People
pp. 7-15 · Read in the full issue
Quietly and unobtrusively—in contrast with the prevailing visita tion of political VlP’s—the Chair man of the Burns Philp group of companies, Mr. James Burns, visited all the main centres of Papua and New Guinea, in the liner BuMo, in July. It was not reported that he sought interviews anywhere with native representatives on the sub ject of self-government; but he met most of the leading citizens, official and non-official, during his tour, and showed a lively interest in the economy of the Territory. The dif ficulty of making a profit out of shipping services under today’s con ditions is a topic dealt with very frankly each year by the BP chair man; but the Big Firm has other substantial interests there, especi ally planting and merchandising. * * * Appealing for lay Anglicans to go to P-NG “to serve as good examples in secular jobs’’, the Rev. Douglas Jones, of the New Guinea Anglican Diocese, at St. John’s Cathedral, Brisbane, in July, said “New Guinea is no South Africa, but there are some Europeans there who behave as if it were”. What natives saw of Europeans now would decide their attitude when self-determination was granted to them by Australia.
Some Europeans do not seem to recognise this and so they give a woefully wrong impression he added.
Latest in a number of Indian appointments this year to senior Fiji Government posts, is the elevation of Mr. R. H. Bechan from Senior Customs Examiner to first Indian
The man who looks after the interests of the Tokelau Islanders—Mr. H. L. Webber. He has his office in Apia, but visits the three atolls every time a plane or a ship goes there. The Tokelaus are New Zealand territory but for convenience, authority is delegated through NZ's High Commissioner in Western Samoa, and through him, to a special Tokelau Officer— currently Mr. Webber. Photo: J. P. Shortall.
Collector of Customs. He is a Bachelor of Arts (gained in NZ) and, before joining Customs in 1952, served with Fiji Education Depart ment. * * * In July, countless NZ homes and offices received a pocket-sized illus trated booklet showing how the Lepers’ Trust Board allocated £64,000 last year to fight leprosy in the Western and Central Pacific.
It was all part of the appeal launched annually by Mr. P. J.
Twomey, the Board’s Secretary, who for 35 years has been collecting money and goods in New Zealand for Islands’ lepers. He is known everywhere affectionately as “The Leper Man”. Now an elderly man, Mr. Twomey says he thinks his days of usefulness are drawing to a close —but his friends won’t hear of it. * * * The new member of the P-NG Education Advisory Board, Mr.
Frederick Boski Tom, appointed to fill a vacancy in late July follow ing the retirement of Mr. A. A.
Roberts, formerly Director of Native Affairs, is an outstanding New Guinean teacher. Before the war, he taught at Malaguna and Nordup schools, New Britain. Sent to Gona (Papua) as a carrier for the Japs after they occupied Rabaul, he escaped, joined the Australian forces, and was wounded serving with the Papuan Infantry Battalion. At war’s end, he joined Sogeri Education Centre teaching staff, then trans ferred to Keravat and now is teach ing at Lavongai, New Hanover. A fluent speaker in English, he was a P-NG delegate to the 1956 South Pacific Commission Conference in Suva, * * * A small colour party, Captain A. N. Maitoga, Sergeant Alan A.
Whiteside, Staff Sergeant Sam Weller Waqairatu, and Staff Sergeant Sanaila Rabuku, representing Fiji Military Forces, received special cheers at a military parade in Kuala Lumpur, Malaya, on August 1, which marked the end of the “emergency” there. Malayan people remembered with gratitude the assistance Fijian jungle-fighters of the Ist Battalion gave them against Red terrorists between 1952 and 1956. * * * By the July Milos, Mr. K. H.
