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99-624: The Coniston massacre , which took place in the region around the Coniston cattle station in the territory of Central Australia (now the Northern Territory ) from 14 August to 18 October 1928, was the last known officially sanctioned massacre of Indigenous Australians and one of the last events of the Australian frontier wars . In a series of punitive expeditions led by Northern Territory Police constable William George Murray , people of

198-567: A posse consisting of tracker Paddy, Alex Wilson, Dodger, tracker Major (elder brother of Brooks' boy Skipper), Randall Stafford and two white itinerants Jack Saxby and Billie Brisco. Brooks was killed on or about 7 August 1928, and his body was partly buried in a rabbit hole. No eyewitnesses to the murder were ever identified, and there are conflicting accounts of the discovery of the body and subsequent events. On 15 August, dingo trapper Bruce Chapman arrived at Coniston, and Murray sent Chapman, Paddy and Alex Wilson and three Aboriginal trackers to

297-606: A spear -thrower. An anonymous 1790 manuscript on Aboriginal languages of New South Wales reported "Boo-mer-rit" as "the Scimiter". In 1822, it was described in detail and recorded as a "bou-mar-rang" in the language of the Turuwal people (a sub-group of the Darug ) of the Georges River near Port Jackson. The Turawal used other words for their hunting sticks but used "boomerang" to refer to

396-430: A 'boom' or 'rang') is made of Finnish birch plywood , hardwood , plastic or composite materials and comes in many different shapes and colours. Most sport boomerangs typically weigh less than 100 g (3.5 oz), with MTA boomerangs (boomerangs used for the maximum-time-aloft event) often under 25 g (0.88 oz). Boomerangs have also been suggested as an alternative to clay pigeons in shotgun sports, where

495-408: A 250–300 mm (9.8–11.8 in) wingspan, and a 20–40 m (66–131 ft) range. A falling boomerang starts spinning, and most then fall in a spiral. When the boomerang is thrown with high spin, a boomerang flies in a curved rather than a straight line. When thrown correctly, a boomerang returns to its starting point. As the wing rotates and the boomerang moves through the air, the airflow over

594-679: A Warlpiri, Japanunga Bullfrog and his wife were approached by Brooks who asked Bullfrog if he could take his wife, Marungardi, to do Brooks' washing in exchange for food and tobacco. Marungardi performed her chores but, either returned to Japanunga's camp without the promised supplies or did not return, so at dawn the next day, Japanunga killed Brooks. A third account is more detailed, stating that Japanunga became enraged when he found his wife in bed with Brooks and attacked him, severing an artery in his throat with his boomerang . This account claims that Bullfrog, his uncle Padirrka, and Marungardi then beat Brooks to death, and that Aboriginal elders, in fear for

693-513: A boomerang by Europeans was at Farm Cove ( Port Jackson ), in December 1804, when a weapon was witnessed during a tribal skirmish : ... the white spectators were justly astonished at the dexterity and incredible force with which a bent, edged waddy resembling slightly a Turkish scimytar , was thrown by Bungary , a native distinguished by his remarkable courtesy. The weapon, thrown at 20 or 30 yards [18 or 27 m] distance, twirled round in

792-425: A camp of 20 Warlpiri, mostly women and children. Approaching the camp Murray ordered the men to drop their weapons. Not understanding English the women and children fled while the men stood their ground to protect them. The patrol opened fire, killing three men; three injured died later of their wounds and an unknown number of wounded escaped. By Murray's account, he met four separate groups of Warlpiri, and in each case

891-476: A hawk, the ducks would dive away, toward hunters armed with nets or clubs. Traditionally, most boomerangs used by Aboriginal groups in Australia were non-returning. These weapons, sometimes called "throwsticks" or "kylies", were used for hunting a variety of prey, from kangaroos to parrots; at a range of about 100 m (330 ft), a 2 kg (4.4 lb) non-returning boomerang could inflict mortal injury to

990-612: A large Warlpiri camp; what happened here is unknown but the Warlpiri decided to kill Morton. During the night they surrounded his camp and at dawn 15 men armed with boomerangs and yam sticks rushed Morton. His dogs attacked the Aboriginal people, and after breaking free Morton shot one and the rest fled. Morton returned to his main camp and was taken to the Ti Tree Well mission where a nurse removed 17 splinters from his head and treated him for

1089-932: A large animal. A throwstick thrown nearly horizontally may fly in a nearly straight path and could fell a kangaroo on impact to the legs or knees, while the long-necked emu could be killed by a blow to the neck. Hooked non-returning boomerangs, known as "beaked kylies", used in northern Central Australia, have been claimed to kill multiple birds when thrown into a dense flock. Throwsticks are used as multi-purpose tools by today's Aboriginal peoples, and besides throwing could be wielded as clubs, used for digging, used to start friction fires, and are sonorous when two are struck together. Recent evidence also suggests that boomerangs were used as war weapons. Today, boomerangs are mostly used for recreation. There are different types of throwing contests: accuracy of return; Aussie round; trick catch; maximum time aloft ; fast catch; and endurance (see below). The modern sport boomerang (often referred to as

