Perth Voice Interactive

A NEW short doco about Weld Square delves into the long history of the park as a meeting place for Aboriginal people.

Our Patch, put together by the Film and Television Institute and the Vincent city council, came about because there are few written records about the park.

They got in touch with Aboriginal filmmaker Mandy Corunna to put various stories about the park on the record.

In the film elder Ted Wilkes explains the park was frequented by Aboriginal people because the southern boundary on Newcastle Street “was the line that people used for the restricted area,” the nightly curfew zone that encompassed the CBD.

“If you got caught by a nasty cop or a nasty official, you were in for a hard time.”

‘We’ve got these move-on notices now, so a lot of people may be arrested if they come here’

Interviewee Jim Morrison, who works across the road at Noongar Radio, recalls “people would come from all over the state, and this would be the park where they’d connect”.

When the exclusion zone was finally abolished in 1954, Assoc Prof Wilkes says “it would have taken Aboriginal people a long time to adjust to go confidently over the line into the restricted area”.

Through the 1960s and 1970s support agencies like the Aboriginal Advancement Council drew a new generation of Aboriginal people.

“There was always a fight over in the park,” Assoc Prof Wilkes says. “There was always a couple of blokes fighting over a family dispute or fighting over a woman or a young yorga.

“I remember one night I got challenged in this park and had to stand up to defend my honour. And there were always people there to properly adjudicate. It was always: stand up, use your fists, fight with your fists and when the first guy drops and says no more, that’s it, the fight’s over.”

While the official exclusion zone’s gone, elder Albert Corunna says it lives on in another form: “We’ve got these move-on notices now, so a lot of people may be arrested if they come here.”

“It’s quite a traumatic experience for us Aboriginal leaders to see that happening to our people,” Assoc Prof Wilkes says.

Ms Corunna says there’s so much history to the park she’s now planning a longer feature.

For now you can see the short film Our Patch screening alongside Freeload (a tale about the secret subculture of young travellers) until July 13, head to http://www.revelationfilmfest.org for tickets and times.

by DAVID BELL