The Union is the oldest and most successful of the blue collar unions in PNG. The union had its origins in the ethnically based welfare societies formed in Port Moresby in the late 1950s. Waterside workers were also active in the PNG Workers’ Association and its successor the Port Moresby Workers’ Association in the 1960s. The Central District Waterside Workers’ Union was established at a public meeting in Port Moresby on 24 July 1968 and registered under the PNG Industrial Organisations Ordinance on 28 January 1969. Between 1977 and 1980 the CDWWU embarked on a series of amalgamations with the Overseas Seamen’s Union, the Rabaul Workers’ Association, the Madang Waterside Workers’ Union and the Lae Stevedoring Union. The amalagamated union, the PNG Waterside Workers’ and Seamen’s Union, the first national private sector union in Papua New Guinea, was registered on 8 January 1980. The name of the organisation was changed to the Papua New Guinea Maritime Workers Industrial Union on 18 October 1993. (See Michael Hess, <I>Unions Under Economic Development: private sector unions in PNG</I>, Oxford University Press, 1992.)

<LI>Port Moresby Council of Trade Unions, Submission to the Urban Minimum Wages Board. Ts., roneo, 228pp., Aug 1974;</LI>
<LI>PNG Maritime Workers Industrial Union, Circulars to National Executive Council Members and Branch Presidents, Jun 1991-Jul 1997;</LI>
<LI>Press cuttings on industrial matters in Papua New Guinea, 1970-1990;</LI>
<LI>Further press cuttings on industrial matters in PNG, n.d.;</LI>
<LI>Rough list of non-current files held in the PNG Maritime Workers Industrial Union’s Port Moresby office in May 1994 and since destroyed, May 1994</LI><P><b>See reel list for further details</b>

In 1855, following the formation of the Australasian Connexion of the Methodist Church, general jurisdiction and administration of the Methodist missions in the Friendly Islands, Fiji and New Zealand was transferred to the Methodist Missionary Society of Australasia which subsequently also took control of Methodist activities in Samoa, New Guinea, Papua, the Solomon Islands and North Australia. New Zealand became a separate Conference in 1910 and in 1922 it took over responsibility for the Solomons Islands District. In 1926 Tonga was made an independent Conference in affiliation with the Australasian General Conference.

Mission Board minutes, 1865-97 (3 vols) (MOM 1-3) (1 reel)
Mission District minutes, 1855-1914 (30 vols) (MOM 5-26, 174-81) (17 reels)
Executive Committee minutes, 1898-1939 (4 vols) (MOM 210-12,276) (3 reels)
Sydney Synod minutes, 1906 (1 vol) (MOM 4);
Port Darwin Circuit quarterly minutes, 1873-99 (1 vol) (MOM 27) (1 reel)
Minutes of the Victorian Section of the General Conference, Tonga Committee, 1888-92 (1 vol) (MOM 28)<B><P>See reel list for further details</B>

In 1932 W.C. Groves carried out ethnographic fieldwork centred on the village of Fisoa in the northern half of the island of New Ireland, in the Territory of New Guinea, part of the administrative district which had its headquarters in the town of Kavieng. His fieldwork was carried out under a grant from the Australian National Research Council. Reports of Groves' work were published in <I>Oceania</I> and <I>Mankind</I>. Following a successful career as an educator, culminating in his appointment as Director of Education in the Territory of Papua and New Guinea, 1946-1958, Groves was appointed Visiting Fellow in Anthropology in the Research School of Pacific Studies at the Australian National University in 1965 and 1966, where he complied the papers copied on this microfilm.

<BR>W. C. Groves, <I>An Ethnographic Study of Fisoa, a New Ireland Community</I> [in 1932], ANU, Canberra, 1965. Ts., 48pp.
<BR>W. C. Groves, <I>Kinship and Social Organisation in a New Ireland Community</I>, ANU, Canberra, 1965-66. Ts., 111pp.
<BR>W. C. Groves, <I>A South Seas' Panorama</I>. Ts. 151pp.
<BR>See Finding aids for details.

