Thursday Island, colloquially known as TI, or in the Kawrareg dialect, Waiben or Waibene, is an

island An island or isle is a piece of land, distinct from a continent, completely surrounded by water. There are continental islands, which were formed by being split from a continent by plate tectonics, and oceanic islands, which have never been ...

of the

Torres Strait Islands The Torres Strait Islands are an archipelago of at least 274 small islands in the Torres Strait, a waterway separating far northern continental Australia's Cape York Peninsula and the island of New Guinea. They span an area of , but their tot ...

, an

archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands. An archipelago may be in an ocean, a sea, or a smaller body of water. Example archipelagos include the Aegean Islands (the o ...

of at least 274 small islands in the

Torres Strait The Torres Strait (), also known as Zenadh Kes ( Kalaw Lagaw Ya#Phonology 2, �zen̪ad̪ kes, is a strait between Australia and the Melanesian island of New Guinea. It is wide at its narrowest extent. To the south is Cape York Peninsula, ...

. TI is located approximately north of

Cape York Peninsula The Cape York Peninsula is a peninsula located in Far North Queensland, Australia. It is the largest wilderness in northern Australia.Mittermeier, R.E. et al. (2002). Wilderness: Earth's last wild places. Mexico City: Agrupación Sierra Madre, ...

Far North Queensland Far North Queensland (FNQ) is the northernmost part of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland. Its largest city is Cairns, Queensland, Cairns and it is dominated geographically by Cape York Peninsula, which stret ...

, Australia. Thursday Island is also the name of the town in the south and west of the island, formerly known as Port Kennedy, and also the name of the

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality, a historical named location or place in Canada * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localitie ...

which contains the island within the

Shire of Torres The Shire of Torres is a local government area located in Far North Queensland, Australia, covering large sections of the Torres Strait Islands and the northern tip of Cape York Peninsula north of 11°S latitude. It holds two distinctions—it ...

. The town of Rose Hill (known as Abednego until 7 September 1991) is located on the north-eastern tip of the island (). In the , the locality of Thursday Island had a population of 2,805 people.

Geography

Thursday Island has an area of about . The highest point on Thursday Island, standing at

above sea level Height above mean sea level is a measure of a location's vertical distance (height, elevation or altitude) in reference to a vertical datum based on a historic mean sea level. In geodesy, it is formalized as orthometric height. The zero level ...

, is Milman Hill, a

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

defence facility. While Thursday Island is within the

and is the administrative centre for that shire, it is also the administrative and commercial centre of the local government area of

Torres Strait Island Region The Torres Strait Island Region is a local government area in Far North Queensland, Australia, covering part of the Torres Strait Islands. It was created in March 2008 out of 15 autonomous Island Councils during a period of statewide local gove ...

despite not being part of that local government area.

History

The island has been populated for thousands of years by the

Torres Strait Islanders Torres Strait Islanders ( ) are the Indigenous Melanesians, Melanesian people of the Torres Strait Islands, which are part of the state of Queensland, Australia. Ethnically distinct from the Aboriginal Australians, Aboriginal peoples of the res ...

, though archeological evidence on Badu, further north in Torres Strait, suggests that the area has been inhabited from before the end of the last Ice Age. The archaeology from Badu, Pulu, Saibai and Mer shows that Melanesian occupation started around 2,600 years ago (see

Kalaw Lagaw Ya Kalau Lagau Ya, Kalaw Lagaw Ya, Kala Lagaw Ya (), or the Western Torres Strait language (also several other names, see below) is the language indigenous to the central and western Torres Strait Islands, Queensland, Australia. On some islands, ...

