‘Legacy lives on’: Aboriginal leaders honoured in park lands statues
Two years to the day of Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue’s death, InDaily can reveal the significant Aboriginal leader will be the first of six honoured in a prime city location. One of the nation’s top artists will create the statue.
Six Aboriginal leaders will be honoured with statues at Elder Park, Deputy Premier Kyam Maher announced on the second anniversary of renowned Aboriginal leader Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue’s death.
The South Australian Ngarrindjeri man who appears on the Australian $50 note, David Unaipon, is among those who will be recognised.
A life-size statue of O’Donoghue, who was a leading advocate for SA’s First Nations people, will be erected at the Tarntanya Wama/Elder Park walkway, on the southern side of Karrawirra Parri/River Torrens by mid-2026.
Future statues of prominent Aboriginal leaders Gladys Elphick MBE, Dr Alice Alitya Rigney AO PSM, David Unaipon, Yami Lester OAM and Garnett Ian Wilson OAM, for a total cost of $1 million funded by the state government would also follow.
Maher was joined by the families of the honourees and Lord Mayor Jane Lomax-Smith for the announcement on Wednesday, which fulfils a 2022 election promise.
“We have lots of statues, lots of commemoration of Europeans and non-Aboriginal people…but we have precious little of our Aboriginal leaders, and this is the start in rectifying this,” he told InDaily.
“It’s also really important for young Aboriginal people to be able to come to the centre of their capital city and see themselves reflected better in public life with these sorts of statues and the achievements this represents.”
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O’Donoghue, a Yankunytjatjara / Pitjantjatjara woman, was the first Aboriginal person to train as a nurse at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and received many accolades for a lifetime dedicated to advancing First Nation’s people, including Australian of the year, a NAIDOC lifetime achievement award and a Dame of the Order of St Gregory the Great – an honour given by Pope John Paul II.
Deb Edwards, O’Donoghue’s niece and head of the Lowitja O’Donoghue Foundation, said she could not believe it had been two years since her death.
“It’s gone so quickly, but I know that she would be absolutely chuffed, overjoyed and she would find it very moving I’m sure, to know that she’s being honoured in this way,” Edwards told InDaily.
“In particular, along with other people who she respected and loved working alongside.”
The statue will be designed by acclaimed sculptor Robert Hannaford AM, who painted a portrait of O’Donoghue in 2006 for the National Portrait Gallery.
Edwards said Hannaford’s memories with her aunty has him already well-prepared for the job, and the family has since worked closely with him to provide photographs of O’Donoghue from every angle so he can piece together her full frame.
“Aunty always had this red power suit that she was always in, and that’s what Robert had painted her in originally so we think that the suit might make a reappearance, who knows,” Edwards said.
The leaders were chosen after state-wide engagement with Aboriginal community members, leaders and organisations, with the First Nations Voice to Parliament also given input on the leaders chosen.
The first statue of O’Donoghue is expected by mid-2026, with each statue to include a sandblasted platform inscribed with information about its honoured leader. Family members would help craft the information with what they deemed most important to commemorate. There will also be QR codes with further historical notes available on each statue, including audio histories.
“We’re not going to rush it. We want to work with families to make sure it’s representing how they want their family members represented. So we will do it as soon as we can. But there will be no rush. We want to get it right,” Maher said.
Lester Irabinna Rigney, a relative of Dr Alice Alitya Rigney AO PSM, who will also receive a statue, said her legacy lives on. Rigney grew up at Point Pearce in the 1940s, she was the first female Aboriginal school principal in the country and was awarded numerous accolades for her contribution to Aboriginal education.
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“Before her school, there were no urban Aboriginal schools, and so Alice’s legacy lives on,” he said.
“One of the most important things that we want to say here as families, who of these respected South Australian, wonderful South Australian leaders, is the honouring of one is the honouring of all.”
The Adelaide City Council would assist placing the statues in the CBD, with Lord Mayor Jane Lomax-Smith saying the commemorative project is “even more important” because of the families’ living memories.
“I knew half of the people involved, maybe it’s because I’m so old, I’ve been around a long time,” she said.
“Every one of these people deserves recognition and what I find so exciting is that most of our statues are people from another century, and nobody remembers them.
“All of us are here because these were special people who we knew had something more…They had a drive and a passion and a commitment beyond the normal, beyond the commonplace, and it made a huge difference to their communities and their people.”
Gladys Elphick MBE
- A Kaurna and Ngadjuri woman, Elphick was born in 1904 and died in 1988, growing up at Point Pearce, Yorke Peninsula
- She was founding president of the Council of Aboriginal Women of South Australia, which became the Aboriginal Council of South Australia in 1973
- She was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in recognition of service to the Aboriginal community in 1971
Dr Alice Alitya Rigney AO PSM
- A Kaurna and Narungga woman, Rigney was born in 1941 and died in 2017, growing up at Point Pearce, Yorke Peninsula
- Starting as a teacher’s aide in 1967, Rigney retired as principal of Kaurna Plains School for Aboriginal students in 1997, a school she started
- Awarded a lifetime achievement award in the Gladys Elphick Awards in 2017, and in 2018 was posthumously made an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in the Queen’s Birthday Honours
David Unaipon
- A Ngarrindjeri man born at Raukkan (Point McLeay Mission), Unaipon was born in 1872 and died in 1967
- He was the first Australian Aboriginal person to publish his writing in English and is known for his inventions focusing on perpetual motion
- At the age of 81, he was awarded a Coronation Medal celebrating the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953 and is pictured on the $50 note
Yami Lester OAM
- A Yankunytjatjara man, born at Walyatjata in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands, Lester was born in 1941 and died in 2017
- He was blinded as a young boy by nuclear testing in outback Australia, and is best known as an anti-nuclear and Indigenous rights advocate
- He was awarded the Order of Australia medal for service in the field of Aboriginal Welfare in 1981
Garnett Ian Wilson OAM
- A Ngarrindjeri man born at Raukkan (Point McLeay Mission), Wilson was born in 1928 and died in 2010
- He was the first Aboriginal wool classer in South Australia and an inaugural member and long-standing chair of the Aboriginal Lands Trust, the first Aboriginal land-holding body in Australia
- He was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for service to Aboriginal Welfare in 1984
