The Music Legend and Wildlife Enthusiast Who Championed NAIDOC Week

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Ted Egan isn’t just a songwriter with an extensive and well-known catalogue documenting life in the Northern Territory.

As a public servant, he also played a significant role in the formation of the group behind what is today known as NAIDOC (National Aboriginal and Islanders Day Observance Committee) Week.

Born in 1932 in Melbourne, Egan moved to the Top End in 1949 and started working for the NT Department of Aboriginal Affairs.

His work as a patrol officer and reserve superintendent took him out of the city and on to cattle stations and crocodile-hunting expeditions.

In his late 30s, Egan worked as a project officer with the Office of Aboriginal Affairs: a new national agency within the Prime Minister’s Department that had been established following the successful 1967 Referendum, which saw the Commonwealth now having overall responsibility for Aboriginal affairs.

In 1970, a year after Egan wrote the track Gurindji Blues with land rights leader Vincent Lingiari, Egan was sent to Sydney to attend the annual general meeting of the Commonwealth Council of NADOC (National Aborigines’ Day Observance Committee).

A letter from the National Aborigines Day Observance Committee secretary in 1967

The purpose of the National Aborigines Day Observance Committee was to “create and promote an informed public opinion on the status and needs of the Aborigines”.

The committee had been set up back in 1957, two years after the National Missionary Council of Australia (NMCA) had asked the federal government to establish a National Aborigines Day.

While denying the request for a National Day, the federal government supported a National Aborigines Day via funding for publications, leaflets and stickers as a way of “creating and promoting an informed public opinion on the status and the needs of the Aborigines … as to what is being done, and what remains to be done”.

In 1969, the NADOC Federal Executive was made up of Rev Frank Engel (chairman), Rev Robert Denham (secretary), Rev Richard Udy (treasurer) and committee members: Rev Robert Brown (SA), Rev James Sweet (Qld), Rev G Night (NSW), Mr Ken Colbung, Mrs S Dunn (NSW), Rev E Newman (NSW) and Pastor Schultz (NSW).

A turning point

In the overall historical context of National Aborigines Day or NAIDOC Week, the February 1970 meeting of the National Executive was a turning point.

At the meeting, there was a move to elect an Aboriginal man — Ken Colbung from WA — as the new National Chairman. Colbung was the Secretary for NSW NADOC which had large staunch Aboriginal membership including Kaye Mundine, Clive and Tom Williams, Charles ‘Chicka’ Dixon, Lyall Munro, Bert Groves and Reverend Frank Roberts.

It would be the first time an Aboriginal person would be at the helm of the National Committee; Lester Bostock was also elected a joint treasurer.

On returning to Darwin, Egan typed up a report to his supervisor — Frank H Moy, assistant director (research) at the Office of Aboriginal Affairs — about the meeting.

“The members of the outgoing committee seemed anxious to replace some of the church officials on the Executive with Aboriginals and this is an encouraging sign,” he wrote.

Egan recommended that NADOC should be a national committee made up entirely of Indigenous representatives.

Moy endorsed his observation about the lack of Aboriginal people on the National Executive.

“We have been lecturing them on this for two years now,” Moy scrawled in pen over this section of Egan’s report.

In his report, Egan went further, writing that the NADOC should be a national committee made up entirely of Indigenous representatives.

“It seems to me that if this is to become a national body, NADOC should appoint a representative (preferably an Aboriginal) in each state,” Egan wrote.

“Mr Phillip Roberts would be an ideal choice for the Northern Territory and perhaps one of our liaison officers for the ACT. Could it be suggested to NADOC that an Aboriginal be appointed in each State, NT and ACT?”

From National Aborigines Day to NAIDOC Week

Later that year, in September 1970, the annual general meeting of the National Council of NADOC saw Indigenous representatives from across the nation attend.

These included: Dick Roughsy (Mornington Island Qld) G Winnunguj (Goulburn Island NT), Tom Williams (Foundation Aboriginal Affairs NSW), George Abudullah (WA), Lyall Munro (Moree Advancement Committee), Kath Walker (National Tribal Council), and Dulcie Flower and Faith Bandler (Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders – FCAATSI).

Egan also used his report to cheekily comment on the lack of interest in the NT about the national celebrations.

“I know at present in the Northern Territory little is done towards the observance of National Aborigines Day because it is considered to be a day on which a few ‘compensation neurotics’ do a bit of stirring in Sydney,” he wrote.

Egan’s attendance at the meeting occurred in an era of growing calls to make National Aborigines Day a proper national day.

“It seems to me that there should be a move to make it a national day in its true sense,” Egan summarised in his report.

“I think that our role should be to make the thing financially secure as far as publications etc are concerned and thereby make it an attractive enough proposition for Aborigines to take over ‘their day’,” he concluded.

Ken Colbung would again sit as National Chairman in 1971 with Pastor Frank Roberts, Kath Walker and Dulcie Flower joining him on the National Executive.

In 1972, control of NADOC was given to the newly established Commonwealth Department of Aboriginal Affairs, and in 1974, the Committee had full Aboriginal representation for the first time.

By this point, Egan had already released several albums and begun to establish his reputation as a musical chronicler of outback life.

He would go on to be a member of the first National Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation and serve as administrator of the Northern Territory from 2003 to 2007.

NAIDOC Week will be marked 6-13 July.