Dalrymple-Hay, well known BSI businessman and non-official mem ber of Advisory Council, left the Protectorate for a long holiday. His many interests throughout the Solomons will be managed during his absence by Mr. Bob Firth, who recently retired from the post of BSIP Taxation Officer and who has spent over 30 years in the group. * * * When the UN “hoo-hah” over P-NG “independence” was at its height, in June-July, Australian newspapers sent swarms of special
writers to the Territory to get colourful feature stories of the re actions of Europeans and natives to the development. One correspondent, Frank O’Neill, went on to Dutch NG and, as his paper, Sydney Sunday Mirror, headlined it, “Uncovered One of the World’s Strangest Success Stories”. He described how at Biak he met 32-years-old Herman Womsiwor, of the local native co operative, who is a Biak Councillor, has timber interests, and speaks pre cise English. Dutch, Malay, Biak and Japanese. A village boy when the Dutch left Biak in the face of in vasion in 1942, he was forced to work as an airfields labourer during the Jap occupation, then became a ■house-boy for the Americans when US forces recaptured it in 1944.
Smuggled out of Biak in a US soldier’s kitbag, he travelled the victory road to Tokio in the van guard of the Allied Army as a unit “mascot”. After the war, he worked in Japan for the American civil service, then returned to Biak and applied his Yankee “know-how” to becoming a multi-lingual native leader and prosperous businessman.
In Port Moresby's most important wedding of the year, Miss Janet Normoyle, only daughter of Police Commissioner and Mrs. Chris Normoyle, was married at St. John's Church of England, July 23, to Mr. lan Robertson. The bridegroom is First Officer on the "Changte" and the young couple will live in Sydney.
Another journalist,, Canberra political columnist Don Whitington, drew attention on his return, to the Gilbertian questions on luggage put by Customs to travellers to P-NG, and also to the permit system— both of which have long riled Terri torians. Whitington pointed out that he went to Canada and USA as a civilian during war-time with far less fuss than going to P-NG last month. Sample questions he had tc fill in: Are you landing motor cars vans or trucks? (This to air passengers whose luggage is limited to 35 lbs, unless they pay excess) Animals or animal products (includ ing meats, salami, cheese, skins, wool hair, horns, hoofs, bones, dried blood and feathers) ? Even P-NG residents leaving the Territory temporarily (even for Australia) must get a re entry permit before leaving.
Keeping an eye on Australia’s con siderable trade with the Central and Eastern Pacific Islands is part ol the duties of Mr. H. C. Menzies Commonwealth Government Trade Commissioner at Wellington, NZ. He made a swing around Fiji, Tonga Samoa and Tahiti in July. * * * For the past four years, a com prehensive film coverage of life and developmental activity in P-NG has been shot by the Australian De partment of Interior Film Division under the guiding hand of Mr Maslyn Williams, senior producer One documentary, Growing Up With Guba , tracing a young natives growth from boyhood to manhood and the effect education is having on a typical NG community, has
Mr, H. H. Gassmann has had an adventurou[?] life since he escaped from his native Bavaria[?] by hitch-hiking into Italy just before th[?] balloon went up in Europe in 1939. in July[?] he and Mrs. Gassmann (above) arrived in Por[?] Moresby to take over the management of Note[?] Papua. Both have been in the hotel or catering[?] business since just after the war, and this is[?] Mr. Gassmann's second spell in the Territory Ten years ago he was catering officer for BGE[?] at Bulolo. Since then he has studied the hote business at first hand in the United Kingdom the Continent and Australia.
Papuan Prints Photo
come in for some heady praise after screenings on TV in Australia in July. It has been entered for the Italia Prize (international TV’s documentary “Oscar”). * ♦ * Loaded with more than 500 speci mens of marine life she collected during a two-months’ working holi day in New Caledonia, Miss Elizabeth Pope, Curator of Worms and Echinoderms at the Australian Museum, returned to Sydney by Tahitien on August 4. Mostly she collected sea urchins and sea stars from parts of the NC coast, but she also brought back samples of coral that become phosphorescent when exposed to ultra-violet light.
She obtained them from Noumea Aquarium, the only place in the world which has the coral among ex hibits. * * * On August 26, the day after the Australian Academy of Science’s Symposium on Natural Products mds in Sydney, 21 delegate inter lational chemists (including three tfobel Prize winners) will make a ;our of Papua and New Guinea. Two Administration officials, Mr. J. S.