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1188-583: A later inquiry, on 4 August, Charlton Young and a companion who were exploring the area for a mining company, stopped by and warned Brooks that the Aboriginal people had been getting "cheeky" lately by visiting the mining camps heavily armed, demanding food and tobacco. About the same time several Aboriginal children were being taken away to Alice Springs. According to one version, Brooks had been approached several times to trade but had so far refused, until 6 August. The Aboriginal tradition, related to Peter and Jay Read by Alec Jupurrula and Jack Japaljarri, holds that

1287-511: A letter to his departmental secretary shortly after the massacre: "…trouble has been brewing for some time, and the safety of the white man could only be assured by drastic action on the part of the authorities … I am firmly of the opinion that the result of the recent action by the police will have the right effect upon the natives." The board sat for 18 days in January 1929 to consider three incidents (Brooks, Morton and Tilmouth) that resulted in

1386-664: A number of male natives being shot." No mention was made of the number killed, the circumstances of the shootings or where they occurred. The trial of Arkirkra and Padygar for Brooks' murder took place in the Supreme Court of Central Australia located in Darwin in North Australia on 7 and 8 November before Justice Mallam . The first witness was 12-year-old Lolorrbra (known as Lala) who testified in detail that he saw Arkirkra, Padygar and Marungali kill Brooks. He also testified that all

1485-423: A number of stints since World War I . In July 1928 he asked Stafford if he could have a go at dingo hunting. Stafford warned him that he and the woman he cohabited with, Alice, had been threatened by "Myalls" (an offensive term denoting traditional living Aboriginal people) and that venturing any further than 22 km (14 mi) west would be unsafe. Alice was believed to have broken kinship rules by living with

1584-441: A prominent Papunya Tula painter, was a survivor of the massacre. His father was away hunting and survived while his mother had hidden him in a coolamon under a bush before being shot and killed. The strong oral history established after the massacre is recorded in paintings by some Indigenous artists and the Warlpiri, Anmatyerre and Kaytetye refer to the period as The Killing Times . Similarly, other massacres that have occurred in

1683-478: A returning throw-stick . Boomerangs were, historically, used as hunting weapons, percussive musical instruments , battle clubs , fire-starters, decoys for hunting waterfowl , and as recreational play toys. The smallest boomerang may be less than 10 cm (3.9 in) from tip to tip, and the largest over 180 cm (71 in) in length. Tribal boomerangs may be inscribed or painted with designs meaningful to their makers. Most boomerangs seen today are of

1782-402: A returning one. The curving flight characteristic of returning boomerangs was probably first noticed by early hunters trying to "tune" their throwing sticks to fly straight. It is thought by some that the shape and elliptical flight path of the returning boomerang makes it useful for hunting birds and small animals, or that noise generated by the movement of the boomerang through the air, or, by

1881-438: A ridge. Paddy and Murray captured two but one ran with Murray firing several shots at him which missed, Paddy then knelt and fired a single shot hitting the fleeing man in the back and killing him instantly. After questioning the other three and finding they had no connection with the murder Murray released them. The next two days saw no contact with Aboriginal people at all as word had spread with many Aboriginal people heading into

1980-421: A serious skull fracture. From the station, on 24 September, a party consisting of Murray, Morton, Alex Wilson and Jack Cusack (the latter two being of Aboriginal descent), embarked on a series of encounters: three incidents were later described by Murray, in which 14 more Aboriginal people were reportedly killed, but it is likely that there were more. At Tomahawk waterhole four were killed, while at Circle Well one

2079-414: A skilled thrower, lightly clipping leaves of a tree whose branches house birds, would help scare the birds towards the thrower. It is further supposed by some that this was used to frighten flocks or groups of birds into nets that were usually strung up between trees or thrown by hidden hunters. In southeastern Australia, it is claimed that boomerangs were made to hover over a flock of ducks; mistaking it for

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2178-404: A very narrow throwing window, which discourages many beginners from continuing with this discipline. For the same reason, the quality of manufactured long-distance boomerangs is often difficult to determine. Today's long-distance boomerangs have almost all an S or ? – question mark shape and have a beveled edge on both sides (the bevel on the bottom side is sometimes called an undercut). This

2277-409: A woman, Bullfrog's wife Marungali, were killed on the encounter, with another woman dying from her wounds an hour later. A subsequent search of the camp turned up articles belonging to Brooks. Stafford was furious with Murray over the shooting and the next morning returned to Coniston alone. During the night, Murray captured three young boys who had been sent by their tribe to find what the police party

