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The Birth of White Australia (1928)

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Clip description

The Duke of York opens the new Parliament House in Canberra on 9 May 1927, before assembled dignitaries. His speech recalls the great men who worked to federate Australia and the ‘gallant men and women who laid down their lives in the war’. An Aboriginal man dubbed as ‘King Billy’ then exhorts a small group of other Aborigines who are watching the proceedings to cheer ‘the son of the great white King across the seas’. An end title notes the passing away of the ‘primal race’ to be superseded by the white ‘invaders’.

Curator’s notes

by Paul Byrnes

The film appears to have had some degree of official government support, judging from its use of footage such as this, and various public buildings in Sydney (including Vaucluse House). This footage is actually better than the newsreel footage of the opening (see Official Opening of Canberra by His Royal Highness the Duke of York, 1927). One difference is that the newsreel doesn’t have the Aboriginal presence. This suggests that the filmmakers may have arranged to shoot their own footage at the ceremony – or that they shot the Indigenous actors later on the same day (since dais and bunting are still visible).

This is not the ‘King Billy’ who was well known in Western Australia at the time of Federation and passed away in 1908. For more on 'King Billy’, see Note from Sophia Sambono, Curator Indigenous Collections, NFSA in the Curator’s notes for King Billy’s First Car (1939).

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