A RETIRED Lutheran pastor from Beaudesert has been left delighted after his book about the struggles of a north Queensland Indigenous community earned a second print run.
Beaudesert man Howard J. Pohlner spent seven years working is a missionary amongst the Guugu Yimidhirr aboriginal people at Hope Vale in north Queensland, and later turned his experiences and stories he encountered into a book titled ‘Gangurru’.
Originally published in 1986, Gangurra examines the history of the Guugu Yimidhirr aboriginal people and their interaction and struggles with European culture.
It is named after the Guugu Yimidhirr’s word for the black male kangaroo.
The Guugu Yimidhirr people are thought to be among the first to interact with Captain James Cook and his travelling party in 1770.
As with most Indigenous Australian tribes after European settlement, the Guugu Yimidhirr people struggled to adapt and endured a torturous fight to maintain even a small slice of their home country.
In the decades that followed, missionaries and churches are credited with helping to keep alive many Aboriginal communities during the worst periods of persecution and interference by European settlement.
One of them was Cape Bedford, which Gangurru examines in detail.
For its second print run, Gangurru, which is foreworded by Neville T. Bonner, has been painstakingly updated with new information and photographs.
The reprint was sparked from a request by the current pastor at Hope Vale, Rev David Spanagel, a request that Mr Pohlner said surprised and honoured him.
About 2000 copies will be reprinted, and The Royal Flying Doctor’s Association has already thrown its support behind the book by purchasing 500 copies.
The Pohlners made a rare visit back to Hope Vale last weekend to commemorate and relaunch the book.
Mr Pohlners said he was ecstatic about seeing his labor of love get a second lease on life.
“I just thank the Lord that it has worked out like it has,” he said.
“I put my heart and soul into it, and I travelled around back then selling it which was hard work. This time, it just came so easy.”
To purchase a copy email publisher Wilfred Kube at wilfred.kube@gmail.com or call Howard on 0409 590 584.