Vomersley, Chief of Botany Division, md Mr. D. W. P. Murty, Agricul ural Department’s principal :hemist, will squire them for a week iround main Territory centres, in iluding the Highlands. * * * So far, Fiji has escaped the bane ►f the professional party politician, >ut a move in that direction was ipened by Mr, James Anthony last nonth during the sugar crisis.
Vorkers, small businessmen, those lit by the cane dispute, and people nterested in the cause of labour hould get together to form a ohtical party, exhorted Mr. Anthony t a public meeting he called in >uva on July 18. Youthful Mr. mthony is secretary of Wholesale nd Retail Workers’ General Union nd was a prominent figure in the il workers’ strike that preceded the )ecember disturbances.
[?]tist John Boustead of Tonga, Tahiti and Fiji, [?] th (right), Hugh Aspinall of Nanu-i-Ra, at a recent Polynesian Association party -Photo by Leicagreaph Co.
Highlight of the 75th anniversar of the Roman Catholic Mission a Yule Is., Papua, in July, was th< announcement that the Rev. Fathe Eugene Klein, MSC, had beei appointed new Bishop, as success© to Bishop A. Sorin, who died u April last year. A Frenchman fron Alsace-Lorraine, he has been i missionary in Papua for 11 years The Rev. Fathers Navarre am Verius, with the Rev. Brothe Gaspara, founded the mhsion o] July 4, 1885, landing at Yule Is. fron a small boat sailed up from Cook town by one of the most picturesqu characters of that period, “Yanke Ned”. * * * Two top officials in the Solomon returned to Honiara from leave u July —Mr. A. M. Wilkie, BSII Financial Secretary and Chairma] of the Trading Corporation boan who had spent his five months’ leav in UK; and Mr. D. S. Corner, Man ager and Secretary of the Protect orate Copra Board, who had thre months in Australia. * * * A man much respected and trustei by New Britain natives, Mr. G. I (“Bob”) Hall, became Magistrate a Port Moresby in July, after six year as Rabaul Magistrate. How he. toe trusts New Guineans was illustrate! a couple of years ago when h adjourned a case to a ship’s hoi where native witnesses were work ing, some of whom (including th winch operator) had been hostile t the cou r t. Mr. Hall waited unti the winchman raised a two-ton sling load clear of the deck, then de liberately walked beneath it. Ther
District Commissioner H. L. Williams, of Madan District (left), with Major-General Denzi[?] Macarthur-Onslow who was one of the mid[?] winter VIP's visiting New Guinea recently. A the same time that DC Williams was spread[?] ing the welcome mat for the Army, Sir Gile[?] Chippindall was also arriving at Madang on th[?] first flight there of a TAA Fokker Friendshi[?] aircraft. Everyone met up at the Madan Residency later—but it goes to show that i[?] NG's open season for Visiting Firemen, even good DC can't be in two places at once.
Photo: Pat Robertsor
could easily have been an “accident", and the natives knew it—but the Magistrate’s trust was recognised and it changed their attitude to the court. ♦ ♦ * No one can say Captain Norman Pearson doesn’t know the NZ-Fiji- Tonga-Samoa circuit—when Union Co.’s Tofua berthed at Auckland on July 31, Skipper Pearson completed his 101st trip around the Central Pacific Islands in her. With Union Steam Ship Co. since 1925, he has commanded Tofua during the whole of her eight and a half years’ career, except for short leave periods. He was Number One on USS Co.’s Matua for a short time before go ing to UK in 1951 to bring out Tofua. * * * A Fijian teacher, Kaminieli Navatu, and a Suva medical officer, Dr. Lindsay Verrier, have combined to start a new enterprise, Farmers Agencies Ltd., to market native pro duce. One of the items mentioned by the Burns Commission Report was the Fijians’ great need for organised marketing. Often Fijian farmers bring their bananas, yams or yaqona to Suva and sit about the market for days until these are sold. Kaminieli hopes to change all that by accepting the whole con signment and selling it on com mission. A trained teaoher since 1952, he taught in various Viti Levu districts, then went to Funafuti, G & E Group, for a time. Last year, deciding to study marketing in NZ, he went to Auckland and worked in the city markets as storeman, tally man, and salesman. When he re turned to Suva, Dr. Verrier assisted him to organise the new company.