2376-562: A word meaning "boomerang" taken from one of the Western Desert languages, for example, the Warlpiri word "karli". Trademarks of Australian companies using the boomerang as a symbol, emblem or logo proliferate, usually removed from Aboriginal context and symbolising "returning" or to distinguish an Australian brand. Early examples included Bain's White Ant Exterminator (1896); Webendorfer Bros. explosives (1898); E. A. Adams Foods (1920); and by

2475-482: Is designed to return to the thrower, while a non-returning boomerang is designed as a weapon to be thrown straight and is traditionally used by some Aboriginal Australians for hunting. Historically, boomerangs have been used for hunting , sport, and entertainment and are made in various shapes and sizes to suit different purposes. Although considered an Australian icon, ancient boomerangs have also been discovered in Egypt,

2574-582: Is evidence of the use of non-returning boomerangs by the Native Americans of California and Arizona , and inhabitants of South India for killing birds and rabbits. Some boomerangs were not thrown at all, but were used in hand to hand combat by Indigenous Australians . Ancient Egyptian examples, however, have been recovered, and experiments have shown that they functioned as returning boomerangs. Hunting sticks discovered in Europe seem to have formed part of

2673-493: Is located about 250 kilometres north-west of Alice Springs. Coniston is best known as the site of the Coniston massacre , which was the last known massacre of Indigenous Australians , in August 1928. Owing to a severe drought, the original owners (the Warlpiri , Anmatyerre , and Kaytetye people ) gravitated towards their ancient water sources, which the pastoralists were using for their livestock. Conflicts soon arose. Coniston

2772-455: Is not true for other types of boomerangs, where the loss of kinetic energy is non-reversible (the MTAs also store kinetic energy in potential energy during the first half of the flight, but then the potential energy is lost directly by the drag). In Noongar language , kylie is a flat curved piece of wood similar in appearance to a boomerang that is thrown when hunting for birds and animals. "Kylie"

2871-402: Is one of the Aboriginal words for the hunting stick used in warfare and for hunting animals. Instead of following curved flight paths, kylies fly in straight lines from the throwers. They are typically much larger than boomerangs, and can travel very long distances; due to their size and hook shapes, they can cripple or kill an animal or human opponent. The word is perhaps an English corruption of

2970-421: Is preferable for an accurate throw, light winds up to 3–5 knots (6–9 km/h; 3–6 mph) are manageable with skill. If the wind is strong enough to fly a kite, then it may be too strong unless a skilled thrower is using a boomerang designed for stability in stronger winds. Gusty days are a great challenge, and the thrower must be keenly aware of the ebb and flow of the wind strength, finding appropriate lulls in

3069-427: Is still a working cattle station, and has been featured by the Northern Territory government for its introduction of a 6.4 kW solar power station. Developed in 1923 by Randall Stafford because of a sustainable water supply, the station still thrives today. Coniston Station has been owned and managed by Max Lines and his wife Jacqui for more than three decades. In 2014, Max Lines found himself bedbound. With

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3168-478: Is the hero of Central Australia. He is the policeman of fiction. He rides alone and always gets his man." The Northern Territory Times announced that the police were wholly exonerated, and that "there was not a scintilla of evidence" to support the view that the police had conducted a reprisal or punitive expedition. Constable William George Murray remained with the Northern Territory Police until

3267-420: Is to minimise drag and lower the lift. Lift must be low because the boomerang is thrown with an almost total layover (flat). Long-distance boomerangs are most frequently made of composite material, mainly fibre glass epoxy composites. The projection of the flight path of long-distance boomerang on the ground resembles a water drop . For older types of long-distance boomerangs (all types of so-called big hooks),

3366-434: Is usually flat. Boomerangs can be made for right- or left-handed throwers. The difference between right and left is subtle, the planform is the same but the leading edges of the aerofoil sections are reversed. A right-handed boomerang makes a counter-clockwise, circular flight to the left while a left-handed boomerang flies clockwise to the right. Most sport boomerangs weigh between 70 and 110 g (2.5 and 3.9 oz), have

3465-549: The Adelaide Register-News who travelled with the board during its tour of Central Australia to determine the claims of drought reported: "Five years of drought have burnt every blade of grass from the plains and left a wilderness of red sand...the wonder is that any living thing survives. Every settler visited by the Board had lost between 60 and 80 percent of his stock [to the drought] this year alone." The day after this report

3564-607: The Last Glacial Maximum , when lower sea levels led to cultural continuity between Papua and Arnhem Land in Northern Australia. The oldest surviving Australian Aboriginal boomerangs come from a cache found in a peat bog in the Wyrie Swamp of South Australia and date to 10,000 BC . Although traditionally thought of as Australian, boomerangs have been found also in ancient Europe, Egypt, and North America. There

