During the 1880s the cane growers of the Tweed and Brunswick succumbed to the use of cheap 'Kanaka' labour,  leading to an enclave of 105 of the 'woolly parson-eaters' in the area by 1891, based mainly around Cudgen and Tumbulgum. Ten years later numbers had more than doubled to 288, a mere 11 being female and 33 being Australian born. Or so said the census headhunter. The police on the other hand reckoned there could have been around 320 of the colourful chaps (although this figure may include some of the dreaded ‘Hindoos' or 'Cingalese’ who took up Tweed residence after being hounded out of the Richmond cane fields; the Tweedies being a touch less pious than the Richmonites.)

In the meantime, from about the mid 1890s, it was figured the sugar industry was up and running and could get by without a bargain-basement workforce, so agitation for deportation started and became a matter of priority for the new Federal Government, which set a target date of 31Dec06 for completion of the infamous exercise. Paradoxically, the Tweedies remained pragmatic about the colour of cheap labour while being firmly in the White Australia camp. In early 1905 the Premier in his sweep through northern NSW indicated he wasn’t in touch with these local contradictions, with the Lismore Chronicle the only local rag to relay his views given to the Sydney papers: There is a great feeling among many people in the north, on the Richmond and the Tweed, about the possibilities of the deportation of the Kanaka. An idea is prevalent there that the Kanakas are to be removed to their isles, in the course of a couple of years. Now, many of these are married, and have families, and own little plots of land. It would be a terrible thing if they were taken away; in fact, I think it would be a blot on our civilization. …. I travelled with a clergyman, who said he had 186 Kanakas in one congregation, and he spoke highly of them. The Kanakas are in great distress of mind about the rumoured removal.

Australia-wide, 1,654 are said to have been given official exemptions while about another 1000 bolters remained as illegal aliens. Amongst the officially sanctioned were those blokes who had white wives and piebald children, but not those with Marys and their piccaninnies. Nevertheless, the Advocate maintained that there was provision for these Oz born piccaninnies to return if they made an application through the bureaucracy, an exercise as tricky as the dictation test. Its competitor, the just as rabid Tweed Herald, didn't like this mixed marriage business one bit and on the eve of deportation reminded its readers that ... There is not the slightest doubt that immorality in all its Asiatic hideousness is rampant among the aliens of the Tweed and Richmond districts. …When, however, it spreads to the white people with whom these low-down creatures come in contact, and numbers of our own – or disowned – white women become victims to lecherous Hindoos and kanakas, the whole sickening question assumes a most disquieting complexion. …and the lustful alien, ever ready to seduce white women,.... This shocking immorality should be repressed with all the severity of the law. …It should be declared illegal for Hindoos and kanakas, and in fact any of the alien scum, to live with a white women. ...]

By early 1907 there were still about 220 of the lusty fellows on the Tweed, with the vast majority in and around Cudgen, …and it is surprising to reflect on the number of leases that these kanakas hold on the river – leases more or less legal, and any number of them not registered. By mid 1907 a lot of the tricky chaps, aka ‘niggers’, ‘darkies’, ‘the black agony’, ‘cullud pussons’, ‘dusky men’, ‘Cudgen boys’,… and their trickier bosses were still ducking and weaving, so much so that the Pacific Islanders Employment Act was again amended to hit any employers of ‘unregistered Kanakas’ with a £100 fine. A month later there were unemployed Kanakas wandering around everywhere, prompting the Advocate to cross its fingers and hope that … their places will not be filled by a worse curse – the Hindoo. Some of the lazy layabouts were then charged with vagrancy.

By the Commonwealth census of 1911 numbers  of 'Polynesian born' around the Tweed had stabilized at 152, constituting the largest enclave of the 287 non-European Polynesian 'Full Bloods' and 45 'Half Castes' throughout NSW. Conversely, the police census showed 172 ‘aliens’ at Cudgen, a decrease of 81 from the peak in 1902, making up 18% of the district population and retaining its place as the largest alien enclave by far in Northern NSW. [The Chinese, separately categorized, dominated on The Tablelands, where almost 900 of the blighters were concentrated around the various diamond, tin, copper, silver, gold and lead mines.] The next largest enclave was at Tumbulgum where numbers had halved, with 51 of the trouble-makers, a decrease of 54 from its peak in 1904, one of whom was Peter Mussing (Wacvie Mussingkom), who thankfully escaped the roundup to beget the remarkable Dr Faith Bandler AM in 1918. Peter landed in Queensland as a 13yr old from Ambrym Island, New Hebridies/Vanuatu, in 1883, and made his way to the Tweed in 1895 with a large group of rellies, marrying Ida Venno (Kishtion), a lass of Anglo Indian extraction, at Cudgen in 1905. He died in 1924, leaving Ida and extended family to look after 5yr old Faith and his other seven children. That same year the Tweed Daily reported that many elderly Islanders, ineligible for the old age pension, wanted to return home to live with kinfolk. They weren’t granted Australian pensions until 1942, 16yrs after the ‘Hindoos’.

Peter’s brother Harry, also forcibly abducted by 'blackbirders', later made several trips back and forth as a recruiter, perhaps playing the same roll in the Kanaka community as Vlismas, Alidenes and Pazoff in their respective Greek and Macedonian communities. In 1910 he was the first man to grow bananas at Eungella, and in 1915 the second Mussing to marry a Venno (Elsie). He died at Murbah in 1950.

Peter's eldest son, John Mussing of Cobaki, was, like his sister Faith, another stirrer under surveillance by ASIO. He got fed up with being unable to park his bum on ‘whites only’ benches at Tweed Heads and started a campaign against segregation in the early 1950s. In mid 1951 he wrote to Mr Anthony MHR, allegedly his father's employer at one stage, who politely told him it was a State matter and foisted him onto Mr Stephens MLA. After receiving no reply from Stephens after 8mths he decided to write to the Tweed Daily, using 'Aussie Values' terms like ‘fairness’, ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom’. He thought that the war had changed things and attempted to lay a guilt trip by pointing out that somewhere in Burma his brother Eddie gave his life and his nephew (David Runge, born 1920 Murbah) gave both legs for such concepts – is this the type of freedom they were defending for the coloured people. (Edward Mussing, born 1908 Murbah, died as an 'Aboriginal POW'.) John was met with the same deafening silence he received from Stephens, maybe because the Tweedies were more alarmed over the mass influx of wogs and dagoes at this time.

Despite the Tweed’s high plantation profile in NSW it was always poor cousin to the Richmond and Clarence in acreage and production. Nevertheless, the Tweed was the greatest user of black labour; in late 1905 it was reported NSW had 1526 cane growers, 1304 employing white labour cultivating 18,631 acres and 222 still employing black labour on 2,411 acres, and that 74% of the growers employing black labour were on the Tweed. This was despite the introduction in 1903 of a 'white bounty' given to growers for cane produced by European labour. There were also 30 ‘coloured canegrowers’ on the Tweed, mainly around Terranora, who had managed to acquire leaseholds after many years of saving and were now caught between a rock and a hard place. The only way they could get the ‘white bounty’ was to employ white labour and do no work themselves. And at a meeting, assembled to ventilate their common grievance… at the residence of Peter Hansen (Portugese), … Bob Limon (more familiarly known as ‘Bob Samoa’) was voted to the chair, and he explained the object of the meeting… as they did not get any bonus like the white growers, this meant that they would be starved out…he would lose his farm and have nothing to show for his years and years of labour…. They had the chutzpah to ask How could they trust the white labourers to put in the plants properly and do the work well by themselves? The reporter figured this was calculated to provoke resentment from white people….

Peter Hansen could be among the many ‘Cingalese/Singhalese’ (from Ceylon/Sri Lanka and Goa) also working the Tweed cane fields at the time, most bearing Portuguese and Dutch names. They were more proactive insubordinates than the Kanakas, whom the Methodists and Salvation Army found worthy recruits. And like the Hindoos were also allowed to celebrate victories at the pub, whereas the Kanakas, like the ‘abos’, had to be a bit more resourceful to get a drink on a hot day.

The Tweed and Bruns Advocate was also a bit worried about from where the replacement labour was coming:  Within a few weeks some 600 men will be required by the cane growers of the Tweed and district, and where these men are coming from is a matter of grave concern. Kanaka labour is becoming scarcer every year, and the white labour hasn’t so far shown any inclination to fill up the gap that is gradually growing more and more apparent. The cause is pretty well as plain as the effect, and the remedy is the only matter that should stir the minds of men at the present time….
Many years ago the greed of commercial men in the Northern State prompted them to recruit kanaka labour from the islands of the Pacific, with the excuse that such was necessary for the preservation of the sugar industry. Having once got them into Queensland the matter of introducing them to the canefields of this state was a trifling one. The black man seems to have crept into the industry here at a time when white labour was plentiful, reliable and cheap, and every effort was made to prove that he was far and away a better man than his white competitor, yet to this day there are numbers of large canegrowers who prefer white to black labour, though they want the white man whom they were used to before the kanaka intruded his presence on us. Even at the present time many farmers will employ nothing but white labour but they are fortunate enough to secure the right stamp of white man – the white man they knew before he was contaminated and degraded by association with the imported slaves of the black skin and smellful carcase. That he has been contaminated and degraded seems certain, for although old hands assert that the kanaka as a worker is not to be compared with the white labourer of the early days, at the present time the white worker is mostly a slothful, sneaking, unreliable beer drinker, without any laudable ambition, without principle, and without pride. It isn’t to be wondered at. The cause has faithfully produced the effect.
… Meanwhile what are the sugar planters going to do for labour? ….

And a month later under another Editorial ‘The Sugarcane Case’: ……Knox (of CSR) certainly has a grievance against the Federal Parliament with the ‘White Australia’ policy, because Knox’s beloved nigger has got to go. We know very well that the expensive white man would stand no more chance here than he seems to be having in South Africa at the present time if large concerns like the CSR Co could have a free hand and flood the country with Asiatic labour….

The deportation paved the way for the dreaded dagoes to gain a foothold. In late 1906 a batch of 1050 Italian labourers were quickly brought in as a temporary stopgap pending white labour taking up the Kanaka slack. Said the local rag paraphrasing the Bulletin: Just at present the Dago person is the prospective stand-by of the Queensland sugar industry… the Dago appears a dubious reed to depend upon. Uncharacteristically the Northern Star was in sympathy: What are we coming to? We drive out the kanaka boy to bring in a horde of Italians. Better, far better, the devil you know than the one you do not.... Not that any of them are desirable, but we seem to be able to bring the kanaka to a higher moral life than most aliens. The Greek variety of dago cane cutter quickly followed (while their prowess in the kitchen featured in the same debate: Look how the Dago has a monopoly of fish and oyster saloons in Sydney and other large centres. Any true ‘Cornstalk’ or ‘Pelmo’ (opposing letter writers) must get quite elated as he sees how the Dago has driven his countrymen out of the fruit and restaurant businesses. Oh no! we want population certainly, give us Britishers and look to our own birthrate; but foreigners we do not want.)

Down in the Brunswick district, Billinudgel and Tyagarah were the leading cane growing areas and exploiters of Kanaka labour. In 1889 eight Kanakas had a cane grower before the Brunswick Police Court for failure to pay wages. They got the money. Sugar prices fell dramatically during the 1890s Depression and accelerated the switch to dairying, so much so that by late 1905 there was only one gang employed at Tyagarah, while Billinudgel only had a couple of growers of any consequence left, leaving the Kanakas to search for other means of earning a quid, mainly with the dairy farmers who snapped them up for scrub clearing: the Kanakas who are felling timber at Mullumbimby find the work a lot harder than cane cutting. A month later the Advocate advised that they had gone further into the scrub at Main Arm. A lot also went into the paspalum seed harvesting business in competition with the parsimonious Hindoos, also scratching around for a livelihood at this time.

In late 1905 the Advocate asked the obvious question: The black man has been cut out of the cane brake only to be brought into competition with the white man in scrub felling. Will the Federal Government give a bonus to white felled timber? However, at this time it was simply land clearing and the bulk of the rainforest timber went up in smoke rather than sawdust at the mill, so an economic incentive like the sugar industry’s ‘white bounty’ for discontinuing the use of cullud pussons wasn’t viable. But social ostracism was a more powerful force and a couple of months later the Advocate’s Billinudgel reporter had the melancholy duty to inform one and all that Your correspondent regrets that a Pocket resident has black labour under the control and whip of a white man. At least five of them tried to escape by attempting to enlist during WW1.

