Early History of the MPA

Written by Helen Bond-Sharp and taken from her book: Maningrida. A History of the Aboriginal Township in Arnhem Land.

Beginnings of the Settlement under Welfare Administration

When the first non-indigenous people arrived in the settlement in 1957 there was a need for stores: tools, construction materials, clothing, medicines and food. The food items were kept in the Welfare canteen which supplied food to the community kitchens where simple meals were produced daily for indigenous people.

Because there was no shop in Maningrida where perishable items such as fruit and meat could be purchased the Welfare Office in Darwin chartered a plane once a fortnight to fly perishable items to the Welfare staff in the settlement. Each member of staff was allowed 10kg worth of perishables. There was no such service for the indigenous population.

The Welfare canteen acted as a shop on paydays, opening a window in the warehouse to serve anyone who wanted simple items such as flour, sugar and tobacco. Indigenous workers used their welfare payments to purchase these items at the canteen. Even into the 1980s many indigenous peoples in the community still referred to the MPA store as the kendin.

Dissatisfaction with this arrangement steadily grew and members of the social club, mainly Balanda decided to set up a co-op in the early 1960s. Members bought shares at $1 each and the co-op prospered, providing a huge improvement in the quality and range of goods. There was a subsequent lift in morale too, but it lacked competent commercial management and after a few successful years it fell into debt.

At this point the Community’s Superintendent, John Hunter proposed the setting up of a progress association. Progress associations were condoned by Welfare Branch and were being set up in other communities. Hunter judged that a progress association was a better commercial option than a co-op because any profits made by the association would be ploughed back into community projects rather than going into the pockets of co-op shareholders.

A further incentive to run a progress association rather than a co-operative society was the issue of tax. A co-op was intended to deliver a profit to its shareholders and as such its profits were taxable. Under a progress association the principal members and beneficiaries were local indigenous people and profits were untaxed.

Hunter’s vision for the Maningrida Progress Association was twofold. Firstly, to hand the management over to community control which could respond to local needs and be free from outside interference and secondly that the MPA would provide employment to indigenous people; that its various commercial ventures would provide income for indigenous workers to move away from dependence on government welfare payments.

John Hunter establishes the Maningrida Progress Association

In November 1968 John Hunter set up the Maningrida Progress Association.

Thirteen people attended the inaugural Maningrida Progress Association (“MPA”) meeting and accepted the constitution. Hunter was elected as president and three indigenous people were elected to the executive: Tommy Yibbaral, Jimmy Gala-awuna and Joe Fry, all from Burarra-speaking clans. Under the constitution all residents of the Maningrida area, indigenous or Balanda, were given membership. Then followed a period of transition: closing down the Social Club and Co-op and transferring functions to the MPA.

The Maningrida Store           

In mid 1969 John Hunter persuaded the Co-op committee to advertise nation-wide for the position of Shop Manager. The successful applicant was Glen Bagshaw, an experienced retailer from Adelaide who had worked in other communities. He arrived in October with his wife Jean and their youngest son. The Bagshaw’s made an enormous contribution to the community over the 8 years they lived in Maningrida.

Amongst Glen Bagshaw’s first tasks was to get the Co-op out of its huge debt, close it down and incorporate its activities into the MPA. He negotiated with the Co-op’s creditors and convinced them he could trade his way out of the debt. His reputation from the other stores he had managed stood him in good stead. Closing down the Co-op was a more difficult process. He advertised in all the local and national papers asking shareholders to relinquish their shares.

Many people contacted him saying they did not want their money back and to put it towards the development of the new association. The Maningrida Store was opened in March 1970. Glen Bagshaw and John Hunter worked closely together. Hunter encouraged Bagshaw to employ local Traditional Owners (“TO”) and the in the first years of the shop’s operation many senior  TOs were employed by the MPA. Willie Neimekining and Helen Djimbalwala Williams both worked in the shop. Jimmy Bungguru worked in the bakery.

Building Enterprises

The new MPA brought together several commercial enterprises, one of which was the Maningrida Store but other ventures were soon added to its services. A building team was established under the leadership of Bob Cross who had recently completed construction of the church. Frank Gurrmanamana was Bob Cross’s first indigenous partner and their first major project for the MPA had been the building of the community shop.

When Bob Cross and Frank Gurrmanamana finished the Maningrida Store they were asked to build the Town Hall. It was a huge project to undertake and James Budyalil and Michael Balibali and joined the team. MPA contributed half the costs as part of its commitment to put MPA profits back into the community. The hall doubled as a cyclone shelter. At the invitation of MPA president Silas Roberts, the Director of Welfare Harry Giese opened the Town Hall in June 1973. After 50 years the Town Hall still serves the community!

Greg Hainsworth initially and then Andrew Pigeon took over from Bob Cross as managers of the building team. Andrew’s team which also included Johnny Wurra made an enormous contribution to the development of the community and the outstations for the next 20 years.

Silas Roberts

In 1970 Silas Roberts was elected as the first Indigenous president of the MPA, taking over from John Hunter. Silas was from Ngukurr (Roper River). He later became chairman of the Northern Land Council and was the first indigenous stipendiary magistrate.

Postal Service

In July 1970 the MPA set up a postal service pledging ‘to make every effort to cater for Saturday mail, even when late’. The service was run mainly by Jean Bagshaw out of the Maningrida Store. The post office service also sold stamps and postal notes, received and forwarded telegrams and offered a registered mail service. The MPA continued to run the postal service until various agencies around the town arranged for their own Private Mail Bags to be delivered from the Winnellie Mail Exchange in Darwin. The MPA still has its own private mail bag: PMB100.