3663-743: The Stone Age arsenal of weapons. One boomerang that was discovered in Obłazowa Cave in the Carpathian Mountains in Poland was made of mammoth's tusk and is believed, based on AMS dating of objects found with it, to be about 30,000 years old. In the Netherlands , boomerangs have been found in Vlaardingen and Velsen from the first century BC. King Tutankhamun owned a collection of boomerangs of both

3762-411: The Warlpiri , Anmatyerre , and Kaytetye groups were killed. The massacre occurred in response to the murder of dingo hunter Frederick (Fred) Brooks, killed by Aboriginal people in August 1928 at a place called Yukurru , also known as Brooks Soak. Official records at the time state that at least 31 people were killed, however analysis of existing documentation and Aboriginal oral histories reveal that

3861-499: The (still current) Boomerang Cigarette Papers Pty. Ltd. "Aboriginalia", including the boomerang, as symbols of Australia dates from the late 1940s and early 1950s and was in widespread use by a largely European arts, crafts and design community. By the 1960s, the Australian tourism industry extended it to the very branding of Australia, particularly to overseas and domestic tourists as souvenirs and gifts and thus Aboriginal culture. At

3960-468: The Aboriginal people as he saw fit. Returning to Coniston, Murray questioned Dodger and Skipper who described the circumstances of the murder and named Bullfrog, Padirrka and Marungali as the killers. According to his own report, Murray also obtained the names of 20 accomplices. (He never recorded the names, or explained how his informants, who were not eyewitnesses, knew them; nor were these inconsistencies ever questioned at later proceedings.) Murray organised

4059-410: The Aboriginal people that had helped them were now dead. Murray took the stand next, his evidence becoming so involved in justifying his own actions in killing suspects that Justice Mallam reminded him that he himself was not on trial and to avoid facts not relevant to the guilt of the accused. The court then adjourned for lunch. The verdict was a foregone conclusion as all that remained was the reading of

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4158-504: The Americas, and Eurasia. A boomerang is a throwing stick with aerodynamic properties, traditionally made of wood, but also of bone, horn, tusks and even iron. Modern boomerangs used for sport can be made from plywood or plastics such as ABS , polypropylene , phenolic paper , or carbon fibre-reinforced plastics . Boomerangs come in many shapes and sizes depending on their geographic or tribal origins and intended function, including

4257-548: The Ord River region have been depicted by Warmun artists such as Rover Thomas . Member of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly , Jack Ah Kit in an adjournment debate on 9 October 2003 stated: It must be remembered that the late 1920s was a time of major drought and therefore, in the context of what was still very much the frontier of black/white relations in Australia, the conflict over resources

4356-482: The Walmulla [ sic ] tribe from Western Australia, who were on a marauding expedition, with the avowed object of wiping out the white settlers…" Following his appointment, O'Kelly had stated his intention that the enquiry would not be a whitewash and it is speculated he had been "got at". To take up his appointment, O'Kelly travelled by train from Canberra to Melbourne with Prime Minister Stanley Bruce , who

4455-416: The accused to testify. Murray took the stand next, angering Justice Mallam when he repeated his justifications for killing suspects. The judge remarked "It appears impossible for all those bands of natives to be associated with the murder of Brooks. It looks as if they were shot down at different places just to teach them and other aborigines a lesson." With no evidence of guilt presented, Justice Mallam ordered

4554-437: The accused were the murderers, was completely contradictory. Under cross examination it became apparent within minutes that he had been coached on what to say. When the prosecution tried to introduce the written confessions of the accused, Justice Mallam pointed out that as the accused had been charged by a South Australian rather than Central Australian magistrate he would disallow the statements. The prosecution declined to call

4653-409: The air and then crash. Fast Catch boomerangs usually have three or more symmetrical wings (seen from above), whereas a Long Distance boomerang is most often shaped similar to a question mark. Maximum Time Aloft boomerangs mostly have one wing considerably longer than the other. This feature, along with carefully executed bends and twists in the wings help to set up an "auto-rotation" effect to maximise

4752-403: The air with astonishing velocity, and alighting on the right arm of one of his opponents, actually rebounded to a distance not less than 70 or 80 yards [64 or 73 m], leaving a horrible contusion behind, and exciting universal admiration. David Collins listed "Wo-mur-rāng" as one of eight Aboriginal "Names of clubs" in 1798. but was probably referring to the woomera , which is actually

4851-538: The boomerang go the furthest possible distance while returning close to the throwing point. In competition the boomerang must intersect an imaginary surface defined as an infinite vertical projection of a 40 m (130 ft) line centred on the thrower. Outside of competitions, the definition is not so strict, and throwers may be happy simply not to walk too far to recover the boomerang. Long-distance boomerangs are optimised to have minimal drag while still having enough lift to fly and return. For this reason, they have