The Micronesia Support Committee was an NGO that carried out research and made its findings available to the public, media, government and other interested individuals and organisations concerned with the political status of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (1947-1990). It was established by Giff Johnson in 1975 and based in Honolulu, Hawai'i. It was superseded by the Pacific Concerns Resource Centre in 1983 with its headquarters in Suva, Fiji. The Committee published the <I>Micronesia Support Committee Bulletin</I> which promoted economic self-sufficiency, self-determination and independence. In the 1970s the US, as the administering power, partitioned the TTPI into four political units: the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Republic of Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariannas. The latter established a political union with the US in 1978. The Marshall Islands, the FSM and Palau opted for independence in Free Association with the US. While the compacts did lead to internationally recognised independence for the Marshall Islands (1986), the FSM (1986) and Palau (1994), the US assumed responsibility for their defence requirements, and was granted rights of strategic denial and exclusive military access to both land and sea. The <I>Bulletin</I> and related publications thus chronicled the political, economic, military, social, and international dimensions surrounding the dissolution of the TTPI and the emergence of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariannas and the Freely Associated States of the Marshall Islands, the FSM and Palau. See also <I>PMB 1172</I>, <I>PMB 1173</I> and <I>PMB Doc 441</I>.

<I>Micronesia Support Bulletin</I> (Honolulu), 1975-82, <I>Panadanus Periodical</I> (Honolulu), 1983, <I>The Young Micronesian</I>, (Honolulu) 1971, <I>Friends of Micronesia Newsletter</I>, (Berkerly & Boston) 1971-74, <I>Micronesian Newsnotes</I> (New York) Dec 1981, <I>The Washington Pacific Report</I>, 1983-90
See reel list for further details

Reverend Norman F. Cocks was born in Harrow, Middlesex, UK. He went to Hackney and New College, London, and was ordained at Skinner St. Congregarional Church, Poole, Dorset on 25 November 1934. His Pastorates in England were Poole, 1934-1940, and High Cross Tottenham, 1940-45. Rev Cocks was then appointed to the post of Australian and New Zealand Secretary of the London Missionary Society, 1945-1970. He transferred to the Anglican Church in Tasmania, was ordained Deacon in St. David's Hobart on 19 October 1970, and was subsequently ordained as an Anglican priest. His portrait is in the "LMS Chronicles" of February 1945 and June 1947.

Volumes 2-5, pp.150-651, of the autobiography of Rev. Norman F. Cocks completed in Hobart in 1987. Ts., photocopy. Chapter headings as follows. Vol.2, pp.150-299: So to London; A change of Wind; Outward Bound; Australian Landfall; Over the Tasman; Papua Invitation; Trial and Reunion; Eleanor Rivett; Traveller’s Days [1947]; More Gleanings from 1947; World Council of Churches – Amsterdam 1948; The Naming of the Ship ‘John Williams VI’; Visit of ‘John Williams VI’; Our New Home and Office; To Fiji and Samoa. Vol.3, pp.299-450: Home Again; 1951 and Britain Again; ‘Passage to India’; ‘Home from the Sea’; India – Australia – Papua; Royal Flush; Island Shadows; The Dickens Fellowship; Another Papuan Journey; A Year of Anticipation; South African Pilgrimage; ‘The Golden Route’ and the Cape; ‘Home’ Again; La Suisse; Transatlantic. Vol.4, pp.450-550: Across the North American Continent; Time Passes; 1961 – An Eventful Year; 1962 – So Many Changes; Port Moresby 21 November 1962; Pleasant Island Again; Churchwise; Another Year; 1965 Constant Movement; Papua ‘The Ecumenical Crisis’; The Wanderers Way. Vol.5, pp.550-651: What is ‘Normality’?; Papua Again; Night Flight to Independence; ‘The Gilbert and Sullivan Colony’; The Penultimate Year – 1969; Farewell Papua New Guinea.