Hasty-Tasty

A commercial kitchen, named The Hasty Tasty was built around 1970 and Jean Bagshaw managed its operations. It operated like a cafeteria, local indigenous ladies serving food from the trays. Fried fish and chips were popular at both the lunchtime take-away meal and at the evening dine-in meal when the customers were mostly Balanda. The fish was caught fresh daily by indigenous fishermen who were employed by the newly established fishing industry.

Fishing Industry

In 1970 a relatively large-scale attempt by NT Fisheries to establish a commercial fishing industry at Maningrida did not last long. It was poorly planned and plagued with problems. After considerable expense NT Fisheries and Welfare officers reluctantly agreed that it had failed, and government withdrew its support. In less than a year the fisheries plant and equipment at bottom camp lay idle. Boats were returned to Darwin.

Glen Bagshaw was not deterred. Fishing was an obvious choice of industry to provide employment for local people. The MPA applied for a grant and received funds to resurrect the fishing venture. Boats more suitable to local conditions and indigenous skills were purchased, and 16 men were employed. The MPA supplied the fuel and a mechanic to maintain freezers, equipment and boats.

The fishing venture ran well for about four years. In April 1974 over 2300kg were delivered to the MPA for sale in the Hasty Tasty, the store and the tucker run (the truck service to the outstations). The industry reached its peak about this time but then slowly went into decline.  Indigenous peoples were using the boats far more for their personal needs than for the industry. The MPA gave the boats to the fishermen on the understanding that that they would have to meet the costs of fuel and maintenance. Within a matter of weeks, the fishing industry had collapsed again.

Art and Craft

Maningrida’s first clergyman, Gowan Armstrong arrived in 1963. He took particular interest in indigenous bark paintings as part of his studies in anthropology. Indigenous people could earn some money from their art and had traded it previously through the Trading Post. They continued to produce art and craft for sale, so Gowan took on the role of managing the art and craft business on behalf of the Social Club. When artists were paid for their work some of the profits were used by the Social Club to run community events such as Christmas parties and sporting events.

When the MPA was set up Babba Armstrong met with the committee and suggested that the MPA take over the funding of community social events in order to maximise returns to artists whose income had fallen relative to other workers. The proposal was accepted immediately by the MPA. The organisation has maintained a policy of assisting with community events and cultural activities.

Vehicles for the Community.

In the early days of the settlement vehicles were delivered by barge, the first one being a tractor. As the community developed people were increasingly interested in being able to bring materials and goods overland. Using the ancient foot trails used by indigenous peoples John Hunter and the sawmill manager, Kevin Ennis blazed the first track between Maningrida and Bulman. The trail was used to bring some of the first trucks into the community. The first MPA vehicle to arrive from Darwin brought Glenn Bagshaw, Bob Cross and James Budiyalil. They drove the same route. It took 4 days.

Youth Wellbeing

Few things have been so deleterious to the wellbeing of youth in the community as petrol sniffing. Petrol sniffing was introduced into Australia by American servicemen during the war. The practice made its way into Maningrida during the 1970s and by 1980 large numbers of youth, both boys and girls were engaging in petrol sniffing. It had negative effects physically (damage to lungs, brain and nutrition), socially (sleeping during the day, not attending school or spending time with family, engaging in break-and-entry), culturally (mixing with boys and girls of the wrong skin group, failing to attend ceremony).

The MPA had the community’s only fuel outlet: a bowser only a few metres from the MPA office and seeing the ill effects petrol sniffing was having on young people the MPA determined to do something about it. They secured the bowser with chains, padlocks and keys but this strategy frequently failed. Fuel managers poured a revolting-smelling additive into the fuel hoping that the disgusting smell would prevent sniffing, but sniffers found ways to filter the additive out and all the while they were breaking into vehicles, garages and private homes in order to steal petrol, food, or tools to enable more break-ins.

Discussion by the MPA committee reflected the concern parents and other family members had about the welfare of their children, particularly regarding the effects of lead on their health. This prompted the MPA to switch to unleaded petrol in 1989 and medical evacuations due to petrol sniffing ceased almost immediately. This was a positive outcome but because sniffers were still getting the high produced by the hydrocarbons in petrol, the activities of sniffers continued unabated.

In 1992, at the request of the Maningrida Council the Menzies School of Health produced a specially prepared report on petrol sniffing in the community and as a result the MPA committee, with Bill Young in the position of General Manager, decided to stop importing petrol altogether and to replace it with avgas. The strategy worked. Within a couple of weeks, the community was completely free of petrol sniffing. In 2005 avgas, or comgas as it was later called, was replaced by the unsniffable Opal fuel.

From its simple beginnings the MPA grew into a large organisation, responsible for much of the community’s development. The shop expanded to include a wide range fresh food and hardware items. It built houses in the town and in the outstations, it operated its own air charter service, in the days before TV it ran a video shop, it managed the town hall and ran movie nights, it established a motel, it took over the Art and Craft business from Gowan Armstrong, and operated a tucker run to the outstations.

Glenn Bagshaw, the father of the MPA would have been proud of its achievements. Although its management faltered on a few occasions it pulled through because the community recognised its importance and valued its many contributions.

Contacts:

E: admin@mpainc.com.au
P: 08 89 796000

© 2023 Maningrida Progress Association Incorporated.