Tommy George

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Dr Tommy George Senior is an elder of the Kuku Thaypan clan. He is a Agu Alaya speaker.

He was born in his own country, near Lakefield National Park. As children, he and George Musgrave were hidden in mailbags by the station owner, Fredrick Sheppard, to avoid removal by police and welfare officers.

As a result, they were able to grow up with their own people, and learn traditional law and language, management practices of their country and how to live off the land. Recently, they were able to successfully claim continuous ownership of traditional lands, and retain custody of some land at Gno-Coom (Saxby Waterhole).

Together they founded the Ang-Gnarra Aboriginal Corporation at Laura, Queensland, the biennial Laura Festival of Traditional Dance and Culture, the Traditional Knowledge Recording Project and the Cape York Land Council.

They campaigned to protect the world-renowned Quinkan rock art near Laura, where they carried out custodial duties for special places, including the rock art galleries.

They shared their knowledge of the bush, their language and their customs with researchers and visitors. It would be difficult to find a piece of scholarly work on traditional language, culture or country in Cape York Peninsula that does not credit their expertise.

In 2005 he was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Letters by James Cook University for his ecological expertise.

[edit] Publications

George, T., & G. Musgrave (1995). Our country, our art, our Quinkans. Laura, Queensland: Ang-Gnarra Aboriginal Corporation. ISBN 0-646-25392-1
George, T., & M. Tresize (1995). Quinkan rock art - Images on rock from the Laura area: Ang-Gnarra Aboriginal Corporation.