Billinudgel became the main ‘Kanaka’ enclave in the Brunswick Valley, where the Star recognised Dick Sickett as ‘the uncrowned king of the south sea islanders’... who had ‘a white heart beneath a swarthy skin….’ onya Dick. He was one of the early scrub fellers and banana growers, but returned to his home island of Tanna in the New Hebridies (Vanuatu) in 1949 after the death of his wife and family. The Slockees, Noters, Marlows, Ivys, Changatos, Corowas and Wategos were also prominent families, the last now immortalized by lending their name to the exclusive enclave of Watego’s Beach, Byron Bay. Most of these names made up the All Blacks Rugby Team that dominated the Tweed/Brunswick competition through the 1950s.

Tony Slockee (Saloki), 11yrs old when he landed in Sydney from Tanna Island in 1870, was probably the progenitor of the now large Slockee clan. He was a cane famer at Cudgen by 1905, with an Australian-born family of 4 boys and 4 girls, when he unsuccessfully applied to become an Australian citizen. His grandson, The Rev Tom Slockee, was foundation chairman of the NSW Aboriginal Housing Office and now occupies a number of prominent positions within ATSIC organisations.

William Changato, from the island of Lifu in the Loyalty Islands (New Caledonia), was a more determined bloke. He was in Mullum by about 1900, but, like Slockee, was a cane farmer at Cudgen in 1905 when he made his first application for naturalization. This was knocked on the head and a year later he came back to Mullum where, in 1916, he tried again to gain the rights of an Australian citizen like his wife. This too was given short shrift, so in 1920 he had another go. This time he brought out the big guns and had his application forwarded with a covering letter from Raymond Perdriau MLA  (he is known personally to me…and is a man of sterling and useful character…) and accompanied by references from the Mayor, the local Methodist minister and two JPs, but you guessed it. He was a cane farmer and banana grower for many years before retiring into Mullum where he and his wife both died in 1939.

Another who became the progenitor of a distinguished family was William Moore Bellear, born on Tanna, Vanuatu, in 1871. At Mullum in 1918 he and his bride, Doris, from the Noonuccal people of Stradbroke Island, begat Solomon David Bellear who married Sadie Corowa in 1943, just after enlisting from Fingal, and produced a remarkable family of nine, the most notable of whom was His Honour, Judge Robert William Bellear, Australia’s first indigenous judge. He was raised at New Brighton, doing his schooling at Billinudgel Primary and Mullum High, before enlisting in the navy from Tyagarah in 1961, serving for 12yrs and becoming the first Aboriginal to attain the rank of Chief Petty Officer. He co-founded the Aboriginal Housing Company in Redfern in 1972, was a director of the Aboriginal Medical Service and the Aboriginal Legal Service through most of the 1970s, and gained his law degree in 1978. He was given a State Funeral upon his early death, age 60, in 2005.

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The Indians

The majority of Indians in Australia in the early years were Sikhs and Muslims from the Punjab, remaining the dominant regional group until the third wave of Indian migration in the 1970s. On the Northern Rivers it seems that the Muslims were initially in the ascendency, starting to appear around the Clarence cane fields in the 1880s. By 1891 a few had drifted to the Richmond, where the census headcounter discovered 25 Indian-born, 8 people claiming to be ‘Mahomedans’ while none put their hands up to be identified as ‘Hindoos or Brahmins’. [Mind you, only 55 people in the whole State claimed to be the latter, 15 of them on the Clarence along with 18 of the Mahomedans, both lots amongst the 69 Indian born. Perhaps some of the Mahomedans were genuine Afghans, but only 20 of these blokes nominated themselves as such in NSW, probably indicating that the remainder of the 528 Mahomedans around the State were mostly Punjabi. The Syrians, of whom there were 378 hawking throughout the countryside (14 in Lismore), were predominately Christians at this time.]

Thereafter colonization was rapid. A police census of ‘coloured aliens’ in mid 1895 showed 200 ‘Hindoos and Afghans’ (ie Sikhs and their Muslim mates), 301 ‘Kanakas’, 9 Syrians and 50 Chinese in the combined Richmond-Tweed districts, with a reported 50 additional ‘Hindoos’ on their way from Sydney. Late the following year another 60 ‘Hindoos’ arrived as a single group to set up camp at Wyrallah near Lismore, leading to rejoicing on the Clarence: ‘They were landed at Harwood, and, we are pleased to learn, intend leaving for their destination immediately – Advance Wyrallah!’ Eight months later another group of 94 ‘evil smelling aliens’ arrived to help build the Wyrallah commune, prompting a special parliamentary report that revealed, wef 31Jul1897, 442 ‘Hindoos’ now making up the alien plague upon the Richmond-Tweed. A spirited campaign by the North Coast Anti-Alien Society then got underway, which, by 1901, had done a fine job in reducing their presence to a manageable 269 colourful ‘Indians and Cingalese’, with ‘turbaned poultices’ probably adorning the heads of most of the 62 ‘Mahometans’ and 156 ‘Hindoos, Brahmins and Sikhs’. Down on the Clarence there was still a sizeable population, but with a more 50/50 distribution, 62 of the former and 69 of the latter amongst 157 Indian-born, while those elusive Afghans now numbered 55 throughout NSW. The 22 Syrians of the Richmond were still mainly Orthodox Christians. While Indian numbers had been whittled back, and continued to fluctuate, the Richmond-Tweed community remained the largest in NSW, inclusive of Sydney, through to WW2, generating local heartburn out of all proportion to their numerical significance.

The Byron-Tweed nexus was a minor Hindoo colony at the time of the 1897 parliamentary survey; 28 bunkered down in the Byron district, 23 at Murbah, 35 at Tumbulgum (where the 'Cingalese' probably fell under the 'Hindoo' umbrella), and none polluting the Brunswick. But upon Federation a few Sikhs and Muslims in the region emerged from hiding to have themselves recorded on the new Richmond electoral roll, with one third nominating their favoured playground as Byron Bay, where they were still collectively issued with ‘Hindoo’ guernseys despite a bit of disharmony in the team.

Fred Wareham, one of the pioneer farmers at St Helena, seeing their diligence started to employ some on his farm, ‘Koreelah’, around the turn of the century. As Maurice Ryan records: Early this century he realised the potential of Hindoo labour, and put a couple of Sikhs on as general farm labourers. They turned out so well that he arranged for the immigration of more, …. By 1911 he had over twenty working for him, all from the Lahore district in the Punjab, and a number of them ex soldiers of the Indian army. …But he never allowed them to handle the cattle. … With Wareham’s guidance and the Sikh labour, Koreelah became the show place of the district.’ But his motives weren’t altruistic; they got half the pay rate of his white labourers.

The electoral roll shows 38 ‘Hindoos’ had signed on with the Byron team by 1906, while there were none registered with the Murbah club and only one officially accepted for the Mullum squad. However, as indicated by the police census and the local rags there were in fact many of their team mates around Mullum and Murbah at this time, perhaps suggesting the influence of the Murbah based Tweed and Brunswick Advocate, which complained in 1905 that there are altogether too many dark ‘uns on the Tweed electoral roll.

A lot of names began to disappear from the rolls after the local White Australia Fan Club encouraged them to hop on their bikes. This encouragement stepped up after mid 1905 when a Norco meeting decided to get tougher on its resolution to ban the produce of dairy farms employing Hindoo labour. …There was no doubt that the Hindoo was not conducive of good butter… One employer of Hindoos was a tad incredulous and eventually managed to extract an admission from the Norco manager that his cream was of extremely good quality, but the health conscious farmers from the Presbyterian stronghold of Myocum, who had all voluntarily agreed not to employ Hindoos about a year earlier, greeted his interjection with hoots and great disorder.

Said the Tweed and Bruns Advocate a month later: Large numbers of Hindoos have passed through Murwillumbah during the past few days, apparently on their way to Queensland. The exodus of these coloured gentry from New South Wales is no doubt due to the fact that they are being expelled from the farms on the Rivers as a result of that motion that was carried at the North Coast Co-operative Company’s half-yearly meeting. Queensland is welcome to them all.
A month after that they discovered the mysterious town of Sweet Bugger All: The Quinbarien (QLD) correspondent of the ‘Courier’ states that Hindoos and Afghans from the Northern Rivers of NSW are arriving at that place.
And a week after that: Hindoos and Afghans still making over the border. On Wednesday a large batch of them caught the Mibbin and made for the Heads, thence taking train to North Queensland, where they have gone to join the heathen Chinese and the all-conquering Jap.
And six months later when the subject was again hot: Heard on the Rivers: That according to “The Bulletin” NSW has exchanged Hindoos to Queensland for Kanakas; and
That the deal is one that NSW would gladly make every day in the week.
And that if the Hindoos could only be deported with the Kanakas the Northern Rivers would be a White man’s paradise.
But the Queerlanders dreamt the same dream and turned their bikes around: A batch of Hindoos arrived in town from Queensland yesterday. The first place they made for was the P.O. Savings Bank. These dusky sons of India always carry a banking account.

Norco’s action was still reverberating into 1906 when The Lismore Chronicle ran an editorial on the hot topic and won accolades from the in/famous Bulletin as well as all the local rags. The Chronicle wanted to very much know, in order to let its readers know too, whether that rule – written or unwritten, matters not – has been, and is being, carried out. …. That the Hindoo is inefficient is beyond doubt. The principle has been bred in him since before the days AURUNGZEBE cursed his laziness on the plains of Deccan. In 2000 years of history the Indian has never evolved one permanent state, or one statesmanlike idea, and his inventive power – save in the invention of false evidence and the cunningness that allows him to keep the secret of the whereabouts of illicit stills – seems almost to be lying incapable at zero. The Hindoo is by nature a dirty man. And there is no guarantee that his dirty habits don’t occasionally become badly mixed up with his work in the milking yards. … And there is something more than cheapness or even efficiency to be considered. There is the effect that an indiscriminate mingling with Hindoos must have on the morals of the rising generation. The Hindoo is undesirable; he is a moral, mental, and physical infection; a public eyesore, and a commercial nuisance. He violates the minor laws of the town by an assumed ignorance, and he sells justice in broad daylight. He lacks all the essentials of a good citizen, and he lacks almost all the attributes of decency in his camp life. As a rule he is useless to the business man of the town, useless to the public institutions, useless to the charities, and a nuisance to the courts. His presence, either in the milking yard or the dairy, is the means of keeping the white man out of a living, and the general public will never be certain that strict cleanliness has been enforced. … the people of this district would like to know how many Hindoos are being employed in district dairies.

Tough question, but the police census of 1905 shows there were 55 ‘aliens’ (or ‘Asiatics other than Chinese’) in the Mullum district and 22 in Byron, most of whom were probably Hindoos at this time and using their unwashed hands in the grass seed business after being locked out of the dairies. While they started to head for the border after things hotted up there must have been a further influx, from other local districts or maybe India itself, as the 1906 census shows an additional 25 now bunkered down in the newly created district of Bangalow but with 55 still in Mullum and 14 left in Byron, sharing the landscape in the combined districts with 6115 antiseptic ‘Europeans’ and 13 grubby Chinese. Mullum sub-district contained the 4^th largest enclave of coloured aliens in the 22 sub-districts making up the Richmond-Tweed Patrol District, only beaten by the ‘Kanaka’ communes at Cudgen and Tumbulgum and the cosmopolitan municipality of Lismore itself. Murbah was being terrorized by 30 ‘aliens’ at this time.

By 1907 however, the public eyesores had returned in force after the Queerlanders pulled the welcome mat. Mullum district, now with 80 aliens, still mostly Hindoos but now with a few more Islanders who had drifted south, moved up a notch to be the third largest alien enclave on the North Coast. This must have been a dreadful shock to Mullum, the only district in the Richmond-Tweed region that could claim official virgin status upon Federation, when not even a token Chinaman blotted the landscape. Bangalow, Byron and Murbah districts remained relatively static with 23, 13 and 44 aliens respectively, exclusive of the 30 heathen Chinese throughout the Brunswick and Tweed regions.

They only added to the dole queue however. Public shaming of employers had by this time become a popular means of preventing Our Smellful Brethren from earning the money to buy soap. Said the Advocate’s Mooball correspondent: A dairyman not far from here has the rather doubtful distinction of being the employer of Hindoos in his milking yards……. If those dark-skinned individuals don’t trek in mighty quick order, I don’t see what’s to stop me from letting you, in the interests of white labour alone, have the name of their employer for your next issue.

By early 1907 the loveable Bulletin, the 'Bushman's Bible', was crowing that the battle had been won in purging the Northern Rivers – where everything reeks of the cow – of that evil, and claiming the credit for itself. This got up the nose of a Tweed farmer who asked why in the name of justice doesn’t the Bulletin give the dairy-farmers credit for having accomplished what they have, minus any other extraneous force than a moral obligation to themselves and to White Australia…. The Bruns Advocate was also a touch miffed and ran an editorial on who should get the …credit for stamping out this evil…. If there is any such quantity as justice about the ‘Bulletin’, it would give credit as well as a pen-thrashing where it is due. And the credit of wiping the Hindoo horror off the North Coast dairy slate certainly belongs to the farmers themselves – not to the ‘Bulletin’ or any other extrinsic force.

