Tropics To

And From The

The Snows

By MAX ORKEN, in Goroka

John Louis Gilmore, of Ne\* Guinea, is now mine host of the

Imperial Hotel, Dalgety, in the

snow country of southern Neu South Wales. From the tropics tc the snows is a long hop for Johr Gilmore, but he takes with him the affection he has built up aftei 46 years in this Australian terri tory.

JOHN GILMORE’S story is wortl telling, because he epitomise! the oldhands who have so long beer a part of New Guinea and who ir recent years have decided to “gc south”. There are many of them and quiet, tolerant, generous Johr Gilmore and his hospitable wife Frar are among the most notable.

Forty-six years is a long time tc be associated with any place. In his time in New Guinea, John has known the carefree pre-depressior years, the depression itself, the Pacific war, the reconstruction aftei

The Famed Gilmores

the war, and now the dramatically changing past five or six years.

John, the eldest of the three children of the late “Flo” and “Old John” Gilmore, was born in Sydney in 1918; but was not destined to remain at home very long. His father, after service with the AIF, came to Rabaul early in 1919 as a representative of a tractor firm, and Flo, with young John, came up in the old Marsina just before Christ mas 1920.

So started a link with New Guinea and its people which is still being carried on by the youngest child, Graham, who runs the Hotel Kainantu as a sideline to his political career as the member for the South Markham Special Electorate in the P-NG House of Assembly. The parents were a couple who, over 40 years residence in the territory (broken only by the period of Japan ese occupation) endeared themselves to all.

Old John did not stay long with the tractor firm, taking a job with the Expro Board with whom he stayed until 1926, when he acquired Put Put plantation at the mouth of the Warangoi.

Ran hotels

Flo, at one stage, became the licensee of the Kokopo Hotel and later ran a popular hotel at Vuna watung, some five miles out of Rabaul, which pre-war Rabaul people remember with nostalgic affection.

After the war. Put Put was disposed of to the Sacred Heart Mission, and Flo opened a hotel in Madang which, by common consent, is among the best in the territory. She died in 1963, and her husband in the fol lowing year.

Young John grew up in the Rabaul of the 1920’s and early 30’s. He went to school first at Vunapope and then to the Marist Brothers in Australia. Some of the “kids” around Rabaul in those days were Tom Ellis, now District Commis sioner at Mount Hagen; Tom Garrett of Varzin plantation and his sister Wish, now Mrs. Bill Moore, of Kokopo.

Things were not too good in the territory in the 30’s. The world-wide depression had not left New Guinea unscathed. Copra prices were at an all-time low and in some areas the copra rotted on the beach rather than attract £4 a ton. John, at the

ge of 16, got a job with the Guinea Lirways at Lae (then only an air eld, a couple of hangars and bush laterial houses). He had his first limpse of the Highlands from which e has just retired, when he came 1 as a supercargo with pilots like ack Turner and Bob Gurney to laces like the Upper Ramu Patrol ost (now Kainantu) and Bena Bena.

John recalls that in those days, ngle-engined planes travelling into ncontrolled territory often carried apercargoes like himself to “sit on le wing armed with a rifle, and rotect the pilot when the cargo was eing unloaded”.

In 1936, John Sr. was badly ijured in an accident, so young ahn went back to Put Put to help in the place. In those days a planta on overseer got £l5-£2O a month, manager £2O-£3O, and a real top lanter, men like “B. P. Robbie”, bout £5O a month. But you could ive money without starving your ;lf.

Three months after Word War II roke out in September, 1939. John alisted. His number was NGXI2.

Frank Boisen, now District Educa on Officer at Rabaul was NGXI3, ad the late Frank Burke was

Fgxi).

John was in the AIF detachment hich was diverted around the Cape » England when Italy came into the ar, and he endured some of the orst of the blitz. By Christmas 940, he was in the Middle East ith HQ 9th Division, and saw out le siege of Tobruk and the Battle f El Alamein.

Behind Jap lines

Back in Australia in late 1942, 2 was nabbed for Angau and posted ) Port Moresby. There, Keith IcCarthy saw him and arranged for is transfer to the Australian Intel gence Bureau. He was a member f one of the parties which entered ipanese-held New Britain via Cape rford with the late “Charlie” ates, Alan Roberts, Malcolm /right, John Murphy and Malcolm nglish, and in all spent nearly ine months behind the Japanese nes in the Wide Bay/Open Bay *ea. With characteristic modesty, 2 plays down his part in these azardous operations, but the DCM s wears on Anzac Day is an idication of how valiantly he carried at his task.

With the Japanese surrender in aigust, 1945, John, with the late ack Allen (of Gilalum) was the rst pre-war Rabaul citizen to go shore. One of the first persons he

saw was old Sister Adela from Vunapope, who had been his teacher more than 20 years previously.

After a spell back at Put Put, he started on his own, operating a trawler called the Lady Josephine.

He ran her until 1953, when he responded to the call of the NG Highlands and took up land about 10 miles from Goroka. He farmed coffee until he sold out to Steam ships Trading Company early last year.

Still only a comparatively young man (he is two years this side of 50) he has not had the best of health over the past couple of years, and with the responsibilities of a young family and the ever increasing strains of life in the territory, he is looking forward to his new life in Australia. And nobody in the terri tory begrudges it.