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Guboo Ted Thomas (29 January 1909 – 19 May 2002) of the ''Yuin people'' was a prominent Aboriginal (Koori) elder (leader), He lived a full life, including touring Australia with a gumleaf orchestra during the Great Depression of the 1930s, playing rugby league and getting banned for fighting a referee, yet growing to become an Elder campaigning for protection of sacred sites on the South Coast, who went to the United Nations in New York, who urged the World Council of Churches to accept indigenous religions, and who met the Dalai Lama. Guboo loved a "cuppa" (cup of tea), had a sense of mischief, enjoyed being doted on by women, and his favourite saying was: ''"Always remember, the best is yet to come!"''.〔(How I remember "Uncle" Guboo )〕 Guboo's work in developing mutual respect and understanding, and in the renewal of the Spirit and the Dreaming, was prolific and ongoing. In his own words: ''The Earth is our Mother.'' ''When I die I'm going down there.'' ''When you die you're going there too.'' ''But what are you doing for the Earth?'' 〔 Newstead, Adrian, ''The Dealer is the Devil: An Insider's History of the Aboriginal Art Trade'', Brandl and Schlesinger, 2014, p. 82 〕 Guboo wanted Aboriginal spirituality, the Dreaming, to enrich the lives of all Australians, and devoted the rest of his life to being a catalyst for a worldwide return to selfless ancient values. He became a member of the Baha'i faith, emphasising the spiritual unity of humankind of all religions. In 1984 the then 75-year-old began travelling the world teaching the Dreamtime, the heart of Aboriginal spirituality.〔(1985 interview with Gubbo Ted Thomas )〕 For the remainder of his life Guboo held "Renewing the Dreaming" Camps around Australia and overseas,〔(Ian West Parliamentary speech )〕〔 Newstead, Adrian, ''The Dealer is the Devil: An Insider's History of the Aboriginal Art Trade'', Brandl and Schlesinger, 2014, p. 80 〕 for which he was well respected. However among his own people he was not without his critics, some of whom felt that he had discovered the perks of being a new-age guru to the white community. Unfortunately he also sometimes upset the actual traditional owners of the land where his ceremonies were held, by not always respecting their sacred sites, and by violating local Aboriginal laws.〔(Geomantica 35 )〕 Guboo's accomplishments speak volumes about his commitment to Australia, and his Aboriginal community: * Through his work with the Institute of Aboriginal Studies an invaluable record of sacred sites along the New South Wales coast was established. * In 1979 the then seventy-year-old elder first came to public attention when, largely through his efforts, the New South Wales Premier Neville Wran ordered a cease to logging on the Mumbulla Mountain south of Bermagui. This led to a significant land rights settlement in New South Wales. * The seventy-nine-year-old's 1988 re-enactment for the Australian Bicentenary of his own childhood 350-kilometre Dreamtime walk of seven decades earlier, with a group of koori kids from broken homes, demonstrated a personal vision guided by hard work, spirituality, respect and love for the land. * Ever the gentle activist, the ninety-three-year-old will be last remembered for sitting in a wheelchair and clapping two sticks together. He was participated in a protest at Sandon Point near Wollongong demonstrating against a development threatening Aboriginal sites and the area's natural beauty. ==Early life== Guboo Ted Thomas was born in 1909 under a gum tree at Jembaicumbene〔(Aboriginal Cultural Association with Biamanga and Gulaga National Parks )〕 in the Braidwood area of the South Coast of New South Wales. He was born into the Yuin people, which he always maintained was a Nation made up of many individual tribes. Ted is a contraction of his birth name Edwin; and Guboo, the name he was best known for, was his tribal name meaning "good friend". Guboo was son of William "Bill" Iberia Thomas, a tribal elder, and Mary Gwendoline "Linno" Ahoy. Although he was the third of 10 children he was recognised as a future spiritual leader by the elders of the ''Yuin'' before he was 10. Guboo knew most about his father's family, and it was from his father's family that he drew his strong bonds with the Aboriginal community. His father William "Bill" Iberia Thomas (1888-?) and his grandfather Peter Thomas were both tribal elders. His grandmother Hannah (Nyaadi) McGrath was a (woman ) who took him along on her healing rounds, and told him Dreamtime stories. His father, grandfather and uncles