4950-428: The boomerang to tilt around the axis of travel, because the boomerang has significant angular momentum, the gyroscopic precession causes the plane of rotation to tilt about an axis that is 90 degrees to the direction of flight, causing it to turn. When thrown in the horizontal plane, as with a Frisbee , instead of in the vertical, the same gyroscopic precession will cause the boomerang to fly violently, straight up into

5049-427: The boomerang's hover time in descending from the highest point in its flight. Some boomerangs have turbulators — bumps or pits on the top surface that act to increase the lift as boundary layer transition activators (to keep attached turbulent flow instead of laminar separation). Boomerangs are generally thrown in unobstructed, open spaces at least twice as large as the range of the boomerang. The flight direction to

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5148-482: The chest breaking a rib. Woolingar was then chained to a tree for the next 18 hours. The next morning the posse, with Padygar and Woolingar following on foot in chains, set out for the Lander River where they found a camp of 23 Warlpiri at Ngundaru. With the posse encircling the camp, Murray rode in and was surrounded by Aboriginal people yelling, Brisco started shooting with Saxby and Murray joining in. Three men and

5247-464: The confessions made by the accused in Alice Springs. Despite lunch for the jurors being provided by the local hotel, two of the jurors went home to eat. A furious Justice Mallam dismissed the jury, ordered a new jury be empanelled and a new trial to be convened the following day. The new trial began with Lolorrbra being asked to repeat his evidence. This time his evidence, although still maintaining that

5346-594: The courtroom to hear this and other evidence of massacre was Athol McGregor, a Central Australian missionary. He passed on his concern to church leaders, and eventually to William Morley, outspoken and influential advocate of the Association for the Protection of Native Races, who did the most to secure a judicial enquiry. The Federal government was also under considerable pressure to act. The British media had been reporting on Australia's treatment of Aboriginal people (Australia

5445-470: The deaths of Aboriginal people, and in one more day, finished its report, finding that 31 Aboriginal people had been killed and that in each case the death was justified. The hearing decided, in the face of indubitable evidence to the contrary, that there had been no drought in Central Australia, evidence of ample native food and water supplies and thus no mitigation for cattle spearing. A journalist for

5544-450: The desert, preferring to risk dying of thirst rather than face the police patrol. Returning to Coniston, Murray left Padygar, Woolingar and one of the three boys, 11-year-old Lolorrbra (known as Lala, who would become a chief witness at the enquiry), whose crushed feet had become infected, in Stafford's custody before heading north to continue the search. Following tracks, the patrol came upon

5643-503: The desired direction, with the right force. The boomerang is aimed to the right of the oncoming wind; the exact angle depends on the strength of the wind and the boomerang itself. Left-handed boomerangs are thrown to the left of the wind and will fly a clockwise flight path. The trajectory is either parallel to the ground or slightly upwards. The boomerang can return without the aid of any wind, but even very slight winds must be taken into account however calm they might seem. Little or no wind

5742-438: The events listed below In all disciplines the boomerang must travel at least 20 metres (66 ft) from the thrower. Throwing takes place individually. The thrower stands at the centre of concentric rings marked on an open field. Events include: Non-discipline record : Smallest Returning Boomerang: Sadir Kattan of Australia in 1997 with 48 mm (1.9 in) long and 46 mm (1.8 in) wide. This tiny boomerang flew

5841-656: The experiment on board the International Space Station . Beginning in the later part of the twentieth century, there has been a bloom in the independent creation of unusually designed art boomerangs. These often have little or no resemblance to the traditional historical ones and on first sight some of these objects may not look like boomerangs at all. The use of modern thin plywoods and synthetic plastics have greatly contributed to their success. Designs are very diverse and can range from animal inspired forms, humorous themes, complex calligraphic and symbolic shapes, to

5940-444: The fatalities were likely to have been as high as 200. Central Australia was Australia's last colonial frontier, sparsely populated and, by 1928, was facing the fourth year of the harshest drought on record. Parched conditions, though later discounted by authorities as a precipitating factor, were to play a key role in events at Coniston. Appropriating water resources was fundamental to pastoral economy, and exclusive control over water

6039-409: The first and last third of the flight path are very low, while the middle third is a fast climb followed by a fast descent. Nowadays, boomerangs are made in a way that their whole flight path is almost planar with a constant climb during the first half of the trajectory and then a rather constant descent during the second half. From theoretical point of view, distance boomerangs are interesting also for

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6138-767: The flight of the boomerang better mimics the flight of a bird offering a more challenging target. The modern boomerang is often computer-aided designed with precision airfoils. The number of "wings" is often more than 2 as more lift is provided by 3 or 4 wings than by 2. Among the latest inventions is a round-shaped boomerang, which has a different look but using the same returning principle as traditional boomerangs. This allows for safer catch for players. In 1992, German astronaut Ulf Merbold performed an experiment aboard Spacelab that established that boomerangs function in zero gravity as they do on Earth. French Astronaut Jean-François Clervoy aboard Mir repeated this in 1997. In 2008, Japanese astronaut Takao Doi again repeated

