Paradigm Shift (4ZZZ FM 102.1 Fridays at Noon) broadcast on 31 May 2019.
A note to indigenous people, Paradigm Shift may contain recordings, images and songs of people who are deceased.
The radio show 'Saving Wee Waa' could have been about any country town in NSW or Vic or Qld etc. It could be about regional Australia … places like Condoblin, Trundle, Moree, Echuca, Tailem Bend, Kalgoorlie, Clermont, Lowood, Katherine … it is about country, about water, about land. 'Saving Wee Waa' was several years in the making.
Over the past ten years 4zzz’s Paradigm Shift has concerned itself with questions such as sustainability, colonisation and solidarity. On today’s show ‘Saving Wee Waa‘ we visit a town on the Namoi River in New South Wales and look at the conflict that came with colonisation. We wish to place that conflict in the context of the socio-economic conditions faced by both settler and Aboriginal people in rural NSW.
We acknowledge the traditional owners of the land around the Namoi Valley, the Kamilaroi people. We have sought their testimonies as to the effect of the birth of a large cotton industry in the town in the 1960s. Particularly we wish to acknowledge the Murray Family who have fought long and hard against prejudice and injustice by the townspeople of Wee Waa. We do not presume to tell their story, nor do we claim any great insight into their pain. However, thanks to the efforts and organisation of Aboriginal filmmakers, storytellers and agricultural workers we have been able to bring this story to air.
In the preparation of this program we have found many sources. We would like to acknowledge some of them here. Firstly, Simon Luckhurst’s Eddie’s Country, second edition published in 2006. Too Much Wrong by Cavanagh and Pitty, second edition 1999. Welcome to Wee Waa, a film by Madeline McGrady and Stephen Robinson. Finally, The Radical Times Archive by Peter Gray.
People interviewed and voices in 'Saving Wee Waa'
Madeline McGrady, Arthur Murray, Anne Murray.
Arthur Murray's testimony soon after his son's death
The twenty-first of last month I lost a boy. A tragedy which I don’t think that he'd ever did ever commit himself because he was only a young child of 21 years of age. He was living with us most of his life until he found a way to support himself mix up with other people in Sydney. He went to Sydney about six months before his death. He played football for the All-Blacks team down in Redfern. And he got a four weeks suspended and they sent him home. Came home and stayed with us for three weeks and on the date he was supposed to go back he was locked up by the police.
Arthur Murray: The police arrived at my place about three-quarters or an hour before I arrived home. My eldest son said to me the sergeant is looking for you. I thought there was a warrant out which I have a warrant out for me. I said I'll go up to the police station and find out. So, I jumped in my son-in-law's car, my son-in-law, my daughter, my wife, and went up to the police station, the sergeant came out and said Arthur he said, I've got some bad news for you. What's that sergeant? We locked your son Eddie up about an hour ago. He said we went back to inspect him and said he was hanging from a cell door. I collapsed … I remember a few months before they went to Sydney the police had threatened him and myself in the main street of Wee Waa, Rose Street, said they'd either get him or me.
Playlist
Ripple Effect Band – Wárrwarra – Ngúddja
Ripple Effect Band – Wárrwarra – Madjandemed
Ripple Effect Band – Wárrwarra – Diyama
Aretha Franklin – Respect
Janey Conway-Heron - Eddie's Song
Jumping Fences – Distancia y Latido (Distance and Heartbeat/Yearning) by Frank Gonzalez
Notes by Ian Curr
Image Left to Right: Joe Flick, Arthur Murray (partly obscured), Isabel Flick, Barbara Flick and Karen Flick. Sitting with her back to camera is Jenny Brockie reporting for ABC news. Note the Wheel trap in front of Karen Flick Photo: Joanna Kelly
