Penneshaw Maritime and Folk Museum: On Kangaroo Island in South Australia

There is no doubt that Kangaroo Island abounds with natural beauty. The stunning landscapes, sea views and wildlife have tourists flocking to the island by the busload.

But while the landmarks may be well-known, much of the island's history is not. Like the stories about the sealers who arrived on Kangaroo island not long after the explorers Matthew Flinders and Nicholas Baudin chartered the coastline. Many of the sealers brought aboriginal women who'd been kidnapped and kept as slaves. It's a story which is touched on at Penneshaw's Maritime and Folk Museum in the display about the life and times of Mary Thomas. The museum’s Graham Trethewey explains:

“Mary Thomas was the daughter of Nat Thomas, a European sealer who came from Tasmania in the 1820s. And her mother was a Tasmanian aboriginal lady that was brought from Tasmania. They lived at Antechamber Bay.”

Mary was born in a bush camp at Antechamber Bay and spent much of her early life with her mother Betty, who’d been kidnapped from Tasmania. Mary and Betty, her sister Jenny and brother Sam roamed the south coast in search of seals, wallabies and kangaroos. For much of her early life Mary could only speak the language of her mother's people until she married William Seymour - one of the men who built the Cape Willoughby Lighthouse. Today a small granite monument in the Penneshaw Cemetary marks the final resting place of an important woman in South Australian history.

“We understand that Mary Thomas was the first child born in South Australia of a European father and an Aboriginal mother.”

Kangaroo Island is a place of many South Australian firsts. Another character on the island was George Fireball Bates. He jumped ship in the 1820s and is credited with building the first stone dwelling in the State - long before Governor Hindmarsh arrived on our shores.

By the 1840s Adelaide authorities saw the island as a dangerous place populated by sealers, whalers, ex-convicts and runaways and considered it a threat to the security of the State's legitimate settlers. Police Commissioner Alexander Tolmer was given the job of extending the long arm of the law to KI and led several police raids on remote parts of the coastline.

Over time, the civilising influence of education had its effect, even if it was somewhat intermittent due to isolation and a lack of resources. Our guide, Graham Trethewey, knows as well as anyone, the difficulty of gaining an education when living on the remoter parts of the island.

Graham had to ride his bike several kilometres to a remote school bus stop. But others, before the war, had an even tougher time. All over KI there were schools like the ones at American Beach and at Salt Lagoon. They were known as part-time schools. There was such a shortage of staff and the schools were so remote the teacher might only arrive on a sulky once every three weeks. Graham's mother Lilly Roe was a teacher at a part time school and for her, like so many others, the modes of transport were many and varied but never easy. Graham told us some walked, others rode push-bikes or horse and carts.

It's just one of the many stories of life on Kangaroo Island to be seen at the Penneshaw Maritime and Folk Museum. It's in the old school building on the outskirts of town on the road to Kingscote.

Pennehsaw Maritime and Folk Museum
On the Kingscote Road
Open Wednesday to Sunday 3 - 5pm or by appointment
Contact 8553 1070