David Unaipon

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David Unaipon bigraphy, stories - Indigenous Australian inventor and writer

David Unaipon : biography

28 September 1872 – 7 February 1967

David Unaipon (born David Ngunaitponi) (28 September 18727 February 1967) was a widely known indigenous AustralianGraham Jenkin, Conquest of the Ngarrindjeri, The Story of the Lower Murray lakes Tribes,(1979)1985 Rigby reprint p.185 of the Ngarrindjeri people, a preacher, inventor and writer. Unaipon’s contribution to Australian society helped to break many indigenous Australian stereotypes. Unaipon is featured on the Australian $50 note in commemoration.

Biography

Born at the Point McLeay Mission on the banks of Lake Alexandrina in the Coorong region of South Australia, Unaipon was the fourth of nine children of James and Nymbulda Ngunaitponi. Unaipon began his education at the age of seven at the Point McLeay Mission School and soon became known for his intelligence, with the former secretary of the Aborigines’ Friends’ Association stating in 1887: "I only wish the majority of white boys were as bright, intelligent, well-instructed and well-mannered, as the little fellow I am now taking charge of."Jenkin, p. 185.

Unaipon left school at 13 to work as a servant for C.B. Young in Adelaide where Young actively encouraged Unaipon’s interest in literature, philosophy, science and music. In 1890, he returned to Point Mcleay where he apprenticed to a bootmaker and was appointed as the mission organist. History Trust of South Australia In the late 1890s he travelled to Adelaide but found that his colour was a bar to employment in his trade and instead took a job as storeman for an Adelaide bootmaker before returning to work as book-keeper in the Point McLeay store.

On 4 January 1902 he married Katherine Carter (née Sumner), a Tangane woman. Australian Dictionary of Biography He was later employed by the Aborigines’ Friends’ Association as a deputationer, in which role he travelled and preached widely in seeking support for the Point McLeay Mission. Webjournals Unaipon retired from preaching in 1959 but continued working on his inventions into the 1960s.

Inventor

Unaipon took out provisional patents for 19 inventions but was unable to afford to get any of his inventions fully patented. His most successful invention (provisional patent 15 624), a shearing machine that converted curvilineal motion into the straight line movement which is the basis of modern mechanical shears, was introduced without Unaipon receiving any financial return and, apart from a 1910 newspaper report acknowledging him as the inventor, he received no credit.

Other inventions included a centrifugal motor, a multi-radial wheel and a mechanical propulsion device. He was also known as the Australian Leonardo da Vinci for his mechanical ideas, which included pre World War I drawings for a helicopter design based on the principle of the boomerang and his research into the polarisation of light and also spent much of his life attempting to achieve perpetual motion.

Writer and lecturer

Unaipon was obsessed with correct English and in speaking tended to use classical English rather than that in common usage. His written language followed the style of John Milton and John Bunyan.

Unaipon was inquisitively religious, believing in an equivalence of traditional Aboriginal and Christian spirituality. His employment with the Aborigines’ Friends’ Association collecting subscription money allowed him to travel widely. The travel brought him into contact with many intelligent people sympathetic with the cause of Aboriginal rights, and gave him the opportunity to lecture on Aboriginal culture and rights. Although he was much in demand as a public speaker he was often refused accommodation and refreshment due to his race.

Unaipon was the first Aboriginal writer to publish in English,Gale (1997), p. 41. the author of numerous articles in newspapers and magazines, including the Sydney Daily Telegraph, retelling traditional stories and arguing for the rights of Aborigines.

Some of Unaipon’s traditional Aboriginal stories were published in a 1930 book, Myths and Legends of the Australian Aboriginals, under the name of anthropologist William Ramsay Smith.Miller, Ben. They have recently been republished in their original form, under the author’s name, as Legendary Tales of the Australian Aborigines.Unaipon, D. (2006) Legendary Tales of the Australian Aborigines, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press. ISBN 0-522-85246-7.