In the Brunswick District the Hindoos were specifically singled out in an orchestrated campaign, particularly in the lead up to the elections to establish the Municipality of Mullumbimby, the formation of which was opposed by the Premier on his visit to town. Byron Shire had been incorporated in 1906 and much to the chagrin of Mullum’s luminaries the administrative centre for the district was established at the Bay. Not happy with the umpire’s decision these blokes decided to carve out their own personal fiefdom. What might have been had the Premier had a bigger set of dangly bits than the town’s movers and shakers.

While minor skirmishes had been going on for some time, the first major assault, headlined ‘The Hindoo Horror’ under the by-line of ‘Southern Cross’, appeared in Aug1908 and went on forever: …. We have in Australia the rabbit pest, the sparrow pest, the noxious weed pest, and the coloured alien pest. … The pest which I would wish to deal with here, and the one which affects Mullumbimby most, is the Hindoo pest. Periodically we have outbursts of indignation against this plague, when its unwelcome presence becomes too apparent, such as at show time; … as a few months will bring the show season round again, a note of warning here might not be remiss.
About a couple of years back several Hindoos were allowed to acquire land at different points within what is now our municipal area, although before the land was sold to them most of it had been taken up by white residents at big prices. The headquarters of the coloured colony, however, were established at the northern end of town, close to the river, and almost adjoining a Government reserve abutting on the riverbank. … Although some of the dusky forms were always hovering around the neighbourhood, Saturday and Sunday were the days specially selected for a full muster, when high carnival was held. Every Saturday night a sort of saturnalia would be held, which did not subside till the early hours of Sunday were reached, when if nothing of unusual importance took place, the other residents in the locality would be given a few hours respite for rest. But shortly after daybreak on Sunday the gibbering jargon and raucous voices that disturbed the otherwise placid atmosphere announced to the persecuted white inhabitants that another day’s torture was in store for them. Willingly would these have shut up their homes and sought peace and quietness elsewhere, but this they were afraid to do with a large number of peregrinating Hindoo hawkers so close at hand. Here it might not be inappropriately asked, Have none of those lay and clerical Sabbatarians who inveigle so vehemently against the introduction of the Continental Sunday into Australia never got a glimpse of what an Oriental Sunday means? Are they aware that, while white people are compelled by law to lay all business aside, and are denied the almost necessary train trip to the sea, believers in Brahminism hold regular auction sales Sunday after Sunday to the noisy accompaniment of a Babel of voices enough to drive the ordinary town dweller frantic? If it is not an auction sale it is some sort of gorge, or perhaps both combined, that desecrates the day that Christians are taught to hold sacred.
While the proper observance of Sunday is a matter that belongs to the moral and social side of the colour question, the physical and sanitary aspect is perhaps of more immediate importance. … As already stated, a few yards from the hut a considerate Government had reserved a strip of ground or terrace along the banks of the Brunswick where it was intended people would be free to enjoy a quiet walk or an hour’s fishing. Apathy again allowed the baneful lantana and other noxious weeds to propagate here, and here was the spot selected by the Hindoos as a repository for their filth. Regularly every morning and evening they might be seen repairing in groups of two and threes to the reserve to convert what was intended for a health resort into a hotbed of disease. This same spot is also much frequented by children from the surrounding houses, and the question whether their moral, mental or physical sense would be most likely to become demoralised amid such an environment might be worth debating (when the ladies were absent).
One might go on ad infinitum showing how degrading and dangerous it is to allow these men to form a colony within or close to the municipal area, but the subject is one very difficult to deal with in the columns of a newspaper, and the most forceful arguments in favour of some energetic action being taken to rid the country of the pest be left unwritten here. A glaring inconsistency that will occur to many minds is the fact that the Federal Parliament passed stringent laws deporting the kanakas who, in the opinion of those who have had experience with both races, is a more desirable dweller here than the Hindoo, while the latter is licensed to go about the country intimidating lonely women and debasing innocent children.
Not only are those in the immediate neighbourhood where Hindoos reside injured by their presence, but every rate payer in the town is affected by them. In a few weeks time, when our own municipality is in working order, it will be necessary to impose a tax …, and no assessor would say that the unimproved value of a piece of ground is as great when it is surrounded by a horde of Hindoos as it would be were they a hundred miles away. Their presence would in most cases reduce the ground value by fully 50%, …. If equitable justice were done, the amount that is lost through the presence of these objectionable citizens should be paid by those who cause the loss, not by those who are already sufferers by them in other respects.
Now, as to what means should be adopted to shake off this coloured incubus, or at all events to keep it from spreading. I would suggest that vigilance committees be formed in every town on the North Coast from the Tweed to the Clarence …and on it goes with other various draconian measures designed to cut off all avenues for earning a quid … refuse hawker’s licences so they are not permitted to become a nuisance on our streets…. refuse them alcohol… boycott hotel keepers who serve them… boycott land agents who sell to them…
The past tense has been used largely in this article for the gratifying reason that within the last couple of weeks two of our more public-spirited citizens have bought the Hindoos out of two of their strongholds, …. It is fervently to be hoped that others will take a similar broad view of the situation, and that all those who deal in land will resolutely refrain from any transaction that would inflict injury on their fellow citizens, and so keep the black, brown or yellow agony as far away from our doors as possible.

The following week the regular columnist, ‘Paspalum’, was pissed because he could never get hold of the secret recipe for Tandoori Chicken: The Hindoo Horror is settling down on us with a vengeance. Its objectionable element is prospering with the seasons. A few years ago the Hindoo was made welcome by the then indigent cane-farmer, because the cane fields could be denuded of their dead foliage at a much lesser rate than a white man could do the same for. If a Hindoo could clear 5/- per week in his cane fields he could live well, because the farm’s hen roost was always handy, and the thief like ways of the objectionable character could always provide a wholesome meal when no one was looking. When the farmer appeared at the camp of his coloured servants the only dish visible was ‘johnnie’ cakes, but hidden in another compartment was roast chicken and other dainty morsels gathered from the fields of a well conducted mixed farm.
The dusky Hindoo was regarded at one time as an honest fellow, but civilization told him it was wrong to be honest when his stomach ached for good wholesome food. …… Now we see the Hindoo in a much more changed condition. He buys land, builds houses, lends money, and gets as drunk as an owl about the highways and hedges. In our main streets often can be seen a tangible mass of the element, arguing the point in the most loquacious manner. They group together in masses of 16 or 20 in a space of as many feet, with the result, of course, that decent people flee from the vicinity and stick a ‘for sale’ ticket on the front door. But the Hindoo, it must be remembered, is a British Subject, and we must accept his companionship as a citizen and grin and bear it. The Hindoo smiles when we frown at him, and goes back to his den with the knowledge that he is protected by the British Lion. In a few years time we will see him conducting business, giving employment to farm labourers, and running factories. But we must not complain, for we are told in the place where we are preparing for the ‘regions of bliss’ that we are all ‘one flesh and blood’.

The alien menace was even worked into an article on gardening … The ‘Queensland Agricultural Journal’ jobs some home truths down the necks of believers of ‘our coloured brothers’ …… The article goes on to talk about gardening and finishes off with a comment on garden pests, which gave the Star a nice exit punch line: The wail might be extended from Wum Lung to Sam Singh, as he is the biggest pest in this part of the country. [The Star was as cunning as a sewer rat in this sort of subtle stuff. A few months later, under an article on ‘Local Matters’, it reported progress on the ongoing crusade against the town’s rat plague and finished off the piece with: ‘In Europe it is alleged that the brown rat of Asia came and killed off the native black rat, and now the black rodent is an extinct species there. This should be taken as a hint by Australians, and everything Asiatic – whether biped or quadruped – kept out of the country and thus ensure a White Australia. The voracious Asiatic only needs a foothold to bring about the downfall of a white nation’.]

The gardening advice was followed by a letter from ‘Cornstalk’. …I think the question of the Hindoo nuisance should be a test one at the coming council election. Let the character of each candidate be carefully scrutinised, and if any shows a partiality for coloured residents and low class living, strike his name out no matter what other claims he may have.
Surely we can get at least six candidates who will not be in favour of retaining this dark blot on our bright and thriving landscape. As health and clean living should be our first consideration, let those who consider themselves competent to look after the municipal affairs of the town see that they will have to tackle this danger in a thoroughly earnest manner if elected, and show to other councils on the North Coast that the motto of Mullumbimby Municipality, the latest addition to their ranks, will be ‘White Australia’ right from the start, as from experience it has been proved to be undoubtedly the best.

The following week, 12Sep1908, saw 180 of the 274 eligible voters go to the polls and elect Mullum’s first worthies. The editor, probably one and the same Cynicus, Southern Cross, Paspalum and Cornstalk, seems to have bagged the council he was fishing for. In his editorial pep talk to the councillors he indicated some serious potty training:  …We trust that the new council will make post haste to cleanse the municipality…. It seems that the unclean were indeed moved on as the police census of late 1908 shows the number of aliens in the Mullum district had dropped dramatically to 33. Twelve months later it was still ongoing when only 19 were recorded in the district, at which time Mullum had slipped to 10th place on the region’s multicultural ladder.

Most of the drift appears to be back to the Lismore/Alstonville/Ballina strip, and to a lesser extent the Tweed district, but in late 1911 a heap of the pestiferous chaps were identified living communally in a few buildings on a farm at Tyagarah, where Hindoos now camp, enabling the turbaned troublemakers to claim the distinction of being the first into the multiple-occupancy game in the Byron Shire, pipping the Finns by over 10yrs. However, they got a bit carried away with this new form of rural residential planning when a group moved into the long closed and abandoned school house at Broken Head in early 1914 without submitting a development application. There is a good deal of local and justifiable soreness in consequence proclaimed the indignant editor, who seemed more concerned with the lack of an environmental impact statement. (20yrs later one of the Tyagarians, Peter Isher Singh, had his own dairy farm at Blindmouth and was sprung by a dairy inspector for having dirty premises. The Northern Star commented: A recent prosecution on the North Coast adds strength to many people's objections to members of coloured races being permitted to dairy in Australia. Actually there is no legal bar, and an aborigine or a Hindu is as much entitled to conduct a dairy as any Australian, but ....)

In late 1909 the fun and games were switched to the Tweed district: The good people of Tyalgum have been stirred up to a sudden frenzy of White patriotism by the fact that a Hindoo has been successful in the local land ballot. If this is allowed Tyalgum declares that it will want to know whether civilization is a failure and the Caucasian played out. It demands, however, that coloured persons shall be denied the right of acquiring land in the district on any terms, and that no matter what becomes of the rest of Australia, the policy of ‘White Tyalgum’ be relentlessly maintained. …… Great sympathy (says a contemporary) should be felt with the agitation which has started on the Tweed in an endeavour to prevent Indians – or Hindoos, as they are generally but erroneously termed – being allowed to participate in ballots for land selections. There are many reasons in favour of the agitation, and very few against it. The experience of the North Coast of the coloured alien is not one which we commend here as a desirable citizen … every objection must be raised when, in violation of the principles which make for a White Australia, he is allowed to enter into ballots for land, which should be kept for our own white people. Day after day young men from this State, unable to obtain land, cross into Queensland to there get what is practically impossible here. We should do all we can to keep the young yeomanry of the State with us, but that can only be done by the throwing open of the large areas of Crown Land, and also by allowing none but white men to apply for selections.

This balloting blunder generated eleventy three on the Richter Scale and hysteria across the region. All North Coast and Metropolitan newspapers picked up the story and ran with it for about six months, providing a ‘Tampa Crisis’ for the Federal elections in early 1910. The White Australia Policy became a major election issue in Richmond, with all candidates coming to Mullum to preach from the balconies of the Middle or Bottom pubs. All candidates took their cue from the agenda setting papers and were falling over themselves to show who was tougher on the Hindoo menace. The Independent Liberal for the Reps ran large adverts in the Star simply saying Vote for Nathan and White Australia with no other election issues.

Peter Street, foundation Mayor of Murbah Municipality, son-in-law of W.R. Baker, part owner of the Tweed and Bruns Advocate, and a lawyer often representing Hindoos, also stood as an Independent Liberal, but halfway through the campaign was influenced to stand aside. Four days after the Tyalgum outburst he had convened an Anti-Hindoo Meeting at the School of Arts that attracted only 100 people, which caused him to lament that the meeting ought to have been ten times the size. Alderman Moriarty shared his Hindoo phobia, commenting that socially and morally they are a blight on our civilization..., and moving the resolution ‘That this meeting of residents of Murwillumbah and district hereby protests against Hindoos being allowed to ballot for or occupy the lands of the State for the following reasons: (1) We consider that they are an undesirable class; (2) they lower the moral tone of any community where they reside. In many centres of the district away from police protection selector’s wives and children will not be safe if the Hindoos are allowed to make homes there.