). In 1848 a hydrographic survey of the area was conducted by Captain

Owen Stanley Captain Owen Stanley FRS RN (13 June 1811 – 13 March 1850) was a British Royal Navy officer and surveyor. Life Stanley was born in Alderley, Cheshire, the son of Edward Stanley, rector of Alderley and later Bishop of Norwich. A brother wa ...

of the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

, the commander of HMS ''Rattlesnake''. He named this island Friday Island and another island Thursday Island (presumably reflecting the day of the week on which he named them). However, in June 1855 Admiral Sir

Francis Beaufort Sir Francis Beaufort ( ; 27 May 1774 – 17 December 1857) was an Irish hydrographer and naval officer who created the Beaufort cipher and the Beaufort scale. Early life Francis Beaufort was descended from French Protestant Hugu ...

of the Royal Navy (the Admiralty Hydrographer) decided to switch the names around, likely to preserve the east-west naming sequence with the present-day Friday Island and the nearby Wednesday Island. The original place of permanent European settlement in Torres Strait was

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

, south-east of the tip of

, established in 1864. However, the channel between

Albany Island Albany Island or Pabaju is an island off the north-eastern coast of Cape York Peninsula in the Adolphus Channel of Queensland, Australia. It is within the locality of Somerset in the Shire of Torres. Geography Albany Island is off the no ...

and Somerset proved to be hazardous for a port and in 1875 it was jointly decided by the Queensland and British governments to transfer the port to the deep anchorage on the south side of Thursday Island. The new port was called Port Kennedy, after

Edmund Kennedy Edmund Besley Court Kennedy J. P. (5 September 1818 – December 1848) was an explorer in Australia in the mid-19th century. He was the Assistant-Surveyor of New South Wales, working with Thomas Mitchell (explorer), Sir Thomas Mitchell. Kenned ...

, the explorer of Cape York Peninsula, and was established in 1867. The town that developed on the island was also called Port Kennedy, but on 1 June 1962 the town was renamed Thursday Island. In 1877, an administrative centre for the Torres Strait Islands was set up on the island by the

Queensland Government The Queensland Government is the state government of Queensland, Australia, a Parliament, parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Government is formed by the party or coalition that has gained a majority in the Queensland Legislative Assembly, ...

and by 1883 over 200 pearling vessels were based on the island.

Pearl trade

A lucrative pearling industry was founded on the island in 1884, attracting workers from around

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

, including

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, Malaya and

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

, seeking their fortune. The Japanese community was in part indentured divers and boat hands who returned to Japan after a period of service and some longer term residents who were active in boat building and in the ownership of luggers for hire—which was illegal but bypassed by leases through third parties back to other Japanese, a practice called "dummying". Additionally, many south

Pacific Islanders Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subreg ...

worked in the industry, with some originally imported against their will, in a practice known as

blackbirding Blackbirding was the trade in indentured labourers from the Pacific in the 19th and early 20th centuries. It is often described as a form of slavery, despite the British Slavery Abolition Act 1833 banning slavery throughout the British Empire, ...

. While the pearling industry has declined in importance, the mix of cultures is evident to this day. The pearling industry centred on the harvesting of pearl shell, which was used mainly to make shirt buttons. The local pearl oyster is Golden Lip Oyster, ''

Pinctada maxima ''Pinctada maxima'' is a species of pearl oyster, a marine bivalve mollusk in the family Pteriidae, the pearl oysters. There are two different color varieties: the Gold-lipped oyster and the Silver-lipped oyster. These bivalves are the largest ...

''.

Shell trade

Trochus ''Trochus'' is a genus of medium-to large-sized, top-shaped sea snails with an operculum, of the family Trochidae, the top snails.Bouchet, P.; Gofas, S. (2010). Trochus Linnaeus, 1758. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at http:/ ...

shell was also gathered using specialized boats. Most shell was exported as the raw material—to a London-based market. Pearls themselves were rare and a bonus for the owner or crew. The boats used were very graceful two-masted

lugger A lugger is a sailing vessel defined by its rig, using the lug sail on all of its one or more masts. Luggers were widely used as working craft, particularly off the coasts of France, England, Ireland and Scotland. Luggers varied extensively ...

s. In shallow water free diving was used while in deeper water diver's dress, or an abbreviated form of it, with a surface air supply was used. In good times there were three divers to a lugger, a stern diver, one midships, and one diver off the bow. A manual air compressor was used. It looked like a yard-wide cube with two large wheels mounted one on each side. For part of the fleet that operated further from Thursday Island, larger vessels, typically

schooner A schooner ( ) is a type of sailing ship, sailing vessel defined by its Rig (sailing), rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more Mast (sailing), masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than t ...

s were used as mother ships to the luggers. Shell was usually opened on the mother vessels rather than on the luggers, in order to secure any pearls found. The waters of the Straits are murky and visibility was generally very poor. Even though dive depths were not great, except at the Darnley Deep (near Darnley or Erub Island), which was 40 fathoms (240 feet), attacks of the bends were common and deaths frequent.

