ARTIST: Andrew Jack 'Chinny' O Chin 1917-1978
DIMENSIONS: 46cm (18 inches)
MATERIAL: Local wood Crows Ash
CONDITION: Fine very well preserved presentation
AGE: Circa Pre - WW11 Depression Era
ETHNOGRAPHY: Traditional SE Queensland Wuka Wuka returning boomerang carved at Cherbourg Aboriginal Mission Reserve in the 1930s to pay homage to two of the greatest Queensland & Australian athletes of their time - Frank "KING" Fisher & Edward Eddie Gilbert (1905-1978).
Fisher served in the Middle East during the War & pre War played Rugby League for Australia 1932-36 including a Great Britain Test. Frank King Fisher, the grandfather of athletics great Catherine Freeman, was regarded as the Aboriginal version of Wally Lewis. He was selected for the all Aboriginal side of the century after representing Wide Bay against touring Great Britain sides in the 1930s. Fisher was denied the opportunity to tour with the Kangaroos when he was refused a passport to pursue his career overseas.
Eddie Gilbert played first class cricket 1931-1936 & started his career by bowling the legendary Sir Don Bradman for a duck.
PROVENANCE: Local Murgon Queensland Family collection. Artifact has never been displayed, published or shown publicly. Gifted to the owner's father thence by descent. An extremely rare significant & important & beautiful historic example of post contact neo traditional SE Queensland Aboriginal art.
Eddie Gilbert 1 August 1905, Durundur Station, Queensland – 9 January 1978, Brisbane, Queensland
FASTER than Harold Larwood' . . . Don Bradman on the ground after being dismissed caught behind off Eddie Gilbert for a duck.
On 6 November 1931 in a match against NSW at the recently opened Brisbane Cricket Ground (the "Gabba") in Brisbane, he dismissed opener Wendell Bill for a duck with his first ball. The incoming batsman was Don Bradman (at the time, the best batsman in the world) and the next delivery was so quick that it literally knocked the bat from his hands. Bradman was then caught behind by wicket-keeper Len Waterman for a third ball duck.
Frank Big Shot King Fisher. Born 1905 in Townsville, Queensland the son of Frank Fisher Sr and his wife Esme. His father had served with the 11th Light Horse Regiment but Fisher's attempt to follow in his father's footsteps in 1940 was blocked on racial grounds. He is the paternal grandfather of Australian track athlete and Olympic gold medalist Cathy Freeman.
The Cherbourg Barambah Magpies rugby league team around 1935: the teams were decked out, ironically enough, in green and gold. Fisher was captain 'more inclined to step around someone than run over the top; but he could do both. And his defence? It was murderous.' But Cherbourg could also defend; no doubt inspired by Fisher who, if he wasn’t working a scissors move with Cherbourg’s elusive fullback Jack O’Chin, was hurting the opposition. Photograph: Vock Collection
In 1932 and again in 1936 he played at half-back for the Wide Bay representative side against the Great Britain touring teams. The English captain, Jim Brough, was reported as saying that "Fisher was the best country player the Englishmen had encountered." On Brough's recommendation, Fisher was offered a contract to play club Rugby League in Salford, England but the Queensland Government refused his application to travel under the Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of Sale of Opium Act 1897 (Qld).
Andrew Jack O’Chin 1917 - 1978 Cherbourg Queensland