6237-403: The following reason: for achieving a different behaviour during different flight phases, the ratio of the rotation frequency to the forward velocity has a U-shaped function, i.e., its derivative crosses 0. Practically, it means that the boomerang being at the furthest point has a very low forward velocity. The kinetic energy of the forward component is then stored in the potential energy . This

6336-415: The foreseeable consequences, then banished Bullfrog and Padirrka and ordered Brooks' two boys to return to the homestead and say that he had died of natural causes. Accounts vary as to who first came across Brooks' body. Until the publication of Cribbin's book in 1984, it was believed that Bruce Chapman, the prospector, was first on the scene. The following day an Aboriginal person named Alex Wilson camped at

6435-566: The ground, sometimes climbing gently, perform a graceful, anti-clockwise, circular or tear-drop shaped arc, flatten out and return in a hovering motion, coming in from the left or spiralling in from behind. Ideally, the hover will allow a practiced catcher to clamp their hands shut horizontally on the boomerang from above and below, sandwiching the centre between their hands. The grip used depends on size and shape; smaller boomerangs are held between finger and thumb at one end, while larger, heavier or wider boomerangs need one or two fingers wrapped over

6534-591: The gusts to launch their boomerang. A world record achievement was made on 3 June 2007 by Tim Lendrum in Aussie Round. Lendrum scored 96 out of 100, giving him a national record as well as an equal world record throwing an "AYR" made by expert boomerang maker Adam Carroll. In international competition, a world cup is held every second year. As of 2017 , teams from Germany and the United States dominated international competition. The individual World Champion title

6633-422: The help of her family and staff, Jacqui continued to run the property. This Northern Territory geography article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Boomerang A boomerang ( / ˈ b uː m ə r æ ŋ / ) is a thrown tool typically constructed with airfoil sections and designed to spin about an axis perpendicular to the direction of its flight. A returning boomerang

6732-541: The jury to acquit the accused. During his testimony, Murray said that the group had "shot to kill": Justice Mallam: Constable Murray, was it really necessary to shoot to kill in every case? Could you not have occasionally shot to wound? Murray: No your honour, what is the use of a wounded blackfellow hundreds of miles from civilization? Justice Mallam: How many did you kill? Murray: Seventeen your honour. Justice Mallam: You mean you mowed them down wholesale! — The Northern Territory Times , 9 November 1928 In

6831-510: The left or right depends upon the design of the boomerang itself, not the thrower. A right-handed or left-handed boomerang can be thrown with either hand, but throwing a boomerang with the non-matching hand requires a throwing motion that many throwers find awkward. The following technique applies to a right-handed boomerang; the directions are mirrored for a left-handed boomerang. Different boomerang designs have different flight characteristics and are suitable for different conditions. The accuracy of

6930-456: The mid 1940s. He retired to Adelaide where he died in 1975. William Morton moved out of the area several years after the massacre. Bullfrog was never arrested and moved to Yuendumu where he died of old age in the 1970s. One of the few survivors was Gwoya Jungarai , who left the area after the massacre destroyed his family. A later picture of him as One Pound Jimmy became an iconic Australian postage stamp . Billy Stockman Tjapaltjarri ,

7029-429: The now deserted soak and finding the body rode back to the station, where he described hysterically how Brooks had been "chopped up" by 40 Aboriginal people and the parts stuffed in a rabbit burrow. Randall Stafford had been in Alice Springs requesting police to attend to prevent the spearing of his cattle. He returned to be told of the murder and dismemberment of Brooks but chose to wait for the police. No one returned to

7128-420: The other must prosper. Pastoralists regarded their presence, begging for food or spearing cattle, as an "aggravation", and would drive the incoming Aboriginals from these few remaining water sources, according to Cribbin, to ensure the survival of their cattle. 61-year-old Fred Brooks had worked as a station hand on Randall Stafford's Coniston station , 240 mi (390 km) north-west of Alice Springs , in

7227-560: The patrol charged a corroboree at Tippinba, rounding up a large number of Aboriginal people like cattle before cutting out the women and children and shooting all the men. There is anecdotal evidence that there were up to 100 killed in total at the five sites. Murray was back in Alice Springs on 18 October where he was asked to write an official report on the police actions. The report was only several lines long; he wrote: "....incidents occurred on an expedition with William John Morton, unfortunately drastic action had to be taken and resulted in

7326-409: The purely abstract. Painted surfaces are similarly richly diverse. Some boomerangs made primarily as art objects do not have the required aerodynamic properties to return. A returning boomerang is a rotating wing. It consists of two or more arms, or wings, connected at an angle; each wing is shaped as an airfoil section. Although it is not a requirement that a boomerang be in its traditional shape, it

