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and moved in with the Edwards. The Aboriginal Department chose not to interfere, Val was apprenticed to his
brother-in-law, and in 1927, he became a qualified blacksmith and wheelwright. This happened just as the motorcar
was starting to make the trade redundant. Street-wise, resentful of injustice, but determined not to succumb to the
social and economic discrimination designed to crush ‘half-caste’ spirits, he engaged for the next dozen years in a
variety of jobs in the Territory. He worked on the construction of the Stuart Highway south of Katherine. During
the Depression, he was one of a number of unemployed granted blocks in a not very successful Government
scheme to develop peanut farming in the Katherine area. He worked for some years as a driver for the Medical
Service and made himself a skilled motor mechanic.
During these years, the tall, rangy young man made his mark as a sportsman—one of the few ways in which
‘half-castes’ could hope to excel in the stratified, racist, Darwin society. He was a noted football player, athlete,
woodchopper and boxer. In 1928, he won the Welterweight Boxing Championship of North Australia by a
knockout; his right fist, according to a newspaper report, could be heard ‘whistling through the air again and again
as he tried to land the required blow on the beaten man’. He is said to have earned the nickname ‘Hookey’ for
his amazing kicking ability in Australian Rules Football, although Val himself recalled that the name was earned
at the Half-caste Home when he contracted hookworm. Val made his mark with the Vesteys and later Buffaloes
clubs—made up primarily of ‘half-caste’ players—and was a member of the Buffaloes team that won the 1935
Grand Final by default when the all-white Waratahs refused to take the field.
It was while working as a driver for the Medical Service that he first made the acquaintance of Xavier Herbert,
working at the time as dispenser in the hospital. Herbert too was in and out of work, and the two men at one time
re-opened and worked the Lucy Mine. When Herbert was appointed temporary Superintendent of the Kahlin
Compound, the two men worked together in a short-lived attempt to improve the living conditions of inmates.
They remained life-long friends. Val’s life is reliably thought to have helped motivate the writing of Herbert’s two
best-known novels Capricornia and Poor Fellow My Country.
Herbert worked with the ‘half-caste’ community to form the Euraustralian League, which later became the
Northern Territory Half-caste Association. The League, formed to achieve full citizenship rights for Aboriginal
people of mixed descent, held its inaugural meeting in Val’s home. In 1936, the Association succeeded in convincing
the Minister for the Interior to make provision for exemption of ‘half-castes’ from the Aborigines Ordinance. Adult
‘half-castes’ could apply for exemption because they were ‘worthy’ citizens and growing numbers henceforth were
granted their ‘dog licence’ as the exemption certificate was derisively known. Although he was encouraged by the
authorities to apply for exemption Val refused on the grounds that he was born a British Subject and should have
no need to apply for his rights as a full citizen. The Chief Protector exempted him from the Ordinance anyway.
This is one indication of the regard authorities had for the angry young man. Another is the fact that he was allowed
to purchase one of a small number of houses built for Darwin ‘half-caste’ families in the 1930s.
In 1938, Val moved to Queensland. He tried to enlist but was not called up as his skills as a motor mechanic
were needed at home. He then worked at the Allied Works camp in Cairns and spent the next 20 years overcoming
discrimination—‘they called us “niggers” over there’, he recalled—and working as a mechanic in and around
Cairns, on the North Queensland goldfields, on pearling boats operating out of Torres Strait, and for the Irrigation
Commission. In the early 1940s, he converted from the Catholic faith into which he had been baptised, to become
a Jehovah’s Witness. He undertook Bible studies, and it was only then that he learned to read and write properly.
Val returned to live in Darwin in 1960 when he heard that his mother was dying. He became renowned locally
for his mandolin playing, singing and composing. In 1974 with Jaffa Ah Mat, he formed a mandolin/steel guitar
band, comprising part-Aboriginal people, Torres Strait Islanders and European Australians, which dominated
Darwin’s dance hall scene for years. For the rest of his days he delighted Darwin residents with his mandolin
playing.
Valentine McGinness died and was buried in Queensland in November 1988, and was survived by a daughter,
Rowena, two sons, John and Cecil, and his wife Jane. He had married Isabel Hume in 1930, but they grew apart
and eventually divorced after he moved to Queensland to find work. He formed a de facto relationship with
Emma Mariset who died in 1942 shortly after the birth of their second son. His partnership with Jane Assan lasted
for more than 30 years until his death.
Val’s contribution to the development of the Territory was not recognised by the award of Imperial or Australian
honours. He is not remembered officially for his membership of boards and committees, for epic or heroic deeds,
for startling discoveries. They did not name a suburb after him. Yet his spirit of independence, his commitment to
justice and his involvement in the Territory’s economic and social improvement marks him out as a remarkable
pioneer.
Australian Archives, Australian Capital Territory, CRS Al 34/5886; Australian Archives, Northern Territory, CRS F144 1319/65; T Austin, I Can
Picture the Old Home So Clearly, 1993; T Austin & K Mills, interviews with V McGinness; D de Brabander, ‘Alyandabu’, The Encyclopaedia
of Aboriginal Australia, 1994; Xavier Herbert Papers, National Library of Australia; D Lockwood, The Front Door, 1977; J McGinness,
Son of Alyandabu, 1991; V B McGinness, ‘Uncle Val’, privately produced audio tapes, nd; V McGinness & T Austin, ‘Breakfast Was One
Slice of Bread’, Northern Perspective, 1988; V McGinness, interview by A McGrath, Northern Territory Archives Service, NTRS 226TS 86;
V McGinness, interview by J Dickinson, NTRS 226 TS 532; Northern Territory Times, 17 April 1928, 15 May 1928; G O’Loughlin, ‘Obituary’,
Northern Territory News, 19 November 1988.
TONY AUSTIN, Vol 3.McGUIRE, ALICE (?–?), was the first appointed Matron when the first hospital was opened at Palmerston in
1874, behind Doctor’s Gully. Her husband, John Samuel McGuire, had joined the South Australian Police as a
trooper in January of that year. Irish born in 1837, he had been a coachman and had decided on the police force in