Yam Island (Queensland)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Yam Island (Iama Island) is an island in the Bourke Isles, 100km North East of Thursday Island Queensland, Australia in the Tancred Passage Torres Strait.

This island is one of the Torres Strait Islands

1 History
2 Significant case law
3 Aerial photos & maps
4 See also

[edit] History

Yam Island is also called Iama or Turtle-backed Island. The original inhabitants traded and fought widely in their sailing canoes. In 1792, they came aboard William Bligh's two ships seeking iron. Bligh named Tudu, Warrior Island, after an attack they later made. The London Missionary Society established a station at Yam's western end making it possible for a permanent village with people settling around the mission. Many of the men took jobs on pearling luggers and a pearling station operated on Tudu during the 1870s with another at Nahgi (Mount Ernest Island, southwest of Yam). Pacific Islanders working at Nahgi station later settled on Yam. During the World War II, many Yam men enlisted in the army, forming C Company of the Torres Strait Light Infantry Battalion.

Despite their seafaring background, Yam people were fairly isolated from the outside world until well after the War. An airstrip was constructed in 1974 and the island's connection to the Torres Strait telephone exchange occurred in 1980. Yam has provided the Torres Strait with important political leaders including Getano Lui Senior (grandson of the first LMS teacher, Lui Getano Lifu) and Getano Lui Junior, former chairman of the Island Coordinating Council.