Telegraph, trade, and cyclone

The Thursday Island Parish of the Roman Catholic Vicariate Apostolic of Cooktown (now the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns) was established in 1884. On 25 August 1887, The Paterson (Cape York) Telegraph Station on the West Coast of Cape York was opened. It connected the Cape York Telegraph Line with Thursday Island, via an undersea cable. In the late-19th and early-20th centuries Thursday Island was a regular stop for vessels trading between the east coast of Australia and

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Mainland Au ...

. A shipping disaster to a vessel in this service occurred in 1890 when struck an uncharted reef in the Strait and sank in five minutes with the loss of over 130 lives. The Anglican Church on Thursday Island built shortly afterwards was named the Quetta All Souls Memorial Cathedral in memory of the event.Foley, J C H, 1982: Timeless Isle. Torres Strait Historical Society, Thursday Island. Today the church is called All Souls and St Bartholomew Church.

Joshua Slocum Joshua Slocum (February 20, 1844 – on or shortly after November 14, 1909) was the first person to sail single-handedly around the world. He was a Nova Scotian-born, naturalised American seaman and adventurer, and a noted writer. In 1900 he w ...

(the first person to sail alone around the world) visited Thursday Island on this voyage in 1897 at the time of

Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee The Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria was officially celebrated on 22 June 1897 to mark the occasion of the Diamond jubilee, 60th anniversary of Queen Victoria's accession on 20 June 1837. Queen Victoria was the first British monarch ever to cel ...

. Slocum's memoir describes the Jubilee celebrations (including a

corroboree A corroboree is a generic word for a meeting of Australian Aboriginal peoples. It may be a sacred ceremony, a festive celebration, or of a warlike character. A word coined by the first British settlers in the Sydney area from a word in the ...

) organised by

Government Resident A resident minister, or resident for short, is a government official required to take up permanent residence in another country. A representative of his government, he officially has diplomatic functions which are often seen as a form of ind ...

John Douglas. Cyclone Mahina, which hit Bathurst Bay, southeast of Thursday Island in 1899, wrecked the pearling fleet sheltering there, with huge losses of vessels and lives.

Fort

The fear of

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

invasion as a result of the deterioration of relations between the Russian Empire and the

British Empire The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...

led to a fort on Battery Point being built in 1892 to protect the island. The fort has not been in operation since 1927, but is today a heritage feature of the island.

Twentieth century

Local pearling declined steadily up to

, partly through competition from a Japanese-based fleet which did not use local resources or personnel. In the 1950s plastic buttons imitating pearl supplanted much of the demand for shell. Before the decline, pearl fishing was taken by the island-based fleet to the

Aru Islands Aru or ARU may refer to: Education * Alpha Rho Upsilon, a defunct fraternity in the United States * Anglia Ruskin University, a university in England * Ardhi University, a Tanzanian public university Places * Aru Islands Regency, a group of i ...

in what was then the

Dutch East Indies The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies (; ), was a Dutch Empire, Dutch colony with territory mostly comprising the modern state of Indonesia, which Proclamation of Indonesian Independence, declared independence on 17 Au ...

. The Thursday Island Customs House opened in 1938 at 2 Victoria Parade (). During

, Thursday Island became the military headquarters for the Torres Strait and was a base for Australian and

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

forces. January 1942 saw the evacuation of civilians from the island. Residents of Japanese origin or descent were interned. The residents did not return until after the end of the war and many ethnic Japanese were forcibly repatriated. The island was spared from bombing in World War II, due, it was thought, to it being the burial place of many Japanese pearl shell divers, or possibly the Japanese thinking there were still Japanese residents on the island. However, neighbouring Horn Island was extensively bombed. There was an airbase there, used by the

Allies An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not an explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are calle ...

to attack parts of

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...