Shortly afterwards the Tweed River District Council of Progress Associations and the Tyalgum branch of the Farmers and Settlers Association also took up the challenge and began writing off to Councils and all sorts of associations around the region urging them to bombard the Minister for Lands, through Mr Hindmarsh (Liberal MLA for Rous), to have the Land Act amended so as to prevent Hindoos and other colored races from taking up allotments.

At the same time George Nicklin of the Tweed and Bruns Chronicle gave a sermon, but with less fire and brimstone after his earlier colourful Hindoo comments won him an appearance in a secular court. Having delivered the Tyalgum truth he went on to chastise his congregation for not heeding his previous warnings: ... In one part of this northern district for months a white woman was living in a one-roomed humpy with four or five Hindoos, and this humpy was passed daily by children going to and from school. Was there a word of protest? Never a one, for these particular Hindoos were not then competing for land. ... On the occasion in a prominent town in the district when Hindoos fought openly for the possession of a white girl not a word was said ... nor was any protest heard when another Hindoo led the daughter of a renegade white man to the altar in quite conventional style. ... At a school in this district the children of a Hindoo are in attendance and associating freely with the white children without any protest being made, even though in most centres the line is drawn as far as our own aboriginals are concerned…. The insanitary habit of living pursued by these natives of India is notorious, yet this did not deter certain prominent dairymen from employing them as milkers.... They are no longer the servile creatures who whined so piteously for a job a few years ago. It is not uncommon to see a white man cleaning the boots of the coloured gentleman, who – this operation concluded to his satisfaction – retires to the hair-dressing saloon to be sartorially attended to by the white barber…

But the wily Hindoo, who is poking his nose into pretty well everything he can on the North Coast, had been eyeing off Tyalgum since early 1906. Tyalgum is a new country and it ‘may’ be the intention of the parsimonious Hindoo to establish a colony there! At the Land Court on Thursday forty applications for land in this locality were received. The land board threw open 26 Tyalgum blocks at that time but the Hindoos, amongst the 108 applicants, were unsuccessful.

In late 1909 Mr G S Briner, Liberal MLA for Raleigh (Coffs/Bellingen), reassured everyone that the Hindu/land problem was in hand. In at least two instances within the last few months Asiatics have been successful in land ballots on the north coast…. I would like to point out that where aliens come into conflict with bona fide white applicants, the land board has absolute power to deal effectively with them and the board can exclude any undesirable applicants from the ballot without being questioned as to its reasons for doing so. If half a dozen white Australians, or natural born British subjects, apply for a block of land, for which two or three aliens also apply, the applications being simultaneous, the land board has power to exclude the aliens from the ballot, and can refuse to give any reason for so doing.

Unfortunately the message didn’t get through to the Land Board, which drew the marbles for Gunga, George Bishan Singh and Harry M. Deen (and Stylianos Andronicos) for blocks at Nimbin in early 1910, right in the middle of the election campaign. This drove the level of the hue and cry on the north coast off the scale and escalated the bidding war for the vote of the clientele of the White Australia Café. A few months later it was still a hot issue for the State elections.

Despite all the election promises the wily Hindoos kept scrupulously meeting the Land Board’s requirements and managed to get into a few more ballots. In mid 1910 representatives of 30 Richmond River Hindoos are camped on the Blue Knob (Tweed District – near Nimbin) blocks that are shortly to be opened for settlement. They were unlucky in the ballot. A week later three blocks of land were thrown open at Billinudgel by the Crown Lands Department, at which there were 103 applicants ‘amongst them being a number of Hindoos which excited disapproval’, but they missed out here too. A few weeks later the Murbah Land Board balloted 8 blocks at Tyalgum, Gooninbar and Chillingham at which there were 138 applicants and no Hindoos won.

However, for the ballot a month later it seems the Land Board finally got its act together and all were informed that for the 21 Gooningbar blocks of land recently thrown open for selection there were 626 applications. 95 applications were thrown out, including all those lodged by Hindoos. The number of applicants is the largest received for any district subdivision since the Boat Harbour blocks of land. In 1911 1332 applications were received for the ballot of 11 blocks at Whian Whian and other places. All the Hindoos… were amongst the 400 rejected and the board …assigned no reason beyond that they admitted to the ballot those they considered had equal claims to priority.

[Bill Narunga gave up on the ballot system and managed to acquire a dairy farm on the open market, but to get his cream accepted by Norco had to employ a white manager, who subsequently dropped him in it upon being taken to court by a health inspector for having dirty premises. Bill was still pissed into the early war years when he suffered an indignity in Lismore, possibly at a Greek cafe, and wrote to the Northern Star: ... is the usual custom in Lismore to refuse to serve a Hindoo in the tea rooms of that town? I am a farmer and have property of my own, having lived in this district for seventeen years, and have always borne a good character for sobriety, cleanliness and honesty. My countrymen are good enough to go to the front and fight beside English soldiers, so I ask why should any person refuse to serve me .... This was just after a troop of Hindoos, Sikhs, Afghans and Mohammedans on horseback was a hit at Lismore's Grand Patriotic Parade of early 1915. (Bill was again an indignant letter writer during the Depression, when people were again hardening-up and protesting over his impending nuptials to a white girl. No Lismore minister would marry them, despite the approval of the girl's parents, and the marriage never came off. The parents subsequently sued a newspaper for £1000.)]

At the height of the banana boom in 1921 the census found 68 ‘Hindus’ in the hills around Mullum, making the community the largest enclave of Sikhs and Muslims in NSW, inclusive of Sydney. Despite the Star’s worst nightmare however, most of the subversive scoundrels dispersed following the collapse of the industry, leaving only Lal, Isher, George, Gundoo, Braham, Mudee Rham ('a priest or holy man of the Brahmin religion now amassing riches as a banana grower'), and a few others to carry on the terrorist campaign around Mullum. But they soon tired and thereafter the remaining chaps chose to remain antisocial and keep a low profile in the town and district. The commune slowly declined, with a drift to the Terania, Tintenbar and Harwood districts. During the next boom, from WW2 into the late 1950s, the Tweed had the largest concentration of Sikhs in the region – excluding Coffs Harbour district, which for a time became the leading banana production region in Australia – and today Murbah seems to be the district of the largest permanent Sikh presence on the Far North Coast. The communal purchase of land at Woolgoolga in the 1930s later led to the first Sikh temple in Australia and remained the only one in the country for many years. Woolgoolga now contains the highest concentration of Sikhs in Australia, but this dominant position is now under pressure from Murbah where the Northern Rivers Sikh Association was formed in 1980 and where a temple was built in 2001. And, much to the pleasure of the Progress Association, another one was completed at Bangalow in 2004.

Ironically, half the Mullum district seems to have a spiritual bent these days, with a lot regularly travelling to India to sit at the feet of some amused Guru, but so far Mullum has remained off the programme for Sikh Temple roll outs.

Given the nature of chain migration it’s likely there was a single Punjabi Sikh/Muslim responsible for alerting his compatriots to this portion of the land of the fair go, just as Peter Pazoff of Macedonia, Andrew Alidenes of Ithaca, Gino Pagura of Italy and the Back brothers of Finland acted as the nuclei for the growth of their respective Mullum communes. Arguably this bloke was Atta Mahomet Shar or/and his brother Walli, who turned up on the Richmond in the late 1880s/early 1890s and became storekeepers at Wyrallah. They were well-educated blokes and upon return to the Punjab pre WW1 were the major conduit through which the Punjabis maintained contact with Australian authorities, particularly Walli, a prolific and flowery letter writer of Karuana, Banga District, Jullundhar.

Afterthought

[For the record, a remarkable bloke who appeared on the scene during the land ballot saga was Prem Singh of Invercauld, Goonellabah/Lismore, who led the counterattack and was still punching long after the voters had raised the hand of the winner. Rarely before in Lismore had the anti-alien noise reached such levels, generating a bit of unease within the Hindoo community that this time around the antagonism could get out of hand. Initially there was a bit of dissention within the ranks, and an 'every man for himself' approach as the Muslims, Sikhs and Syrians tried to distance themselves with a diversionary argument over religion in the pages of the Northern Star (Hindoos worship cattle as their God, and therefore are idolaters… said Mahomet Aalum ... Why is it that coloured people are being continually insulted by so-called Christians? ...I wish to mention here that a true Afghan would just as soon lose his life as be called a Hindoo or Assyrian, and then people wonder why we retaliate when we are insulted.)

At the end of Jan1910 Prem drew the issue back to the main game and, being less inclined to turn the other cheek as in times past, deplored the fretful and wilful allegations made against the Hindoos by a certain paper (either the Lismore Chronicle or the North Coast Daily News)...in an article on... ‘Hindoos and Land Settlement’ ...and... the unjust assertions that all Hindoos are undesirable aliens and are not fit to be allowed to acquire Crown Lands in Australia, ... It has wantonly hurt the feelings of the quiet and peaceful Hindoos on the Richmond. In a similar way, the other night, Aldermen White and Latcham used some very offensive and uncalled for language against the personal interests of the Hindoos of Lismore. In the course of their speeches they spared no pains in giving the Hindoo a bad name. ... Aldermen White and Latcham, you deserve seats as members of the State in recognition of your high sense of justice and impartiality towards the coloured subjects of the King living in Lismore. After you have got a seat in Parliament then you will see how long your offensive language and your oppressive policy will be tolerated by the people of India. Instead of running down the Hindoos of Lismore it was your duty as European members ... to think well of and look after the personal interests of all the people, black or white, according to the Local Government Act....In conclusion, I trust that our just and impartial Government will see their way clear to look after and well protect our personal interests, rights, and privileges in Australia against the wild attacks of these ignorant and thoughtless fools of the White and Latcham school. …

He followed up with another letter 3 days later, and again a week after that when the Sydney Morning Herald got interested, and again on 23Feb1910 refuting general slanders (Hindoos lusting after white women), while most of his mates were still on the religious bent. All of which generated responses, rabid and sympathetic, and helped make 'white Australia' a major election issue, although it was a no-brainer as each candidate displayed colourful credentials. Liberal Massy-Greene safely held Richmond.

There may have been other letters, but the only one that got a run was after the Federal election, written 25Mar1910 and published 27Apr1910: ...Replying to a question asked by one of the semi-civilized at Grafton, as it was reported in your paper recently, the Honourable Mr Wade, our worthy Premier of the State of NSW, had no hesitation in declaring that the Hindoos, as British subjects, could not be debarred from settling upon the dusty and inhospitable land of Australia. This official statement, made by a leading, responsible man of the State of NSW, must have surely thwarted the evil designs of some of those newspapers and others who are of late indulging and advocating some very mischievous sentiments, which may, as we are afraid, seriously affect our just cause in this so-called ‘White Australia’. …We, the Hindoos, tender our sincere thanks to the Honourable Mr Wade for his sense of Justice and impartiality, and we reply that he may be trusted to administer justice to all the black and white subjects of the King in this part of the Empire. …

This got him immortalised in Hansard when the Danish-born Niels Nielsen, Labour Shadow Minister for Lands, read his letter to Parliament: ... I just want to read a certificate of character which the Premier has obtained from a resident of the Northern Rivers. ... I do not think that certificate will do the Premier much good, especially as far as the northern rivers district is concerned. I venture to say that the members representing those northern constituents dare not say that they are in favour of Mr Prem Singh getting any land on the rivers...

Prem reckoned the political upstart, White Australian Nielsen, in order to satisfy his own mean and selfish desires, used some very offensive language and intolerant language against our personal interests, rights, and privileges as regards lands... In conclusion, I trust that our enlightened House of Parliament will not diverge from the fundamental principles of British justice and impartiality, and they must, by force of character, kick Nielsen and Co out of the House to avoid further trouble... But the deaf mob tossed out Premier Wade and the Liberals, although all North Coast Libs were safely returned.

