Deaths

of Islands People

Archbishop Adolf Noser \t Alexishafen, Papua New jruinea, on April 16, aged 86.

One of the most celebrated of 5 NG’s pioneering missionaries, he American-born Archbishop Moser was a member of the Catholic missionary order, Society of the Divine Word

Svd).

Ordained in 1925, he first /orked in West Africa, and ame to PNG in 1955, as lishop of Madang.

Bishop Noser helped set up idigenous orders of brothers nd sisters. He was a familiar ight on his bicycle around iadang, even after he had Jtired at the age of 76.

He was widely revered for the implicity of his lifestyle, his ccessibility to his flock, and his uiet but boundless confidence i the future of the country he ad made his home.

In a 1978 interview he said:

This country has good, stable leadership, and a good Christian outlook. The prob lems of the clans will settle. A way will be found to unite the nation . . . ‘Economics, particularly in the cities, are putting an end to the wantok system. A man needs all his earnings to provide for his wife and family. There is nothing left over for wantoks.

Everyone must learn to work.

Then there will be no need for the wantok system . .. ‘lt is one thing to be a subsistence farmer, sell the produce and get a quick return.

It is another to work a plan tation and get no return for say seven or eight years. The desire and need for quick results must give way to long-range plan ning. It will.*

Lillian Barclay-Millar

On the Queensland, Australia.

Gold Coast, on April 3, aged 78.

Mrs Lillian Barclay-Millar ‘Tiger Lil* to many ex-New Guinea Territorians won her spurs as a character on the Wau goldfields of Morobe, New Guinea, in the 19305.

Tiger Lil came from a well established Melbourne family, and attended one of the city’s best known girls’ schools. She first married a naval officer named Bennett and later Toby Millar, a well known Terri torian. By 1939 she was living in Rabaul where I remember her as a large, blonde lady who drove about like a demon in a large purple car, at a time when cars were rarely purple, and whose rhetoric when aroused made even brave men quail.

After the evacuation of women from New Guinea at the beginning of the Pacific War, she lived and worked in Sydney.

She was a sort of ‘mother’ to early Australian National Air lines hostesses, had a short stint with Northern Hotels in Fiji, later ran an estate agency at North Sydney, and then re turned to Papua New Guinea, where she managed hotels in Port Moresby and the High lands.

James Michener met her when he was in Australia in the

1950 s researching a sequel to

his Tales of the South Pacific.

He was so taken with her personally and by her stories of wild, old New Guinea that she appeared in the dedication of

the book Return to Paradise as ‘Tiger Lil, of the Goldfields’, along with ‘Brett Hilder, from all over’, and a number of other Islands identities.

In recent years, Mrs Millar had been living in that haven for ex-PNG residents, the Gold

Coast.

J.T.

Papa Raui Pokoati In Rarotonga Hospital on March 25, aged 69.

Papa Raui gave leadership to the people of the island of Mitiaro in the Cook group from self-government in 1965.

Born on Mitiaro in 1911, Papa Raui attended the London Missionary Society’s Maori Mission School on the island for 10 years.

A versatile sportsman in his youth, and later on a successful planter and poultry farmer,

Papa Raui was keenly inter ested in community improve ment from early in life. This interest led him into politics in 1965, when he became MLA for Mitiaro.

He represented the island in the assembly for 13 years until he broke away from the Cook Islands Party to lead a new third party, the Unity Move ment. He lost his seat by 20 votes in the 1978 election, and although the election result was quashed he did not stand in the by-election. Instead his cousin, Tiki Tetava Ariki, was elected.

A keen Bible student to the end of his days. Papa Raui said in an account of his life he wrote in 1965: ‘My main concern is the improvement and welfare of my people and the honest governing of our people.’

Among mourners at his fu neral on Mitiaro were the Cook Islands Premier Sir Thomas Davis and a host of other

dignitaries.

Papa Raui is survived by his mother, his wife, nine children, and more than 40 grand children.

Dr Lindsay Verrier At the Home of Compassion, Suva, on April 20, aged 73.

English-born Dr Verrier took medical degrees in Britain and arrived in Fiji in 1938 to serve as a medical officer. He was transferred to the Gilbert Islands, now Kiribati, in 1940, escaping and returning to Fiji alter the arrival of the Japanese.

Dr Verrier’s connections with Fiji’s Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara began in the 1950 s when he began financing the future PM’s medical studies in New Zealand. But before they could be completed, Ratu Mara was recalled to Fiji by Ratu Sir Lala Sukuna to begin a civil service career that took him into national politics.

Dr Verrier was one of the founder-members of the Alli ance Party, working closely with Ratu Mara. But the pair quarrelled, and Dr Verrier left the Alliance to occupy his parliamentary seat as a one man Liberal Party. He left parliament in 1972, but in November 1980 appeared at the national convention of the Alliance to announce that be cause of the growing strength of

the National Federation Party he thought the government could do with his support again.

He and the prime minister were thus publicly reconciled, but Dr Verrier’s cancer was already very much advanced, and his convention appearance was vir tually his last public gesture.

A man of varied interests, Dr Verrier had a passion for index ing. His interest in the Fijian family system led him to work on a comprehensive record of Fijian families in the Macuata and Bua districts.

He was a familiar figure around Suva on his motor scooter. His refusal to comply with the law requiring the wearing of a crash helmet led him to court, where he was fined.

Dr Verrier spent some weeks in the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney earlier this year (PIM Apr p 37). It seems characteristic of the man that he could quip to a friend who visited him at the time: ‘You should come to my funeral the ham’ll be good.’

Iroij Namo Hermios In Majuro, Marshall Islands, on March 26, aged 54.

Vice-speaker of the Nitijela (parliament) and Iroij of much of the Northern Ratak Chain, Namo Hermios had recently returned from a medical checkup in Hawaii where it was determined that the leukemia he suffered from was in re mission. It is therefore assumed the cause of death was a heart attack.

A week of mourning for Iroij Namo Hermios was proclaimed from March 28.

Judge James Alastair Fraser At Rarotonga Hospital on March 27, aged 70.

New Zealand-born Judge Fraser had been in the Cook Islands since 1961, when he was appointed Chief Judge of the High Court and the Land Court.

He also served as an indus trial magistrate, and as New Zealand’s acting high com missioner for the Cook Islands.

After retiring from the bench in 1965, Judge Fraser was called back in 1978 as com missioner to the High Court, a position he held until his death.