The Dutch Interior Minister (Mr.
Edzo Toxopeus) will visit Australia 111 , October for talks on joint problems in the New Guinea Admin
[?]Aboard the "Tulagi" in July, returning to Honiara, BSIP, after leave in New Zealand, was Archdeacon H. C. V. Reynolds, of the Melanesian Mission. Archdeacon Reynolds will act as Vicar general of the diocese in August, when Bishop A T. Hill makes an extended visit to Australia.
istration. The Minister will make a fact-finding trip to Dutch Nev Guinea and will visit Australian Ne\* Guinea.
Hon. Eugene F. Paul, one of thi best-known men in Western Samoj —he is at present Minister foi Finance in the Territory’s more-or less Provisional Government—was ii New Zealand in July, and obliged t< undergo medical treatment there The Constitutional Convention ii which Mr. Paul is deeply interested is due to commence its sittings ii mid-August, but it was doubtful, a the end of July, whether he wouk be there for the opening session. * * * Among the VlP’s who have beer observing Australia’s depressing temperatures from the comforting sunlight of New Guinea, in the pas month, have been the High Com' missioner for South Africa, and hii wife. Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton visitec various Territory centres. Normally they reside in Canberra, where then were many snowfalls in July. * * * The five natives, or part-natives who drafted the 2,000 word; “objective” of the newly-formec Papua and New Guinea Worker; Association, and presented it in Juh to Minister Hasluck, were: Reuben Taureko, aged 32, j resident medical officer in the nativi section of Port Moresby’s Tauranu Hospital, who was trained for sever years at the Suva Medical School Sampson Topatiliu, 36, an Adminis tration clerk in Rabaul; Hinaks Goave, aged 35, an Administrator clerk in Papua; Kahu Suggoho, 30 on the staff of the Taurama Hospital
Mrs. F. Binskin, of Binskin Is., Bagga, via Gizo BSIP, writes to say that she is not "70-ish", a Geologist John Grover stated in his article page 57, June "PIM", and sends this photo graph along to prove it. She is 66 —born a Roviana Lagoon where, she says "our old Nor man Wheatley home is now Munda airfield".
was educated in Papua and at the Suva Medical School; Elliot Elijah, 34, a teacher in a Port Moresby native school. Taureka and Suggoho, by virtue of the fact that they gained a diploma at the Suva Medical School, are locally called “Doctor”,
A 6th Division veteran of World War 11, Mr. “Blue” Russell, and Patrol Officer Jock Aitken, with 80 natives, made a seven days’ march in June, to Karamui Plateau, in an uncontrolled section of the Eastern Highlands, New Guinea. Since then, using only native labour and hand tools, they have constructed an air strip 2,200 ft long and 150 ft wide, in the midst of heavy jungle. Pilot Dol. Williamson took a single mgined Otter in onto the air-strip m July 15. and since then the air strip has been used fairly regularly.
On June 21, at the Roman Catholic Church, Port Moresby, Miss A. Seedsman was married to Mr.
J. O'Rourke.
Papuan Prints Photo.
Mrs. Pat Tudor, who has been carrying on a [?]rade store and a coffee plantation at Kainantu, New Guinea Eastern Highlands, since the death [?]f her first husband, sold her interests recently [?]nd in July married Dr. A. Gray, an Administra [?]ion medical officer who has been doing re [?]earch into the mystery disease kuru at Okapa, [?]n the Eastern Highlands. Dr. and Mrs. Gray [?]xpect to leave for the United Kingdom in October.