Throughout the State election campaign he stepped up the letter barrage, or the Northern Star had a change of heart, publishing mainly land ballot stuff but starting to branch out into other themes. The balloting beefs were all in the same vein: ... The wholesale exclusion of the Hindoos from balloting on the Tweed farms has caused an utter disappointment and general dissatisfaction among all the Indians as regards the expected miscarriage of British justice and impartiality. ... This is the first time in the history of NSW that such a wholesale exclusion had ever been suggested; this is the first unhappy time that an idea of discrimination had ever before been conceived by any previous court of justice which nobly uphold its just, impartial dignity and prestige independently of public sentiment. But all that has been done is mainly due to those mischievous anti-Indians, speaking or writing, and also to the resolutions passed and carried unanimously by our local selfish and black-hearted white Australian politicians of the Lismore Municipal Council, who ultimately had succeeded in influencing the Land Court for the unjust exclusion of the Hindoos from balloting for the lands. Is this the British justice that His Majesty’s Indian subjects have been refused even land settlement in Australia?  Is this the boasted British justice of our white fellow creatures that they could unjustly and wilfully forfeit to their black people, who are at their mercy, all the State rights equally granted by the old code of that justice? We beg to ask that Land Board who sat for the disposal of these blocks were they justified, in order to please the selfish and black-hearted white Australian on one side, and to displease and utterly disappoint the Indian public on the other side, in effecting the wholesale exclusion of the Hindoos from balloting? Could not they find any of the twenty Indian applicants fit and desirable persons to ballot… But this time around he couldn't provoke many outraged citizens, so letting the candidates off the hook in having to confirm their white Australia credentials at every rally.

Undeterred by the election results, Oct1910, he kept up the land laments and white Australia angst into mid 1911, but by this time he'd long been expounding on Guru Nanak’s Teachings ...for the spiritual enlightenment of our 'white Australian' Aryan Saxon brothers of Lismore. He got free rein from the mischievous owner and Star editor, the ageing Thomas Hewitt, who, while firmly in the 'white Australia' camp, nevertheless believed in the 'fair go' and had little time for hypocritical employers of Hindoos. In Dec1910 Hewitt withdrew from active duty and anointed Gratten Grey, of the 'Tasmanian Hansard staff', as editor. He wielded the quill for 9mths before resigning to take up a position with the opposition, after which editorial control was exercised by Robert Browne, previously a journalist in India (and a man of 'conservative and Imperialistic sentiment'), for the next 10yrs.

Prem's mate Nielsen, the new Minister for Lands, resigned from cabinet on 1Aug1911, the day before the Star reported Prem's farewell knees-up at Invercauld: ...After enjoying the repast and other amusements, Sardar Hazara Singh, on behalf of his Sikh brothers, presented to Prem Singh an address expressing their deep sorrow for his departure, but at the same time wishing him a happy voyage and safe arrival at his destination. The address went on to say that the Sikhs owed him a debt of heartfelt gratitude for the way he had manfully with his ready tongue and pen repulsed the unjust attacks of ‘Ever Clean’, ‘White Australia’, etc., (rabid anonymous letter writers post State election), who had wilfully attempted to degrade and deprecate the mental, moral, and physical excellences of the Sikhs, and further eulogised the manner in which he (Prem Singh) had preached the Guru’s mission in this dark land of White Australia... Subsequently Prem Singh spoke briefly on the general politics of the day. He said that the Government policy of White Australia was absolutely an unjust and inhuman Act ever conceived ... He further held that if Australia really desired to maintain her perpetual independence, she should embrace Sikh settlers from the Punjab ... Further, he was much pleased to inform them that John Bull, whose avaricious policy had ruined Indian social and political happiness, and rendered the country destitute, is beginning to learn better now. … Prem Singh and his brother Sikhs with clasped hands prayed to the Almighty to save our most kindly European employers of the Richmond, and other families, and mercifully grant them divine bliss and celestial happiness and everlasting prosperity in recognition of the continual support they had afforded the Sikhs, notwithstanding the anti-Asiatic feelings prevalent in this so-called White Australia…

Two weeks later his final swansong was a public address on Sikhism delivered at the Federal Hall in Molesworth Street where, of all people, Ald. R. White presided, and briefly introduced the speaker.... Prem Singh said he felt highly honoured at seeing so many people present that evening to hear his address. He said: You may be surprised to see here tonight an Indian standing on a public stage and speaking on a strange subject in a country like Australia, where the coloured races, especially the Sikhs, are indiscriminately misrepresented and wrongfully misunderstood, unhappily disregarding the high and lofty ideals of life, and totally ignoring the mental, moral, and physical achievements they have naturally acquired in the realm of virtue and divine knowledge… The cheeky chap probably wrote this and the above himself and submitted the reports to obliging Hewitt or Grey.

Shortly afterwards Labour was under fire for not sorting out a more equitable means of determining eligibility for land ballots. A movement of great interest, not only to this district, but throughout the State, is being started in Lismore…. At the recent ballot, out of 1332 applicants, about 400 were arbitrarily rejected by the Board in their discretionary selection of who had a right to go to the ballot. The fact that they were thus rejected by a decision arrived at privately and without evidence other than the mere application forms has caused great dissatisfaction amongst the rejected applicants and their friends.…The Board rejected the applications of all the Hindoos, and while there is no wish to question this, ... The law simply states that every British subject of a certain age and under given conditions shall have a right to apply. ... At the present time there have been some three hundred young men and women deprived of these rights and practically classed with Hindoos as undesirable settlers…which went through to the keeper, either because Prem left no nightwatchman to wield the bat, or the new umpiring editor was playing with a different rule book. And 22yrs later, when a Hindu with the fascinating name of Mullum Calm (Mows/Mohs/Mohammed Khan?) won a block at Kyogle, it was the Country Party's turn to wear the anger of the farmers for not amending the legislation.]

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The Chinese

The first group of Chinese into the general area consisted of 19 gold fossickers spotted up around Drake and Tooloom in 1856. By 1871 there were 98 of the blighters, 10 of whom had filtered down to the Richmond proper, and by the late 1870s allegedly 300 were sifting for alluvial gold at Evans Head (or so goes the folklore, but the circumstances behind the naming of Chinamens Beach remain inscrutable. Ditto Chinamans Wharf and Chinamans Road at nearby Bagotville.) In 1880 they triggered the Northern Star's early warning system: Hither They Come; After being left to ourselves for many years past, the children of the moon, in the shape of the heathen Chinese, have at length discovered that the Richmond district is not a sort of bad place for living in, and in Lismore in particular, with smiles childlike and bland, they can be now seen daily…. The only fear, however, is, that seeing the goodness of the land, our Johns will come here ‘too muchee.’  They didn't, but in 1891, on the brink of the Depression, there were still 53 wandering the Richmond-Tweed region, almost two thirds of whom were in and around Lismore trying to earn a quid as market gardeners or cooks in the pubs and boarding houses following their ejection from the goldfields.

The nuisance was almost rooted out upon Federation when a uniform Restrictive Immigration Act, aka The White Australia Policy, was introduced and numbers rapidly declined across Australia, but there were still 51 stubborn individuals, 3 of whom were Australian-born, remaining on the Richmond-Tweed, inclusive of the 12 now scratching a living around the Tweed-Brunswick. [Still, by early 1904, the Tweed and Bruns Advocate reckoned that The Heathen Chinese is not doing too bad in NSW. At present there are in the state 30 chow laundrymen, 873 hotel and other chow cooks, 700 chow grocers, as many chow furniture makers as there are whites, and 3500 chow gardeners.] They were amongst the first into the banana industry, in both NSW and QLD, and were present in great numbers in the Brunswick Valley until bunchy top disease caused their exodus in the mid 1920s.

Through to WW1 seven Chinese, or ‘Confucian Vegetable Vendors’, ‘The Wegetable John’, 'Johns', ‘Chows’, 'celestials', and other codenames applied by the Star, were consistently recorded as living in Mullum, but whether they remained the same seven individual blokes is unclear. Charlie Man Wha established a fruiterer’s business in Mullum around the turn of the century and could be the bloke simply identified as a ‘Chinese storekeeper’ who was assaulted in his shop by a couple of yobbos in early 1906. He seems to have sold out to his compatriots George Duck and Sam Ling about 1907/08, but Sam died in Mullum in mid 1908 after being kicked in the guts by a horse. Sam Sing and his assistant Ah Kum were identified with a fruit and veggie store in late 1908, but it could be that they acquired the shop of Duck & Ling. And through to the war Sam Lee was a market gardener at ‘The Botanical Gardens’, Mullum Showground.

Shortly after Charlie sold up, Georgie Ah Yet seems to have become a cook at one of the pubs. Then came Ah Sam, alias Tom Choy, alias Tom Kum, as a cook at the Middle Pub, but he was sprung and deported in 1920 after 17 years in the country. During the war George Tim was a proverbial temperamental cook in the bottom pub.

Willie Young, aka Willie Yung Lee, a Chinese doctor based at Byron Bay, was a well-known local identity as he travelled around delivering his alternate medicine. By early 1914 his reputation as ‘the healer’ had spread all over the north coast, with pilgrims arriving by the wagon load to be administered with the strange herbs and veggies he grew himself and dispensed with an accompaniment of New Age incantations. He was also credited with hypnotic or clairvoyant propensities - at 2/6d per consultation. These days his spiritual descendants at the Bay use a new variety of herb, smoked while undergoing cranial-sacro and chakra balancing, Feng Shui geopatic reorientation, and/or reiki massaging.

He set up a hospital at the Bay in mid 1914 by buying up a terrace of cottages on the same block as his humpy. In appearance he is just a common chow, smaller and thinner than the average John, with the usual flat face and receding chin. There is nothing about him to indicate the clairvoyant. The council wasn’t happy with the state of the place and tried to close him down, but he had a loyal following and wasn’t to be intimidated – A glance in (by the Bangalow Herald reporter) showed it to be crammed with people, old, young, and middle-aged, all herded together in semi-darkness. It was understood that these people had received tickets of admission on the previous Monday and their turn had only come on Saturday… but his premises are not fit to accommodate the number of people whose faith in Mongolian Allopathy prompts them to resort to the chow for relief…. He seems to have opened consulting rooms at Tweed Heads and Casino in 1916, but was still firmly ensconced at the Bay in mid 1917 when his workload was such that he was in urgent need of a housekeeper. At some stage he moved to Grafton where he dispensed concoctions until late 1929 when he was high on something and crashed his lorry, after which he became a market gardener 'on an extensive scale'. (At which time Tommy Young, an ex-hotel cook, was offering 'guaranteed permanent cures for indigestion... and all other ailments treated' at his herbarium opposite the railway station at the Bay.)

Chinese herbalists were operating all over the place through to the 1930s offering cures for a wide range of aliments from cancer to mondayitis. George Sun turned up at Bangalow in 1907 and remained for 23yrs until moving to Lismore to open a business in an Andrulakis building, passing the Bangalow business to his partner George Sue, aka Sue Sing Lee and J. Sue Lee, who was burnt out in 1931 and moved to Casino to operate from the shop of Charlie See Tong. George G. Young, also Bangalow based but with a travelling sideshow, turned up in the early war years and advertised with many citations from satisfied customers throughout the Tweed-Brunswick region, before disappearing around 1920. Wong Yuen, George Yin Lee, George Young Fong, George Dow and P.G. See & Tong serviced the district from Lismore, while Yee Wah Hong and W. Ah Quee regularly toured around the Brunswick district from their base in Murbah. George Lau On Lee, nominally based in Sydney, was a regular visitor to towns all over the region. From the mid 30s the Murbah based Wing Yuen Lee also started peddling his concoctions around the neighbourhood. Abdeen Ferris, a Syrian Herbalist, was a strong competitor, along with Abdullah, an Indian and Oriental Herbalist, also both Murbah based, although the former was based in North Lismore to the mid 1920s. Earlier, the Hindoo Herbalists had ruled the roost, with the Casino based Esur and Nurain Singh having the highest profile as they regularly toured around Bangalow, Mullum and Murbah. In 1907 they were in business in Sydney with the earlier Mullum identity Dr Delph Singh, but came to the Northern Rivers shortly afterwards.

The big Chinese numbers however, came during and after WW1, initially at Murbah but later Mullum, when the banana industry started to get off the ground. Through to WW1 Murbah and district recorded a fluctuating population up to 22 ‘Celestials’, the highest peak number in the Richmond-Tweed region, and thereafter numbers increased rapidly until Mullum took centre stage. From early 1916 the Star started to report the growth of this new industry in earnest, with most of the early articles to do with the Chinese invasion at Murbah. It made much of a ring of four Chinamen accused of selling Tweed bananas as Fiji bananas… It is interesting how the wily Kwong fuh Liu, true to his racial instinct, ….

It seems Alderman White, ex mayor of the Lismore Municipal Council, a leading figure in the jihad over ‘Hindoos’ entering Crown Land ballots, which sparked the entertaining ‘White Australia Election’ of 1910, and later the leading crusader against the Greek fruiterers in Lismore’s Great Barrow Wars of 1923, was the bloke who first figured they needed Government reinforcements when he wrote to Mr Nesbitt (Nationalist MLA for Lismore) in mid 1916. …As you are aware a Chinese ring have been controlling the banana industry in Australia for years, and the progress of the industry in the Tweed was the only ray of light visible, the Chinese not having the control of this sector. Now it appears they are going to have a cut here. Is there any way they can be prevented from flooding our district? Will you kindly look into the matter. Nesbitt sent it on to Walter Massy Green MHR who set in train an investigation, which eventually gave all the Chinese a clean bill of health, as they were ‘old residents of the Commonwealth’, and nothing could be done about the plague. There the matter rested until things got out of hand in 1919.