. At the end of the war, the island tradition of a no-footwear policy was reinstated out of respect for the ancient spirits believed to reside on the island. After the war, an airline service was set up by Ansett Airlines from

Cairns Cairns (; ) is a city in the Cairns Region, Queensland, Australia, on the tropical north east coast of Far North Queensland. In the , Cairns had a population of 153,181 people. The city was founded in 1876 and named after William Cairns, Sir W ...

to TI twice a week, using

de Havilland Dragon Rapide The de Havilland DH.89 Dragon Rapide is a 1930s short-haul biplane airliner developed and produced by British aircraft company de Havilland. Capable of accommodating 6–8 passengers, it proved an economical and durable craft, despite its outd ...

s and later DC3s. Passengers disembarked on Horn Island and caught a ferry-boat over to TI, as they still do. The island was also served by a ship, the ''Elsana'', which made the journey once a month. For a short period after the war Okinawan divers were used on the luggers but this was not a great success. In the 1950s, the

CSIRO The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an Australian Government agency that is responsible for scientific research and its commercial and industrial applications. CSIRO works with leading organisations arou ...

attempted to establish

cultured pearl Cultured pearls are pearls which are formed within a cultured pearl sac with human intervention in the interior of productive living molluscs in a variety of conditions depending upon the mollusc and the goals. Having the same material as natur ...

farms, but many were devastated by disease in the 1970s. The trigger is considered by some to be the use of

dispersant A dispersant or a dispersing agent is a substance, typically a surfactant, that is added to a suspension of solid or liquid particles in a liquid (such as a colloid or emulsion) to improve the separation of the particles and to prevent their sett ...

s on the 1970 oil spill from the tanker ''Oceanic Grandeur''. This industry still exists around the island today. In the 1970s, there was also an attempt to farm green turtles. The Melanesian background of the Thursday Islanders became an issue in the 1970s, when

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...

sought to include some of the Torres Strait Islands within its borders. The Torres Strait Islanders insisted that they were Australians, however, and after considerable diplomatic discussion and political disputation between the Queensland and the Federal Governments, all of the Torres Strait islands, including Thursday Island, remained part of Australia. From 1900 to 1996 the Quetta Memorial Church on the island was the cathedral church of the large

Diocese of Carpentaria The Anglican Diocese of Carpentaria was an Anglican diocese in northern Australia from 1900 to 1996. It included most of northern Queensland, the islands of the Torres Strait and, until 1968, all of the Northern Territory. The see was based at ...

which included North Queensland, the Islands of the Torres Strait and, to 1968, Northern Territory.

Demographics

In the , the locality of Thursday Island had a population of 2,805 people. In the , the locality of Thursday Island had a population of 2,938 people. In the , the locality of Thursday Island had a population of 2,610 people.

Heritage listings

Thursday-island-our-lady-of-the-sacred-heart-church

Thursday Island has a number of

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and human-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In ma ...

sites, including: * Green Hill Fort, Chester Street * Quetta Memorial Precinct, Douglas Street * Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Church, 120 Douglas Street * Thursday Island Cemetery (incorporating the Japanese Cemetery and the Grave of the Hon. John Douglas), Summers Street * Thursday Island Customs House, 2 Victoria Parade The Gab Titui Cultural Centre (2004) on Thursday Island showcases both heritage and contemporary Islander artworks.

Economy

The Island is one of the two bases for the Torres Straits Pilots, a cooperative owned and run by qualified Master Mariners who pilot ships through the Straits and down to Cairns. This is a necessary service because navigation through the area is tricky due to the extensive reef systems. The island has the area hospital and courts, is the regional centre for higher education, a centre for some research organisations and is the administrative base for the local, state and federal governments. Banking and phones are available. Thursday Island is only in part self-sufficient for water, some being piped from the adjacent island. It has two wind turbines which generate some of its electricity requirement. The economy of the island is dependent on its role as an administrative centre and is supported by pearling and fishing, as well as a fast-developing tourism industry, with perhaps the most famous tourists being novelist

Somerset Maugham William Somerset Maugham ( ; 25 January 1874 – 16 December 1965) was an English writer, known for his plays, novels and short stories. Born in Paris, where he spent his first ten years, Maugham was schooled in England and went to a German un ...

and

Banjo Paterson Andrew Barton "Banjo" Paterson, (17 February 18645 February 1941) was an Australian bush poet, journalist and author, widely considered one of the greatest writers of Australia's colonial period. Born in rural New South Wales, Paterson worke ...