7425-637: The required 20 m (66 ft), before returning to the accuracy circles on 22 March 1997 at the Australian National Championships. A boomerang was used to set a Guinness World Record with a throw of 427.2 m (1,402 ft) by David Schummy on 15 March 2005 at Murarrie Recreation Ground, Australia. This broke the record set by Erin Hemmings who threw an Aerobie 406.3 m (1,333 ft) on 14 July 2003 at Fort Funston , San Francisco. Long-distance boomerang throwers aim to have

7524-511: The savagery and disproportionate nature of the Coniston reprisals. Even he, albeit based only on the unsubstantiated writings of a journalist, agrees that many more died than the official record will admit. The seventy-fifth anniversary of the massacre was commemorated on 24 September 2003 near Yuendumu organised by the Central Land Council . In 2012, a docu-drama film titled Coniston

7623-516: The soak and no one attempted to retrieve the body. On 11 August, the Government Resident John C. Cawood sent Constable William George Murray , the officer in charge at Barrow Creek who also held the post of Chief Protector of Aborigines , to Coniston to investigate the complaints of cattle spearing. Told of the murder, Murray drove back to Alice Springs and telephoned Cawood, who refused to send reinforcements, telling Murray to deal with

7722-403: The soak to find out what happened. The three buried Brooks on the bank of the soak. In the afternoon two Warlpiri, Padygar and Woolingar arrived at Coniston to trade dingo scalps. Believing them to be involved with the murder Paddy arrested them but Woolingar slipped his chains and attempted to escape. Murray fired at Woolingar and he fell with a bullet wound to the head. Stafford then kicked him in

7821-518: The straight flying (hunting) and returning variety. No one knows for sure how the returning boomerang was invented, but some modern boomerang makers speculate that it developed from the flattened throwing stick, still used by Aboriginal Australians and other indigenous peoples around the world, including the Navajo in North America. A hunting boomerang is delicately balanced and much harder to make than

7920-445: The throw depends on understanding the weight and aerodynamics of that particular boomerang, and the strength, consistency and direction of the wind; from this, the thrower chooses the angle of tilt, the angle against the wind, the elevation of the trajectory, the degree of spin and the strength of the throw. A great deal of trial and error is required to perfect the throw over time. A properly thrown boomerang will travel out parallel to

8019-422: The top edge in order to induce a spin. The aerofoil-shaped section must face the inside of the thrower, and the flatter side outwards. It is usually inclined outwards, from a nearly vertical position to 20° or 30°; the stronger the wind, the closer to vertical. The elbow of the boomerang can point forwards or backwards, or it can be gripped for throwing; it just needs to start spinning on the required inclination, in

8118-584: The tourist or competition sort, and are almost invariably of the returning type. Depictions of boomerangs being thrown at animals, such as kangaroos, appear in some of the oldest rock art in the world, the Indigenous Australian rock art of the Kimberley region, which is potentially up to 50,000 years old. Stencils and paintings of boomerangs also appear in the rock art of West Papua , including on Bird's Head Peninsula and Kaimana , likely dating to

8217-535: The traditional Australian type, the cross-stick, the pinwheel, the tumble-stick, the Boomabird, and other less common types. Boomerangs return to the thrower, distinguishing them from throwing sticks. The origin of the term is uncertain. One source asserts that the term entered the language in 1827, adapted from an extinct Aboriginal language of New South Wales , Australia, but mentions a variant, wo-mur-rang , which it dates to 1798. The first recorded encounter with

8316-488: The tree) and then marched the two 240 mi (390 km) to Alice Springs . Arriving on 1 September, Arkirkra and Padygar were charged with the murder of Brooks while Murray was hailed as a hero. On 3 September, Murray set off for Pine Hill station to investigate complaints of cattle spearing. Nothing has been recorded about this patrol, but he returned on 13 September with two prisoners. On 16 September, Henry Tilmouth of Napperby station shot and killed an Aboriginal person he

8415-500: The very time when Aboriginal people and culture were subject to policies that removed them from their traditional lands and sought to assimilate them (physiologically and culturally) into mainstream white Australian culture, causing the Stolen Generations , Aboriginalia found an ironically "nostalgic", entry point into Australian popular culture at important social locations: holiday resorts and in Australian domestic interiors. In

8514-479: The white man. Brooks bought two camels and on 2 August, left with two 12-year-old Aboriginal children, Skipper and Dodger, as his camel handlers, to trap dingos for the 10 s (2023:A$ 45.49) bounty on their scalps. Approaching a soak 14 mi (23 km) from the homestead , he found around 30 Ngalia-Warlpiri people camped. Brooks knew some and decided to camp with them. The first two days were uneventful and Brooks caught several dingoes. According to evidence in