But in the interim, after all that effort to be rid of Mullum’s Hindoo Horror, bang goes the neighbourhood again when the Star discovered that the tricky Confusion blighters had trespassed into its bailiwick. In early 1916 the Tim Young Co, a Sydney fruit merchanting company, purchased 65 acres of freehold land around Mullum for banana growing, the success of which prompted more of his compatriots to join the game. In mid 1916 under the favoured heading of White Australia the Star reported: The advent of 15 Chinamen to work a banana farm on the Main Arm is causing perturbation of spirit in many papers. The Sydney correspondent of the Brisbane ‘Daily Mail’ says: ‘Fifteen Chinamen have arrived at Byron Bay to engage in banana cultivation on the Tweed River. It is said to be a most profitable occupation, and one not requiring any superhuman talents. Both the home and foreign consumption is large. Your Queensland bananas are well and favourably known, but now it behoves you to look to your laurels. There is no knowing what triumphs in bananarial art 15 Chinamen may produce. Doubtless ere long we shall only buy Tweed bananas – pure Chinese grown!” The Tweed Daily then explains that they did not go to the Tweed at all but to the Brunswick. The plantation which the chows went to is owned by a Chinamen, and the natural effect followed. So long as the Australian Parliament allows Chinamen and Hindoos or other coloured races to own land there will always be these howls, and the White Australia policy a farce.

And then a couple of weeks later another 21 of the wily chaps were discovered clearing 60 acres at Main Arm. By 1917 about another 15 were working the 170 acre farm of Tiy Sang & Co at Main Arm, near Coopers Place. …An Oriental Takeover…Chinese Invasion… thundered the Star. All through 1919, during which another 28 arrived in town, the Star had regular updates under the heading The Chinese Invasion. By early 1920 there was also a group of 16 celestial fellows up at Wilsons Creek and Huonbrook growing bananas, at the same time as a Billinudgel delegate to the Northern Rivers District Fruit Growers Conference, while seeking support for banning the Chinese from the banana industry, said …on one block of 150 acres, owned and worked by Chinese, 33 Asiatics were employed. In 1921 a few more were identified at Mullumbimby Creek, while at Wilson's Creek the cluster of dwellings forming the Chinese living quarters, near the intersection of Upper Wilson's Creek Road and Cooper's Creek (now Huonbrook) Road, was causing anguish over the location of the proposed new school (which, in 1923, enrolled 11yr old Ajudie Singh, the son of Jawala, as one of the first pupils.)

In mid1919 a conference at Billinudgel decided to treat with urgency the danger arising from the invasion of the Tweed and Brunswick districts by Chinese speculators, bent on securing the very choicest lands for the purpose of banana growing. … there was a regular influx of Chinese to the Tweed and Brunswick districts of late, and that these gentlemen were intent upon seeking out all the most suitable spots in the localities named for banana growing. The invasion of the Celestials … constituted a big menace. It was detrimental to the best interests of the white population and more especially to the returned soldiers whom the Government was endeavouring to establish on land in the banana growing industry. Under the existing laws Government lands could not be acquired by the Chinese, but these people were offering big inducements to freeholders to dispose of virgin country at a high purchase price. … It was a well known fact that these people had ample funds at their disposal, thus precluding our own race from participating in the benefits from this particular industry. He especially emphasised the great headway the Chinese had already made in the Mullumbimby and Main Arm areas….

Six weeks later the Star editorialised that at the present rate of increase there will soon only be Chinamen here! Whether the Chinaman is a bad or good citizen, whether he works hard or not, whether he gets high wages or low wages, whether he spends his money or hoards it, or whether a White Australia is only an ideal to be scoffed at need not be touched on. The main fact is that the Chinaman is a Union on his own and he is out to break the White Man’s Union in the banana industry holusbolus. When half – only half – of the banana production is in the hands of the Chinamen, what will be the position of the White Man in the trade? The Chinamen will control the market and the White Man will be gradually squeezed out. Maybe, as has been said, the Chinaman will give a higher price and pay cash down, thus the seller apparently makes a bigger profit and gets a quicker return. But what kind of inheritance is left for his family? Taking away all sentimental reasons, the Chinamen is a bad business proposition in this country. A meeting is to be held at Murwillumbah to protest against fruitgrowers having dealings with the Chinaman, and most likely a few will take a pledge to have no more such dealings but the ‘other cove’ will keep on selling as usual. There is only one way, and that is a law made that only members of approved races hold freehold titles. This has been done in other countries and can be done in Australia too.

And a week later: There was a fairly large attendance at the public meeting called by the Fruitgrowers Association…to deal with the question of the invasion of the industry by the Chinamen. …A committee was appointed to carry out propaganda work. The Tweed RSL requested legislation to deal with the yellow peril …”

And two weeks after that an Editorial titled ‘The Inheritance that was Sold for a Mess of Pottage’: Here is the first instance recorded – it is from the first book of the Bible: …. Thus Esau despised his birthright.’
The last sentence of that quotation clearly depicts the minds of the Esaus of this district, they ‘despise their birthright’ and, what is worse, they despise the birthright of their children. This paper pointed out before that gaining a little (or even a big) profit now is counteracted if our children have no land to live on or are driven off what is left to them by undesirable neighbours. The meeting of members of the Fruitgrowers’ Association held in the School of Arts on Saturday last was a very tame affair. …. The Transvaal imported some of these ‘industrious, lawabiding and well behaved’ race, and within a year the British Government had to arm the Boers with shot guns to protect themselves and their families from the peaceful Ching! Of course, we have never had anything like that in Australia, but as the numbers increase so will the number of rogues. This paper has nothing to say against the Chinese here at present; so far as is known, they are peaceful and law abiding, but what of the future contingents? … Let one Chinese supporter come forward and prove the superiority of the Chinaman over the White Man and also state the advantage to be gained by importing Chinamen to the North Coast. (This was a reaction to W.R. Baker, the leading real estate broker in the Chinese land acquisitions.)

Billinudgel RSL took the strongest stand …Every possible remedy, from bombs delivered by aeroplanes to amended legislation, was suggested…and all were very emphatic in declaring that the alien invasion must be checked by some means….The tone of the meeting throughout was very hostile to the alien invasion and there can be no doubt that this question calls for serious attention on the part of the authorities.

In late 1919 both Mr F. W. Stuart, Secretary of the Tweed Fruit Growers Association (and a star in the ‘Alien Election’ of 1925 and Murbah’s ‘Internment of Aliens’ paranoia during WW2), and Mr E.C. Upton, Secretary of the Brunswick Fruit Growers Association, separately wrote to Mr W. Massy Greene MHR. Said Stuart: …You are no doubt aware that a Chinese company has entered into this business in the vicinity of Mullumbimby, and this being evidently a success to these people, prompts them to go further into the country.
I feel that it is unnecessary for me to point out the seriousness of these people entering into an industry, which has been developed by the white man and has proved such a wonderful asset to this district, and offers such wonderful opportunities to our returned soldiers.
We hope you will treat this matter seriously and impress upon the Government the urgent need of introducing legislation as required…

Massy Greene sent it onto the Minister for Home and Territories, with the note ….I will be very glad if you would look into this question for me, and see whether there is any means at all that the Commonwealth Government could adopt that would prevent the industry falling into the hands of the Chinese, as I am satisfied that it will be utterly ruined once they get hold of it.
This, at all events, has been the experience in Northern Queensland, and I feel sure that if they obtain a leading position in the banana industry in the Northern Rivers of NSW, they will first drive every white man out of it, and then it will not be long before the industry as such becomes defunct.

The Minister set in train the necessary investigation, which was given some urgency through alarming scaremongering in the Sydney papers. Captain Carmichael MLA, of the Soldiers and Citizens Political Party, following his tour of the Northern Rivers, told journalists that …feelings are working up so hot that I should not wonder if another Lambing Downs incident should occur.”
“On one place 50 Chinese are employed, and on another 35, and I find there is the most extraordinary laxity in either registering or checking these arrivals as they come through. A number of these Chinese seem to come direct from China, and how they are permitted to land in view of the restrictions supposed to be in force is not apparent. For example, in the small town of Mullumbimby I found that 28 Chinamen had come through and registered during the current year. Of these 10 had landed at Thursday Island during 1919, and their passports show that this is their first landing. If this is done in one small township the leakage over Australia must be very considerable.”

He confirmed his concern to the Government sleuths: ‘…. According to Mr Carmichael, the local residents, particularly the returned soldiers, are much incensed against these Chinese, and during his visit there he had with difficulty restrained them from carrying out their intention of throwing the Chinese into the river. He is certain that serious trouble will occur there shortly…

The subsequent investigation found 147 Chinese banana benders in the Mullum district, all of whom were ‘old residents of the Commonwealth’. The only bloke sprung in the crackdown was Ah Sam, who had been minding his own business as a cook at the Middle pub long before his compatriots turned up to fatten bananas. He must have cursed them all while he did 6mths in Grafton Gaol awaiting deportation. The Minister issued a press statement that Carmichael had cocked it up, but the only newspaper to carry the correction was the Melbourne Age.

So on it went. Anecdotally, a physical clash between the Chinese and Australian banana growers did take place, after which the local police sergeant gathered the Mullum citizens in the centre of town and ‘literally read the riot act’ from the balcony of the Middle Pub, or so goes Mullum folklore. [Said Miss M.J. Martyn in her ‘History of the Tweed’ series: At the close of the Great War, returning soldiers took up hillside lands…. Banana prices boomed and with them the price of land. …. Hindus and Chinese joined the throng of settlers and careful action by the whites only just prevented a peaceful penetration.]

By 1921 there were enough Chinese around to warrant the formation of the subversive Mullumbimby Chinese Masonic Society, with Charles Young Doo (from Sydney) as the Installing Master, Louie Cleong as the Grand Master and Treasurer, Georgie Goland as Secretary, Fong Hoy, Fong Yip and Georgie Wong as Grand Wardens, and Georgie Chew (Murwillumbah), Young Sio (Bangalow), Mock Tim (Lismore) and How Pawn (Casino) as Country Representatives. The census of early 1921 sprung nearly 160 of the yellow chaps in the hills around Mullum, making the place the largest enclave of Chinese in the state outside Sydney. In late 1921 numbers were such that The Reverend Yee of the Chinese Presbyterian Church of Newcastle saw an opportunity to come to town on a recruiting campaign.

In early 1921 the District Surveyor at Grafton advised that the Chinese owned 333 freehold acres and leased a further 236 acres on the North Coast, two thirds of which were under bananas mainly around Mullum, allegedly making up 10% of the land under banana cultivation in the district. Later in the year, while NSW was still arguing over appropriate legislation to keep the blighters out, W. N. Gillies’ Government in Queensland wasn’t so backward and introduced a bill banning anybody from the banana industry, owners or labourers, who hadn't passed a dictation test.

It was market forces that saw it all come to an end. A series of gluts beginning in early 1922 and topped off by bunchy top disease a little later saw the banana industry enter Rip Van Winkle land, easing the Star’s heartburn as the celestials faded away. But it can probably be declared a draw as the main forces of whiteness, the Mullum and Billinudgel RSL clubs, also folded, although reformed in time to meet the dago menace during WW2.

The above George Goland was one of the few Chinese identified as remaining in the Brunswick district. He was born in Canton (or ‘Hansa’ according to some sources) in the 1870s and landed in Sydney in 1887, eventually making his way to the Mullum district around 1919. He subsequently became well-known in the district as a cook in various pubs in Mullum, Bangalow and Bruns, while commuting from his home in New City Road over many years. He was a well-educated bloke, remaining single and dying in Lismore in 1954. Canon Rowe of Mullum gave him an Anglican sendoff.

[For the record, a couple of exceptional blokes, Luther and Vivian Yung, born 1895 and 1906 Lismore to parents Foon Yung (aka Frederick Yung, aka Chow Toong Yung) and Jessie Mary King (born 1877 Grafton, the daughter of Stephen Ah King, aka Sun Hung Kee / Hung Kee Sun), became players in momentous events in China's turbulent history of the 1920s/30s. Their grandfather Stephen was grand master of a Chinese Masonic Lodge and a foundation member of the 'Revolutionary and Independence Association of Australian Chinese', while their father Foon, who opened a general store in North Lismore in ~1878, was allegedly leader of this terrorist organisation at some stage. (But they both could have been subordinate to Lee Loy/Long who was proclaimed The Master of Chinese Freemasonry in Lismore upon his death in 1913, aged 53.)