instructed him in sacred rites, male ancestral laws and ''Yuin'' customs . He was eventually chosen by them to be given special knowledge and to become the future elder and spiritual leader of the ''Yuin'' Nation. From his mother's family Guboo had a very eclectic background that he knew little about. His part-aboriginal mother Mary Gwendoline "Linno" Ahoy (1887–1959) had a Chinese father, and is most remembered for this by her children and grandchildren. Guboo also knew that she had French blood as her mother's surname had been de Mestre, his French great-great-grandfather Prosper de Mestre (1789–1844) was a prominent businessman in Sydney from 1818 to 1844, and whose father Colonel Andre Charles de Mestre (c. 1756–1794) had been a French soldier whose head had been removed by a cannonball in Martinique; his Australian-born great-grandfather Etienne de Mestre (1832–1916) was the horse trainer who owned and trained Archer the horse that won the first and second Melbourne Cups in 1861 and 1862; his Aboriginal great-grandmother Sarah Lamb, and his part-aboriginal grandmother Helen (Ellen) de Mestre (c. 1850–1934) would have been proud to see the part that Guboo has played in Aboriginal affairs during his lifetime; and his Chinese grandfather James Ahoy was a market gardener in the Braidwood area at the time of the gold-rush who moved back to China leaving his family behind. What would Gubbo have thought of his maternal forebears if he had known about them? Given his commitment to the aboriginal land rights struggle his feelings probably would have been ambivalent considering some of them owned large tracts of land in New South Wales that had been taken from his Aboriginal people. Guboo grew up on the Wallaga Lake Aboriginal Reserve where he attended the tiny local school until he was eight. Guboo would say of this time: ''"All I was taught at school was to knit, sew, make little johnnycakes and tend a garden. In those days, no-one bothered to teach the Aboriginal children the three Rs."'' Withdrawn from school by his parents, his education in his "Dreamtime culture" then began. When he was nine, his father, uncle and other Yuin elders took him on their Dreamtime walkabout from Mallacoota on the Victorian border to the Hawkesbury River and showed him all the sacred sites for which he would later be responsible.〔 Newstead, Adrian, ''The Dealer is the Devil: An Insider's History of the Aboriginal Art Trade'', Brandl and Schlesinger, 2014, p. 79 〕 During his early years he also watched as his grandfather called in dolphins to help them catch fish, and called in killer whales to help them catch whales,〔(Bega Valley Region Old Path Ways And Trails Mapping Project )〕〔(Indigenous kinship with the Natural World in New South Wales (for which Guboo was interviewed just days prior to his death) )〕 his grandfather even being called by the killer whales at night to join a hunt.〔(Video Interviews - Killer whale stories - Kouri Whaling - Guboo Ted Thomas )〕 Always hardworking, As a teenager he had toured with a Hawaiian performing troupe. As a teenager and a young man he was a member of the Wallaga Lake Gumleaf Band that toured southern New South Wales and Victoria, and performed at the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge in 1932. The Gumleaf Band played at football dances, and on the back of trucks at district shows, gymkhanas, and sports picnics on the beach. He used these trips to visit Aboriginal missions from Victoria, up the New South Wales coast into Queensland, and inland over the Great Dividing Range. He would visit the old people to learn more about their customs and beliefs, tour their sacred sites and talk to them about protecting the land and the Great Spirit that sustained it. The band included 7 of Guboo's family including his father and uncles and 3 of his brothers. It was an Aboriginal group that performed traditional dances with sticks and spears. It also included step dancing, tap dancing, hula dancing, and Māori influences, burlesque, clowning, and singing. They were a dance band that made music with gum leaves, an accordion, ukuleles, guitars, fiddle, and drums.〔(Popular Music: Commemoration, Commodification and Communication )〕〔(Selected bibliography of material on the Yuin languages and people )〕 Guboo played the guitar, so very different from the traditional instruments that Guboo played in his later years of the clapping sticks and didgeridoo.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Guboo Ted Thomas」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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