Jim Falk (University of Wollongong), A New Force in the Nuclear Conflict: the Birth of the Pacific Trade Union Forum, Jun 1981. Ts., p/c, 32pp.
Michael Hamel-Green (People for Nuclear Disarmament), The Second Pacific Trade Union Forum Conference, Noumea, New Caledonia, 26-28 September 1982. A report on the background, proceedings and outcome of the conference, 1982. Ts., p/c, 22pp.
Michael Easson (Assistant Secretary of the Labor Council of NSW), Left and Labor in the Pacific. Contribution to Hoover Institute, Stanford University, Seminar on ‘The Red Orchestra in the Pacific’, n.d. Ts., p/c, 65pp.
R Hogan (Victorian State Secretary, Federated Miscellaneous Workers Union), Report to ACTU Executive on Pacific Trade Union Conference held at Auckland, New Zealand, May 18-May 20, 1986, 3 Mar 1987. Ts., p/c, 35pp plus attachments.
Raghwan (Education Officer, ICFTU/APRO Pacific Office), ICFTU/APRO Education Project, Brisbane, Australia. 1. Report, Proceedings and Recommendations of the ICFTU/APRO Pacific Education Project Review and Planning Workshop, 26-18th April, 1989; 2. Conclusion of Steering Committee Meeting of the South Pacific and Oceanic Council of Trade Unions (SPOCTU), 28th April”, 1989. Ts., p/c, c.60pp.
Minutes of the ICFTU/APRO Pacific Structure Steering Committee meeting, Brisbane, Australia, 28 Apr 1989. Ts., 6pp.
Michael Kinnane (Executive Officer, South Pacific and Oceanic Council of Trade Unions), Trade Unions in the Island Countries of the South Pacific Region: an overview, Jan 1990. Ts., p/c, 7pp., plus attachments.
Michael Kinnane (Executive Officer, South Pacific and Oceanic Council of Trade Unions), Trade Unions in the South Pacific: some observations, 4 Sep 1990. Ts., 12pp.
Pratap Chand, Ken Douglas & Bill Mansfield (South Pacific Union Development Program Steering Committee), Review of the South Pacific Union Program, May 1997. Ts., 30pp.

In the most industrial country in Oceania, labour unions are quite strong and active, and at times their strikes become militant and political, pushing politicians to complain or listen, for example, on the issue of favoring local hiring that was inscribed in both the Noumea Accord and the organic laws that followed (nc, 18 Oct 2007). Faced with rising living costs, they also want their share of the proceeds from economic development, so the minimum monthly wage was raised in January to 120,000 Pacific francs, or about us$1,200 (nc, 8 Jan 2007). Mining unions noted the rising price of nickel and demanded a corresponding increase in wages, and those in various support or service sectors felt likewise. But social dialogue between workers and employers has all too often not gone smoothly in New Caledonia, leading to roadblocks with burning tires and work stoppages without enough action by the State, positive or negative (nc, 4 Sep, 2 Oct, 9 Oct 2007). France too has its powerful labor unions who strike militantly, but in late 2007 Sarkozy battled transporters over pension reforms, while a thousand people marched in Noumea against “terrorism” by local unions (BBC News, 13 Nov 2007; nc, 12 Nov 2007). For example, USTKE, which Estrosi had criticized, blocked the local cement industry and urban bus company for months—along with other strikes to support favoring local hiring and protecting workers fired for union activities—and in October USTKE called a general strike because the police had intervened (nc, 13 Oct 2007). After testing the waters in the presidential and legislative elections by backing Bove and then its own candidates, respectively, USTKE defied appeals by the FLNKS not to divide the Kanak vote and formed its own Labor Party in November, with support from metropolitan Trotskyists, dedicating itself to independence, anti-globalization, and revolutionary socialism (nc, 16 Nov 2007). It remained one of the two largest unions, as labor leaders compete for membership using dramatic strikes to attract support (nc, 12 April 2007). From David Chappell, “Political review: New Caledonia”, The Contemporary Pacific 12.2 (2000) 515-520.
After a decade, in 2007, USTKE started a new series of Combat Ouvrier, again as a monthly, renumbering from No.1. No.8, Feb 2008, up to No.27, Nov 2010, are available on the web at: http://ustke.org/pdf.html.

Combat Ouvrier, Nos.1-43, 45-49, 51-54, 1992-2001, published monthly.
See Finding aids for details.

Basil Shaw BA, BEd, DPE (Qld), MA (Ed., London), PhD, completed his biography of Michael Somare as a PhD dissertation in the Division of Humanities, Griffith University, Queensland.

A study of traditional leadership in Papua New Guinean societies provides the conceptual framework for Basil Shaw’s, Somare: A Political Biography of the First Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea. His study examines Somare’s life from his birth in the Murik Lakes in the Mandated Territory of New Guinea in 1936 to his loss of the prime ministership of Papua New Guinea in 1985.

The study is presented in two parts. The first part, Chapters 1-4, establishes a need for a biography of Somare and identifies three major objectives: firstly, to review the material in Somare’s autobiography, Sana, which covers the period to 1975, and to add to it where possible; secondly, to update Somare’s life to 1985, when he lost the prime ministership for the second time, and thirdly to explore the relationship between traditional leadership and contemporary political leadership at the national level.