Foon Yung returned home in 1908, a couple of years after the death of daughter Isadore, leaving the education of his other children in Jessie's hands while he immersed himself in Chinese politics. After leaving school both Luther and Vivian served cadetships with the Northern Star before they and their mother, and probably daughter Lavina, ventured into China in 1925. Luther, who submitted articles to the Star through the mid 1920s, took up a position with the Shanghai-based 'North-China Daily' in 1928, rising through the ranks to become 'executive officer' by the time he returned home in 1953 to offer his knowledge of Mao's regime to Australian authorities. Vivian got his hands dirtier as a political adviser/activist, historian and journalist with 'United China', but making a short trip back in late 1932 to gather information for a book on the Australian-Chinese stirrers, giving prominence to the Ah See family of Grafton, the eldest son of which, Jimmy, aka Tse Tsan Tai, born 1872, was prominent in the Boxer Rebellion. Father Foon died in Canton in 1930, aged 91, and the Kuomintang mourned the loss of one of New China's greatest patriots. Vivian, probably accompanied by mother Jessie, escaped the Japanese invasion and made it back home to die, he in 1941 and she in 1943, while brother Luther was interned.]

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The Italians

In 1881 about 240 Italians from around Venice, survivors of the scheme to colonise New Ireland perpetrated by the callous conman, Marquis de Ray, were taken in by the New South Wales Government as refugees and eventually established themselves at what later became New Italy, near Woodburn. They gradually spread out into the surrounding region and arguably acted as the nucleus for the later chain migration of their compatriots, who subsequently became the dominant ‘alien’ group in the North Coast’s banana industry, if not in the Tweed-Brunswick district.

The New Italy pioneer families were Antoniolli, Battistuzzi, Bazzo, Bertoli, Buroro, Capelin, Comminitti, Fava, Felicietti, Gava, Giordano, Guareschi, Ianna, Marozin, Martinuzzi, Mazzer, Mellare, Morandi, Morandini, Nardi, Nicolia, Palis, Pedrini, Pelizer, Pezzutti, Piccoli, Roder, Romano, Rosolen, Sanotti, Scarabellotti, Serone, Spinaze, Tedesco and Tome families.

These families and their descendants slowly penetrated into the rest of the region. Specifically, the Nicolia, Pezzutti, Rosolen, Ianna, Sanotti, Scarrabelotti and Serone families were identified around the Tweed and Brunswick in the early years. The prominent Scarabellotti family was established in the district by who were children accompanying their parents on the Marquis De Ray’s expedition and married a year or so after arrival. Their son, Frank Scarrabelloti of Bangalow, was Australia's oldest man when he passed on in Jun2007, just short of his 110th birthday. (And his brother/cousin, Mr A. Scarrabelotti, was fully-assimilated by the time he joined the committee of the Richmond District Banana Growers Association and became the Bentley representative to the Banana Growers Federation, arguing in 1929 that he found it difficult to compete with Hindoos, whose mode of living enabled them to live cheaply and thus produce bananas more economically than was found possible by Australians... black labour had been practically eliminated from other fruit culture, but black growers thrived in the banana growers midst... It would be step in the right direction to enforce the White Australia policy...)

Nevertheless, despite this early Italian presence, and the difficulty of identifying a ‘pioneer’, arguably it was Gino Pagura at Main Arm who fulfilled the same role in the Italian community as Vlismas, Alidenes and Pazoff did in theirs.

Gino was born in the village of Castions di Zoppa, Pordenone, in 1906 and upon reaching the age of 18 the plan was for him to go to Canada like his father before him and like his brother who went in 1923 at the same age. By the time Gino’s turn came however, Canada’s doors were shut and he was talked into coming to Australia in 1925 by inventive Travel Agents, the same blokes who turned the Macedonians in this direction. In 1932 he headed north and a year later was president of the Fernside branch of the BGF, secretary of the Lismore District Council of the BGF and officer-in-charge of all banana transport.

Long hours for very little return had him deciding enough was enough and in 1938 prompted his permanent move to Main Arm, where he had earlier acquired a patch in Cooper’s Lane and had six acres planted out by 1937. In the meantime, 1934, he had married Pauline Whiteman.

He relocated to Goonengerry sometime after the war and became prominent in the ‘New Settlers League’, established in Mullum in the early 1950s, whose regular picnics at New Brighton and Brunswick Heads attracted up to 300 people at times. He was present at every naturalization ceremony through the 1950s. In mid 1956, with Gino as President and with the League now renamed as ‘The Good Neighbour Council’, a record crowd of 500 people attended the New Brighton picnic, attracting New Australians, mainly Italians, from all over the region.

At the time of the 1958 Continental Ball he was also President of the ‘Italian and Greek Community’, whatever that was. Betty Benedett and Livia Verado were joint secretaries of the Ball Committee, Cav Ludlow, treasurer, and Vera Black publicity officer. It was an Italian theme ball that year with the Mambo Italiano Orchestra brought down from Brisbane, and again in 1959.

Gino was also outspoken at BGF meetings through the 1950s, particularly during the period of the prolonged glut of 1955 and 56 when everyone was pulling their hair out searching for solutions, and he proposed what became known as the ‘Pagura Plan’. But: ‘On Wednesday Mr Pagura endeavoured to outline the scheme amidst continuous interjections and laughter which introduced an almost farcical atmosphere to the meetings. Unembarrassed, in early 1956 the BGF adopted a corruption of his marketing plan, with three Sydney retail fruit shops and an agreement with the agents at the markets. Alas, by late 1957 the venture had lost £9400 and one shop had closed, and the BGF was again debating implementation of his full plan, involving ripening rooms at Gosford/Hornsby and its own carrier business to distribute fruit directly to metropolitan fruit shops. But as the glut deepened it eventually transpired that a complete reorganisation of marketing and distribution was required with the advent of the bulk buying muscle of the new chain stores.

In the Lismore district about 30 or so Italians, at the instigation of Gino’s friend, the late, great Florian Volpato, gave up on the BGF in the late 1950s when they set up their own cooperative, The Fruit and Vegetable Marketing Co-operative. They figured they could do a better job of marketing than the BGF and could eliminate the many middlemen handling their produce. They set up ripening rooms at Wollongong and distributed the fruit directly to the large population. It was a very successful operation and was eventually sold at a profit after the last of the original shareholders retired.

Florian gave the region a touch of continental class in the late 1950s when he opened his famous namesake restaurant, Florians, in a former Greek cafe in Lismore, where the locals could experience the new taste sensation of espresso coffee. The place also accommodated the nightclub, ‘La Gondola’, for a few years. He also started The Continental Hour on 2LM in 1958, broadcasting Greek as well as Italian music.

In 1959, after 10 years of throwing his hat into the ring, Gino was finally elected as the first migrant to join the BGF board of directors, and a year later he was appointed to the Mayor’s committee of the ‘United Nations World Refugee Year’ appeal. Upon retirement he and Pauline moved to Lismore where Gino continued his services to the community and was instrumental in establishing the Challenge Foundation sheltered workshop. He was a wonderful man and a remarkable Australian. RIP Lismore 21Sep02.

Like Gino, most of the Italians in the Brunswick Valley came via Lismore and district, which remained as the place of the highest concentration of Italian banana growers. Also like Gino, most originated in the same mountain villages close to Yugoslavia in northern Italy. While the Greeks had marginally bigger numbers in the Brunswick Valley, the exuberance of the Italians sticks in the memory of the locals.

Some of his compatriots who followed him to the Brunswick before the war, and for whom he acted as an interpreter and tutor, include the Verado, Benedett, Dichiera and Conte families. Pre WW2 arrivals in the Tweed District, encompassing Crabbes Creek and Burringbar, include the Cargoni, Giacomini, Zambelli, Santin, Martinelli, Pirlo, Bandiera and Bianchetti families.

In Australia generally, most of the pre WW2 arrivals were northern Italians, particularly from around Lombardy and Piedmont, the great bulk of them arriving post 1923 after imposition of immigration restrictions in the USA. Post war the two northern regions of Veneto and Friuli, together with the five southern regions, in order, Sicily, Calabria, Abruzzi, Campania and Puglia, dominated. Through to the 1980s almost 300,000 settled permanently.

The Italians were prominent in Mullum’s ‘New Australian’ soccer team, the captain of which was Rodulfer Valzan, a northern Italian who played first division soccer in Italy and is believed to have had international experience. He grew bananas at Coopers Lane, married a local girl and has now retired to Bundaberg.

In 1958 Matthew Bortolucci of Main Arm returned to his hometown in the Veneto Region and established an unofficial ‘sister town’ relationship when he presented the local agricultural society with paraphernalia from the Mullumbimby Agricultural Society. He returned with similar stuff and presented it to the Mullumbimby society in a reciprocal gesture on the part of the residents of the province in which the Mullumbimby donation was accepted.

Public wog walloping got off the ground in mid 1940 when Mr. Anthony said he had discovered that many naturalised aliens, particularly Italians, were purchasing a considerable quantity of farming property. …. He had made a protest to the Prime Minister and suggested that legislation should be devised under the National Security Act to prohibit the transfer of property…A week later he was asked to put up when the Attorney-General told him that an investigation would be made if a list of the names of the Italians was supplied… Said Mr Anthony: ‘It is certainly no part of my duty to quote individual cases…. There is plenty of evidence in Lismore if the Attorney-General is genuinely looking for it. Menzies sided with Anthony and introduced the necessary legislation on 24Jul40.

Within a week the Brunswick District Council of the BGF followed by saying Mr. H.L. Anthony MHR was behind the movement for the internment of aliens…in passing the motion That all enemy aliens be interned, and that their property be confiscated and devoted to their upkeep during their internment. One bloke in supporting the motion referred to the labour shortage in the banana industry and said that, as many alien shopkeepers had been forced to close their premises, he had no doubt that numbers would join their countrymen in the banana and sugar industries. Thereafter the internment and ejection of Italians from the banana industry were regular topics at BGF and RSL meetings in the Brunswick district.

A long-winded article in the Mullum Star a couple of weeks later, quoting Colonel Bruxner, Country Party Member for Tenterfield, Deputy Premier and Minister for Transport, explained why this was necessary. … sympathy for enemy aliens being interned is providing a very efficient smokescreen behind which enemy agents can operate and also a means for them to delay their interment and thus remain at large to perfect their organization. …allowing people to remain at large who are definitely dangerous. Anyone who has had experience in dealing with the long established plan of enemy espionage and propaganda will know that it is not the person who is readily suspected or whose outspokenness easily convicts him or her who is the really dangerous enemy agent, but the one against whom it is almost impossible to get any evidence at all and whose work is so cunningly and secretly carried out that when you do discover him you are led to use that oft made statement of to-day  -  “I would never have suspected him.”
The sure proof that it is safer to intern all enemy nationals in the first place is that now, after almost eleven months of war, more of these people are interned every day, which means that for the whole of this period they had had an almost free hand to carry out their work. … one cannot blame the public for making the mistake that many of our refugees who are not even enemy nationals at all are dangerous. …
…Even at the risk of causing some inconvenience or some slight set back to the aims of some of those who have lately come within our midst, we cannot afford to leave people at large to work their will to undo all the effort we are attempting.

So there. Mullum, or at least the BGF and RSL, took up the clarion call with great enthusiasm. While they weren’t quick enough off the mark to spring anyone spying on the district’s vast military installations, they sure had fun putting the wind up a small and bewildered group of dagoes. That Italian numbers around the Brunswick Valley were insignificant was irrelevant when that rush of blood to the head occurs, but there’s a whiff of suspicion that some of the pious patriotic posturing and daft delusions were a smoke screen for reducing competition in the lucrative wartime banana industry.

Elsewhere many Italians had to suffer internment in camps hundreds of miles away from their families for no good reason other than the whim of some official or a dobbing neighbour taking advantage of the climate. A few have no sense of humour and retain some lingering bitterness at this treatment to this day. Like the raison d’etre of The Goons, Monty Python, John Cleese et al, it was all a silly, pointless exercise. But that’s show biz. And the internees sang for their supper, contributing significantly to Australian agricultural production as they worked alongside the Italian prisoners-of-war who were allotted out to Australian farmers.

Australia’s post war mass migration policy brought more Italians and swelled the number of ‘aliens’ involved in the banana industry, but they were welcomed with less enthusiasm than the other groups and continued to cop the flak into the mid 1950s, by which time their numbers were on a par with the Greeks. By the late 1950s however, paradoxically when the New Settlers League picnics were becoming almost an all-Italian affair and their influence on the direction of the Continental Balls increased substantially, their rate of exodus from the Mullum district was greater than that of the Greeks. The drift appears to be all to the Tweed district, where postwar migration saw them overtake the Greeks to become the dominant migrant group after the Brits. 

