Gungu Yimidhirr people by sending missionaries C.A. Meyer, George Schwarz and Wilhelm Poland. At the outbreak of the Second World War the people, along with missionary Schwartz, were interned at Woorabinda, near Rockhampton, in Queensland. In just one month twenty eight people lost their lives with nearly a quarter of the people dying over the next eight years. In 1986 the community became the first to receive a Deed of Grant in Trust (DOGIT) and formed the Hope Vale Aboriginal Council. In 1997 a Native Title determination was made concerning the lands of the Hope Vale. Source: aiatsis.gov.au/sites/default/files/catalogue_resources/MS...

The Guugu Yimithirr people like all Aborigines in Australia have been here for approximately 100,000 years. The Guugu Yimithirr first came to prominence in 1770 when they engaged with Captain James Cook and his crew on the good ship Endeavour. As is well known in history the Guugu Yimithirr hosted Captain Cook at present day Cooktown (Gungarr) for 7 weeks. During this time he not only had to repair the Endeavour he also met the Guugu Yimithirr people and engaged in dialogue along with Joseph Banks and Sydney Parkinson. They gathered a word list of the Guugu Yimithirr language and from this encounter the Guugu Yimithirr have been immortalised in the English language by giving the name to that giant hopping marsupial-Gangurru-Kangaroo. Hope Valley Mission was founded in January of 1886 by the Lutheran Missionary John Flierl. He was on his way to establish a mission in New Guinea but was held up in Cooktown and during the idle time he began work amongst the Guugu Yimithirr clans in Cooktown. He established himself as missionary on the Cape Bedford Aboriginal Reserve, choosing a spot on the bay north of Cape Bedford which he called Elim. Source: www.hopevale.qld.gov.au/history