, and the most numerous being day-trippers from the cruise ships that call into the island each year.

Climate

Climate data for Thursday Island was sourced from Horn Island, which is 8.7 km ENE of Thursday Island. Thursday Island has a

tropical savanna climate Tropical savanna climate or tropical wet and dry climate is a tropical climate sub-type that corresponds to the Köppen climate classification categories ''Aw'' (for a dry "winter") and ''As'' (for a dry "summer"). The driest month has less than ...

( Köppen: Aw), with a

wet season The wet season (sometimes called the rainy season or monsoon season) is the time of year when most of a region's average annual rainfall occurs. Generally, the season lasts at least one month. The term ''green season'' is also sometimes used a ...

from December to April and a

dry season The dry season is a yearly period of low rainfall, especially in the tropics. The weather in the tropics is dominated by the tropical rain belt, which moves from the northern to the southern tropics and back over the course of the year. The t ...

from May to November. Temperatures remain hot year-round, with average maxima ranging from in July to in November. Average annual rainfall is , with a late summer maximum. Extreme temperatures have ranged from on 8 December 2002 to on 8 September 2019.

Language

Torres Strait Creole Torres Strait Creole (), also known as Torres Strait Pidgin, Brokan/Broken, Cape York Creole, Lockhart Creole, Kriol, Papuan, Broken English, Blaikman, Big Thap, Pizin, and Ailan Tok, is an English-based creole language (a variety of Pidgin ...

is the dominant language spoken on Thursday Island by the Islanders, followed by

, commonly called Mabuiag (pronounced Mobyag) by many, although English is also spoken. The indigenous language is Kaiwaligau Ya, another dialect of Kalaw Lagaw Ya, otherwise known as Kowrareg, (or more correctly Kauraraigau Ya, the name used by the people in the mid to late 1800s).

Amenities

Thursday Island has number of services open to the community, including a sporting complex, gym, public library as well as ANZAC park and Ken Brown Oval. There is a community pharmacy, general store, butcher, bank and many other essential services. The

operates Ngulaig Meta Municipal

public library A public library is a library, most often a lending library, that is accessible by the general public and is usually funded from public sources, such as taxes. It is operated by librarians and library paraprofessionals, who are also Civil servic ...

at 121 Douglas Street. The current library facility opened in 2015. Sacred Heart Catholic Church is in Douglas Street. It is within the Thursday Island Parish of the

Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns The Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns is located in the state of Queensland, Australia. It is a suffragan diocese of the Archdiocese of Brisbane. The diocese was erected as a vicariate apostolic in 1877 and was elevated to a diocese in 1941. It ...

Education

Tagai State College is a government primary and secondary (Early Childhood to Year 12) school for boys and girls that operates 17 campuses throughout the Torres Strait, including two on Thursday Island. The Thursday Island primary school campus (Early Childhood to Year 6) is at 31 Hargrave Street (). The Thursday Island secondary school campus (7-12) is at 21 Aplin Road (). In 2017, the school across all locations had a total enrolment of 1,554 students with 168 teachers (165 full-time equivalent) and 198 non-teaching staff (142 full-time equivalent). The school includes a

special education Special education (also known as special-needs education, aided education, alternative provision, exceptional student education, special ed., SDC, and SPED) is the practice of educating students in a way that accommodates their individual di ...

program at Summers Street (). Our Lady of the Sacred Heart School is a Catholic primary (Prep–6) school for boys and girls at Normanby Street (). In 2017, the school had an enrolment of 103 students with 12 teachers (9 full-time equivalent) and 13 non-teaching staff (9 full-time equivalent). The Torres Strait Campus of the Tropical North Queensland

TAFE Technical and further education or simply TAFE () is the common name in Australia for vocational education, as a subset of tertiary education. TAFE institutions provide a wide range of predominantly vocational courses. Colloquially also known ...