Those around Billinudgel formed close links with the new Greeks and Macedonians. Social life consisted in gathering at each other’s homes on a Friday night with a gallon or so of beer from Ma Ring’s pub or the endless grappa ordered through Markus Black. The Italian and Greek social experiences were very similar, with the exception that the Italians, where people could tell the difference, were treated much more harshly during and after the war for being ‘on the wrong side’, notwithstanding that dagoes were ‘undesirable immigrants’ anyway.

As with the Greeks, the Italian population in the region peaked in the early 1960s with the decline in the banana industry. In the Richmond district the population at that time was reckoned at around 850, while the combined Tweed-Brunswick mustered about 230. The enclave around Terania and Nimbin made up 9% of the Terania Shire’s population, the largest migrant percentage, inclusive of the Brits, of any Local Government Area in the Richmond-Tweed region. And by this time their feisty Australian-born were all over the place and uninclined to accept show biz careers.

Unlike the Greeks and Macedonians, the Italians didn’t leave the region in near the same numbers following the industry downturn. They had reached ‘critical mass’ and were more socially organised, even having an Italian order of priests based in Lismore to administer to their spiritual needs and a branch of the Italian Consulate established in Lismore to look after their many administrative problems. Lismore now has a ‘sister city’ relationship with the Italian city of Conegliano, in the middle of the district from where most of its Italian community originated.

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The Finns

While the earliest Finn so far identified around the Northern Rivers was Andrew Williams, who landed in 1890, aged 30, it was Jacky Back (Karl Johan Ohls) who led the Finn invasion of Mullum in 1902. He was of Swedish descent, born in Munsala (Ostrobothnia), Finland, in 1877, and migrated to Australia in 1896/99 to slip the conscription agents of the Russian Czar. Probably with stake money provided by his father, he acquired three blocks (640, 510 and 22 acres) at Goonengerry and shortly afterwards started construction of a sawmill on the smallest block, Devil's Lookout, adjacent to which his brother, William Andrew, and his father, Andrew William, acquired respective 442 and 65 acre blocks shortly afterwards. The mill was a massive undertaking, but it never got operational and the huge hardwood logs stood up on the skyline for about 40 years until a bushfire destroyed the place. (The blocks subsequently passed through the hands of the BGF to now form the major part of the Goonengerry National Park.)

His father, Anders (Andrew), and 16yr old brother, Vilhelm Anders (Billy, aka W.A) Back, arrived at Bangalow station in early 1903 in the middle of a heat wave. The story goes that they walked through the Big Scrub all the way to Goonengerry, and Andrew, decked out in fur-lined clothes suitable for the arctic winter, was attacked by hundreds of leeches dropping from the canopy. Whether it was this experience, or snakes and other nasties, unheard of in Finland, that turned him off the promised land is unknown, but Andrew promptly returned home and left his sons to get on with the job on their own. He is believed to have been a man-of-means in Finland and to have made another trip at some stage.

A short time later K.J. and W.A. made their way along the bullockies’ tracks to Wilson’s Creek where Jacky became the pioneer sawmiller on site. After a swag of surrounding scrub had been felled and burnt and all the stumps removed he diversified into farming and market gardening. Billy meanwhile had branched out on his own and established a farm at Burringbar, having mortgaged his Goonengerry block to the NSW State Savings Bank. He won the hand of Miss Christina Hart in 1908 and subsequently was credited with driving the first motorcar over the tracks to Wilson’s Creek to visit his in-laws. Upon settling in Mullum he became an elder and keen worker for the Presbyterian Church.

Jacky, a backwoods philosopher says Finn historian Koivukangas, has the distinction of being the first Finnish author in Australia, a remarkable feat for a bloke who never had a day's schooling in the English language in his life. Using the pseudonym ‘Australianus’, he wrote a book of verse and stories called ‘The Royal Toast’, of which he had several hundred printed. He also wrote a book on economics and contributed articles to the Sydney Bulletin. In the middle of the Depression he tried to save the world with his book ‘A Solution to the World’s Financial Problems’, published in 1932. He gained a reputation as an eccentric and colourful character who could turn his hand to anything. He seems to have become a banana grower at Yelgun sometime in the 1930s before retiring to live with his Holm rellies at Billinudgel. He died in 1962 aged 84 and lies in Mullum cemetery.

As for W.A., the Tweed Times and Brunswick Advocate was prescient in early 1909: Mr W. Back of Burringbar was offered by auction at Burringbar £16 per acre for his farm of 296 acres… and he …owns over 1000 acres of prime land along the railway line and 1280 acres at Mullumbimby. As Mr Back is a very young man, there must be looming in front of him the vision of a millionaire’s wealth. His Burringbar farm supplied the poles for the Lismore to Casino telephone line.

He went on to become a mover and shaker in the business world - Beyond doubt the wealthiest Finnish immigrant in Australia says Koivukangas. Just before the war he left Burringbar and settled in Mullum where, in 1918, he built ‘Cedarholm’, now ‘Cedar House Antiques’, with cedar milled by his brother Jacky. In Mullum he became an auctioneer and stock and station agent and began buying up large properties and subdividing, including ‘Jasper Hall’ at Rosebank and ‘Morrison Farm’ fronting the Brunswick, which took up about a quarter of the Mullum municipality. He is credited with building 100 houses in Mullum and creating 30 dairy farms. Later he moved into Queensland and acquired a large station at Winton, amongst others, before developing the suburb of St Lucia in Brisbane. Sydney properties were also in the portfolio.

The Backs acted as the nucleus for the later chain migration of their compatriots. Their father Andrew no doubt passed the word around of the success of his sons in Australia and W.A.’s holiday back home in 1923/24 generated much interest. Some of those who followed the Backs include the Kastren, Holmkvist, Holmnas, Fors, Melen, Tuohimaki, Roos, Snabb and Soderholm families. (Possibly connected to the farming Soderholms was Captain Soderholm, the Finnish Master of the 'SS Bonalbo' doing regular runs between Ballina and Sydney through to the early 1930s.) The Kastrens acquired Park Farm, the best known farm and one of the oldest in the district, from W.A. sometime in the early 1940s. It covered the area from the railway line in east Mullum and extended way into the Byron Shire. A portion was developed by the Back Real Estate Company in the late 1940s as the Kastren Subdivision, which created the site for the Primary School and all the surrounding lots as far as Argyle Street. By 1957 the remainder was in the hands of Ellen Fors.

Olavi Koivukangas remarks that the Back farm at Wilsons Creek was the staging post for Finns proceeding into Queensland, particularly those making for the Finn Commune at Nambour. The Backs were followed by other migrants from Swedish-speaking Finland, including members of their own family. The Finnish community at Mullumbimby grew during the 1920s… and became firmly established during the 1930s.

W.A.’s farms were also the initial source of employment for many new arrivals who later moved on to north Queensland. One such, Nestori Karhula, the central figure in establishing the Cairns Finnish Commune, arrived in 1921. He left a memoir listing over twenty adults together with their children who were resident in Mullum in 1935. This figure indicates that the Finns were amongst the largest alien groups in the district at this time. In the course of time, therefore, Mullumbimby developed into a Finnish-Swedish colony, whose connections with Finland have survived to the present day. Mullumbimby became the best known settlement of Swedish speakers from

Their sister Anna, Mrs Erik J. Holm (Nyholm), landed with her husband and five children in 1921. They lived and worked at Main Arm for 6yrs before acquiring a 275 acre farm at Billinudgel, where they remained until 1968. Another sister, Sofia, remained in Finland, where their father, Andrew, died in 1928 and mother, Sanna, in 1937. That such remote deaths in Finland should be highlighted in the Tweed Daily probably suggests the prominence of W.A. at that time.

W.A. certainly had pull. During WW1 it wasn’t safe to speak with an accent in Mullum and in mid 1915 the Star found it necessary to say It has been said that Mr. W. Back of this town is of German nationality. On Mr Back’s naturalization papers, 18Feb1908, the place of birth is given as Munsala, Finland, a Sweedish part. The next paragraph continued in the same vein: Mr E. J. Erichs, a native of Denmark….

But no such consideration was given to other aliens, who had to pay for their own adverts. One such, Mr G. T. Wonstrom, was a Jeweller and Optician in the Nelson Building: As some person interested has been circulating that I am a German I wish to state that I am a British subject. I have never been in Germany; I was born in Traryd (Sweden) from an old Swedish family. Moreover, I always made it a point even before the war, not to deal from German or Jewish firms, on account of their filibustering methods, and I consider I have every right to ply my calling as I have not ‘jumped into’ the trade. I have served proper apprenticeship in the thorough manner of the old country – all above statements I can prove. Apparently nobody was convinced as three weeks later he had a closing down sale and advertised his intention to enlist.

Mullum rioting was close. On the 30Dec1915, the last edition of the year, under a heading Smashing-Up Rumours, the Star reported: All last week there were rumours about town that several places were to be smashed up on Christmas Eve, but they came to naught. In Lismore it did happen and several shops had their windows broken and the contents taken. … In town here again are rumours of disturbances to take place on New Year’s Eve. … The next edition wasn’t until 13Jan1916 and contained no reports of New Year’s Eve festivities. (Lismore's Christmas Eve entertainment programme included the trashing of 'German' shops. See under 'Olympia Continued' at
 http://freepages.misc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~aliens/chapter_7.htm )

It’s hard to get a grip on whether the RSL and BGF were including Finns in their railing against ‘aliens’ and ‘enemy aliens’ during the next war. The only specific reference to Finns occurred during a district council meeting of the BGF in late 1941 when they were trying to get a bit more serious about cleaning up the glut and inferior fruit problems. A number of remedial measures, mainly put by Tom Mott of Upper Main Arm, whose proposals became known as the Mott Scheme, were discussed, but one bloke couldn’t help himself by adding that the Government wasn’t waking up to the fact that we have the enemy amongst us, and cited a case where it was alleged an alien …bom diddy bom bom …. When Mr Gaggin mischievously asked if the Finns would be countered as enemy aliens, the hanrahan was indignant and ambiguously replied I’ve nothing against the Finns, maybe because he was afraid of incurring the wrath of the powerful Billy Back, his fellow Elder at the Presbyterian Church.

Twelve months later Tom Mott was the President of the BVD Council and made a plea for the small Finnish growers who were dependent on the industry for their living. He moved ‘that the Federation be asked to consider making application to the Minister for Agriculture (Mr Dunn) to grant permits to plant bananas to naturalized British subjects of Finnish origin, provided such permits do not exceed a reasonable living area.
Seconding the motion, Mr Gaggin said ‘the Finns were friends of Democracy and had no anti British feelings’. He spoke in eulogy of their industry, integrity and honesty.
The motion was carried by 10 votes to 4.
The authorities were unsympathetic and two months later sprung Anton Lennart Snabb, a Finn of Possum Shoot, planting out 250 new plants on his 7acre lease. (Jacky Back had been sprung at Yelgun 2yrs earlier.)

At the start of the war Finland was amongst the first countries to start generating refugees, prompting calls for them to be allowed into Australia - Australia’s experience had proved that migrants from Finland and other Scandinavian countries would become acceptable Australians.... Nevertheless, Finnish migration to Australia generally dried up after the war; in the 10yrs to 1958 only 993 Finns had settled. Some of those who came to Mullum include the Uppgard, Hager, Nylund, Ostring, Liljestrom and Smolin families. Most congregated with the prewar arrivals at the top of Main Arm, earning the place the colloquial name of ‘Finn Village’. Their acceptance was made easier because the northern Europeans are of the same quality as the British... and less likely to pollute the Australian gene pool.

In late 1958, the Murbah Daily News, which by the mid 1950s had morphed into a strong advocate for migration and a leading regional newspaper in lending its muscle to help migrants settle into the community, ran an editorial: New Citizens from overseas are helping to build not only Australia’s numbers but her general progress towards attainment of greater nationhood. Increases in the Commonwealth grant towards the fares of approved migrants from Scandinavia, Finland, Switzerland and the United States are operative. … Mr Downer has estimated that an intake of 5000 migrants a year from Finland may be developed. It is emphasised that a flow from this source and from other parts of northern Europe should be fully exploited because people from these areas can be readily assimilated in this country. … Mr Downer has pointed out that with increased prosperity overseas, it is evident that migrants are not available to be picked up as and when desired by Australia….

At the time of the 1947 census only 476 people in NSW nominated themselves as Finnish born, and only another 18 in 1954. The census compilers didn’t bother listing the numbers in Tweed-Byron, burying them under the 90 ‘others’. Peak years of migration were 1959 and 1969, coincidental with peaks in unemployment in Finland, but by 1990 only just over 9000 had settled permanently, about 40% of them having decided to return home or move on elsewhere. Most are now in NSW and QLD and have gravitated to the capital cities and Mt Isa. They dominated the Gold Coast construction industry into the 1980s, and provided the golfing industry with Greg Norman.

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