Profiles
History has faces,and names. Warriors and poets, inventors and parliamentarians — ten lives that carried this story. Where a portrait does not survive, a monogram stands: presence, not absence.
All Warrior Survivor Inventor Poet Land Rights Leader Community Leader Parliamentarian Land Rights Advocate Referendum Campaigner Athlete
Pemulwuy c. 1750 — 1802
Led twelve years of guerrilla resistance around Sydney Cove, defying a colony that put a price on his head.
Full profile Truganini c. 1812 — 1876
Wrongly remembered as the 'last Tasmanian' — a survivor who crossed the continent and whose people endured.
Full profile David Unaipon 1872 — 1967
Inventor, preacher and the first Aboriginal author published — the face of the $50 note.
Full profile Oodgeroo Noonuccal 1920 — 1993
Poet, political activist and educator — the first Aboriginal Australian to publish a book of verse.
Full profile Vincent Lingiari c. 1908 — 1988
Led the Wave Hill walk-off — a nine-year strike that grew into the modern land rights movement.
Full profile Sir Douglas Nicholls 1906 — 1988
Football star, pastor and advocate — the first Aboriginal Australian knighted, and Governor of South Australia.
Full profile Neville Bonner 1922 — 1999
The first Aboriginal person to sit in federal Parliament — twelve years in the Senate.
Full profile Eddie Mabo 1936 — 1995
His ten-year case overturned terra nullius and wrote native title into Australian law.
Full profile Faith Bandler 1918 — 2015
Ten years of quiet, relentless organising behind the 1967 Referendum's 90.77% 'yes'.
Full profile Cathy Freeman b. 1973
Lit the Sydney 2000 cauldron, then lit up the track — Olympic gold for all of Australia.
Full profile