The second part of the study, Chapters 5 to 10, is the political biography proper. The early chapters focus on the developmental stages of Somare’s life, showing how the leadership characteristics of oratory, effective communication, negotiating ability and the determination to retain power function in the National Parliament. The latter chapters of this part of the dissertation examine the difficulties that Somare and others faced in the introduction of the Westminster system of government into Papua New Guinea. The challengers whom Somare has faced as a political leader, and the issues which deprived him of government in 1980 and 1985, are also examined. (From Basil Shaw’s ‘Abstract’.)

Bob Langdon, the first executive officer of the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau, 1968-1984, established his reputation as a Pacific Specialist with the publication of his history of Tahiti, <i>Island of Love</i>, in London in 1959. As a journalist with the <i>Pacific Islands Monthly (PIM)</i>, 1962-67, he travelled extensively in the Islands on assignments producing investigative articles, many on obscure aspects of Pacific history. It was in the <i>PIM</i>, too, that Bob first published his account of the marooned Spanish sailors on Amanu in the Tuamotu Islands. This discovery became the basis of his studies of European castaways in the Pacific Islands, prior to Captain Cook, which appeared in his books, <i>The Lost Caravel</i> (1975) and <i>The Lost Caravel Re-explored</i> (1988), and in his many articles published in scholarly journals.

The first volume of Langdon’s autobiography, <i>Every Goose a Swan: An Australian Autobiography</i> (Sydney, Farm Cove Press, 1995) takes the reader up to 1959 when, as a journalist in Adelaide, Langdon was attracted by an advertisement for a ‘Journalist-printer wanted for Polynesian islands’.

Volumes 2, of Langdon’s autobiography, Ts., 107pp., Chs.46-65, and Epilogue, gives an account of Langdon’s work as a journalist on the <i>Pacific Islands Monthly</i>, his recruitment to the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau by Harry Maude, his experiences at the Australian National University, his expeditions to the Pacific islands, his work for the Australian government’s South Pacific Cultures Fund, and his pusuit of his unorthodox views on the migration of the Pacific Islanders.

This oral history audio media project, called the Fiji Oral History Project Part 1: Part-Europeans and Europeans, comprises 28 taped interviews with 26 senior members of these communities living in Fiji and Australia. The interviews were conducted by Marsali MacKinnon from 1998 to 1999. They trace the history of a number of Part-European and European families in Fiji through the 19th and 20th centuries, beginning with the first arrival of their European ancestors. A fresh and vibrant collection of many previously un-recorded personal memoirs, as well as family stories passed down the generations, it is a significant contribution to the social history and intangible heritage of Fiji - and the South Pacific region.

PMB AUDIO 1 Moira Hedstrom (née Deitrich) p.2
PMB AUDIO 2 Hubert “Jumbo” Sabben p.18
PMB AUDIO 3-4 Bill Miller, Interview No.1, Part 1 p.36
PMB AUDIO 5-6 Bill Miller, Interview No.2 p.55
PMB AUDIO 7 Dorothy Walker p.75
PMB AUDIO 8 Maureen Southwick (née Storck) p.78
PMB AUDIO 9 Henry Sahai p.93
PMB AUDIO 10 Tui Levuka p.100
PMB AUDIO 11 George Gibson p.103
PMB AUDIO 12 William Moses p.113
PMB AUDIO 13 Dora Patterson p.120
PMB AUDIO 14-15 Capt. Fred Vollmer p.131
PMB AUDIO 16 Nicky Yoshida (née Ashley) p.146
PMB AUDIO 17 Bertha Wendt p.158
PMB AUDIO 18 Alice Mahabir p.171
PMB AUDIO 19 Sir Len Usher, Parts 1 & 2 p.193
PMB AUDIO 21 “Pa” Hazelman and Noleen Billings p.208
PMB AUDIO 22 Thomas Fenton p.220
PMB AUDIO 23 Jess Jackson p.227
PMB AUDIO 24 Betty Simpson p.241
PMB AUDIO 25 Lema Low p.250
PMB AUDIO 26-27 Rodney Acraman, Interview No.1 p.265
PMB AUDIO 26-27 Rodney Acraman, Interview No.2 p.288
PMB AUDIO 29 Judy Zundel p.298
PMB AUDIO 30 Daryl Tarte p.316
PMB AUDIO 31 Sir David Ragg, Parts 1 & 2 p.334
PMB AUDIO 33 Don Burness p.355
PMB AUDIO 34-35 Bill Clark, Parts 1 & 2 p.372