Aboriginal Projects
2006 Aboriginal Projects
Wendy's Story
Since 1993 the Mary MacKillop Foundation, through the Sisters of St Joseph, has encouraged and supported Aboriginal people in the SA bush communities of Yalata/Oak Valley and Coober Pedy - and more recently Murray Bridge - to record their knowledge of culture, country and language in more permanent form. Preserving the authentic voice of the author is paramount.
One such voice is Wendy Harris, now a resident of the Aboriginal Elders Village in Adelaide and the author of ‘Wendy Harris: A Coober Pedy Pioneer’. Those who have read the book note the understated nature of a life of many sorrows, cheerfully told.
Wendy’s journey begins at Alpanyinta, a place run by her Afghani father. As a child, she witnesses the cruelty her father metes out to her mother. After he dies she lives in the family bush camp, looking after her blind grandmother. The family makes two trips south to Coober Pedy, a tiny settlement in the 1930s. On return to the bush, life is stable until the day a policeman arrives. As a ‘half-caste kid’, she is taken away to a home in Oodnadatta. Broken-hearted, her grandmother dies fretting for her. Wendy is put to work in a Port Augusta Mission Home where she learns to read.
At 15, Wendy is sent to work on Sheringa Station, then on to Adelaide where she meets her husband. They have four daughters, one dying in infancy. When the marriage breaks down she is forced out to work and her girls are put in a foster home. Wendy returns to Coober Pedy and eventually delights in becoming the head waitress for Pioneer Coaches’ roadhouse: ‘I had a pale blue uniform, lavender earrings and cardigan and pantyhose and black shoes. I used to look lovely!’ she recalls. Many years pass before she is reunited with her daughters.
Wendy’s book was launched in July this year – an experience she described as the best thing that ever happened to her. It was also a healing occasion for two people who attended: one of her adult children and a granddaughter who did the book reading. Wendy’s book is the sixth happy collaboration with Mary 2 Print and Video - also a work of the Sisters of St Joseph. ‘Living Alongside the Animals - Anangu way’ is presently in production with IAD Press and the fifth book to have found an outside publisher.
Thanks to initial funding from the Mary MacKillop Foundation, the SA Aboriginal experience has found more permanent expression for the encouragement of ‘future generations’, including within mainstream culture. To quote Sally Morgan: ‘We have to find a way of living together in this country...It will only come when thousands of stories have been spoken and listened to with understanding’.
Sister Michele Madigan with Liz Bruce
All titles now available at the Mary MacKillop Museum Shop, North Sydney.
To download further information about our projects please click here.
You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to view this file.
Click here
for the Free Download.