8613-413: The wings creates lift on both "wings". However, during one-half of each blade's rotation, it sees a higher airspeed, because the rotation tip speed and the forward speed add, and when it is in the other half of the rotation, the tip speed subtracts from the forward speed. Thus if thrown nearly upright, each blade generates more lift at the top than the bottom. While it might be expected that this would cause

8712-447: Was a priority to maintain cattle in good condition on any station. With the worsening of the drought, as waterholes dried up, the starving nomadic Aboriginals were forced to move back in towards the permanent waterholes and soaks located on the new station properties. It was generally believed in the white community that the interests of traditional Aboriginal land owners and those of cattle stations could not be reconciled. Either one or

8811-525: Was campaigning for the upcoming election with the White Australia policy as his party's main platform, accompanying him. O'Kelly later said that had he known how the enquiry would turn out, he would have refused the appointment, stating that if the same circumstances happened again someone would be hanged for the killings. Reporting on the inquiry, the Adelaide Register-News wrote: "he [Murray]

8910-637: Was chasing away from the homestead; this incident was included in the later enquiry. On 19 September, Murray again departed, this time under orders to investigate a non-fatal attack on the person of a settler, William "Nuggett" Morton, at Broadmeadows Station, by what Morton described as a group of 15 Warlpiri people who were also in the same area. Morton, a former circus wrestler, had a reputation for his sexual exploitation of Aboriginal women and violence against both his white employees and Aboriginal people. On 27 August, he left his camp to punish Aboriginal people for spearing his cattle. At Boomerang waterhole he found

9009-423: Was doing. Murray had the boys beaten to force them to lead the party to the rest of the Warlpiri but had they done so, they would have been punished by their tribe. To resolve the dilemma, the three boys smashed their own feet with rocks. Despite the injuries Murray forced the now crippled boys to lead the party; according to Cribbin. By nightfall they reached Cockatoo Creek where they sighted four Aboriginal people on

9108-455: Was good enough for a blackfellow", and claimed he bragged to fellow officers that he had killed "closer to 70 than 17". The Board of Inquiry was presided over by police magistrate A. H. O'Kelly and was deeply compromised from the start – its three members being hand-picked to maximise damage control, J. C. Cawood , Government Resident of Central Australia , and Murray's immediate superior, being one of them. Cawood revealed his own disposition in

9207-491: Was in financial difficulties at the time and an economic mission from London was considering financial assistance), a federal election was due on 17 November and the League of Nations had publicly criticised the case. During the trial Murray was billeted with the Northern Australia police. Although Murray officially admitted to only 17 deaths, Constable Victor Hall said he was shocked with Murray's "freely expressed opinions of what

9306-489: Was intense. It was a conflict between the land and its people; and the cattle, and those who had brought with them the guns and diseases that followed. What is often misunderstood is that the Coniston Massacre was no single event, but a series of punitive raids that occurred over a number of weeks as police parties killed indiscriminately. Even Keith Windschuttle , one of the great deniers of frontier violence, acknowledges

9405-405: Was obliged to shoot in self-defence – a total of 17 casualties. He later testified under oath that each one of the dead was a murderer of Brooks. The Warlpiri themselves estimated between 60 and 70 people had been killed by the patrol. On 24 August, Murray captured an Aboriginal person named Arkirkra and returned to Coniston, where he collected Padygar (Woolingar had died that night still chained to

9504-414: Was published, a settler replied in the letters to the editor that the drought made the life of one ewe worth more to Australia than "all the blacks that were ever here". Cawood expressed his satisfaction with the outcome in his annual report for 1929, writing: "The evidence of all the witnesses was conclusive … the Board found that the shooting was justified, and that the natives killed were all members of

9603-503: Was released by PAW Productions and Screen Australia . It presented oral history and recollections of elderly Aboriginal people , including descendants of massacred victims. Directed by David Batty and Francis Jupurrurla Kelly, it was aired throughout Australia by ABC1 on 14 January 2013. Coniston (Northern Territory) Coniston is a cattle station in the Northern Territory of Australia in central Australia and

9702-523: Was shot dead and Murray killed another with an axe. They then moved east to the Hanson River where another eight were shot. Morton identified all of them as his attackers. The party now returned to Broadmeadows to replenish their supplies before travelling north. No records of this patrol were kept. According to the Warlpiri, this patrol encountered Aboriginal people at Dingo Hole where they killed four men and 11 women and children. The Warlpiri also recount how

9801-636: Was won in 2000, 2002, 2004, 2012, and 2016 by Swiss thrower Manuel Schütz. In 1992, 1998, 2006, and 2008 Fridolin Frost from Germany won the title. The team competitions of 2012 and 2014 were won by Boomergang (an international team). World champions were Germany in 2012 and Japan in 2014 for the first time. Boomergang was formed by individuals from several countries, including the Colombian Alejandro Palacio. In 2016 USA became team world champion. Modern boomerang tournaments usually involve some or all of

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