Institute is located on the island next to the Tagai State College.

Popular Culture

The island was the location of the film '' King of the Coral Sea'' (1954).

Notable residents

Notable residents of Thursday Island include: * Henry Gibson "Seaman" Dan, award-winning Torres Strait Islander musician. * John Douglas,

Premier of Queensland The premier of Queensland is the head of government in the Australian state of Queensland. By convention the premier is the leader of the party with a parliamentary majority in the Legislative Assembly of Queensland. The premier is appointed ...

(1877–79) and Government Resident on Thursday Island (1885-1904). * Matthew Elliott, Australian professional rugby league football coach and former player * Tiarna Ernst, professional

AFLW AFL Women's (AFLW) is Australia's national semi-professional Australian rules football in Australia, Australian rules football competition for women's Australian rules football, female players. The 2017 AFL Women's season, first season of the l ...

and Western Bulldogs Premiership Player. * Tommy Fujii,

mother-of-pearl Nacre ( , ), also known as mother-of-pearl, is an organicinorganic composite material produced by some molluscs as an inner shell layer. It is also the material of which pearls are composed. It is strong, resilient, and iridescent. Nacre is ...

shell diver as a boy, later businessman * Scott Harding,

AFL AFL may refer to: Education * Angel Foundation for Learning, a Canadian Roman Catholic charity * Ankara Science High School, a high school in Ankara, Turkey, natively referred to as ''Ankara Fen Liesi'' * Assessment for learning Military * ...

player and American FootballerMedia releases for AFL Cape York Kickstart Pacific Toyota Crusaders
/ref> * Elma Gada Kris, dancer, choreographer, actor, NAIDOC award winner (2019) artist of the year. * The

Mills Sisters __NOTOC__ The Mills Sisters, formerly known as the Singing Grandmas, were a group of three sisters from Torres Strait Islands, Rita Mills and twins Cessa and Ina. Early life Ina and Cessa, who were twins, were born in 1927, and Rita in 1934, ...

, a group of three musical sisters, Rita and twins Cessa and Ina, who performed all over the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is bounded by the cont ...

and in Europe between the 1950 and late 1990s. * Danny Morseu, professional basketball player * Bernard Namok, designer of the Torres Strait Islander flag. * Peter Ware, WAFL premiership winning footballer with

Swan Districts The Swan Districts Football Club, nicknamed the Swans, is an Australian rules football club playing in the West Australian Football League (WAFL) and WAFL Women's (WAFLW). The club is based at Bassendean Oval, in Bassendean, an eastern suburb ...

and

AFL Queensland AFL Queensland Limited (AFLQ) is the governing body of Australian rules football in Queensland formed in 2000 and based at Leyshon Park in the Brisbane suburb of Yeronga. AFL Queensland has over 216,000 participants (including Northern River ...

Hall of Famer. * Jesse Williams, born on Thursday Island in 1990, the first

indigenous Australian Indigenous Australians are people with familial heritage from, or recognised membership of, the various ethnic groups living within the territory of contemporary Australia prior to History of Australia (1788–1850), British colonisation. The ...

to receive a scholarship to play

American football American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular American football field, field with goalposts at e ...

for the

Alabama Crimson Tide The Alabama Crimson Tide refers to the college athletics in the United States, intercollegiate athletic varsity teams that represent the University of Alabama, located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Tuscaloosa. The Crimson Tide teams compete in the Na ...

. *

Ethel May Eliza Zahel Ethel May Eliza Zahel (3 February 1877 – 9 April 1951) was an Australian public servant and schoolteacher who was born in Mackay, Queensland, Australia. On 6 November 1895 she married Mark Charles Zahel, solicitor, at her parents' home in M ...

(1877–1951), teacher and public servant.

References

External links

*
Glover's 1879 watercolour of Thursday Island
*
Town map of Thursday Island, 1982

Thursday Island and North Queensland photograph album

State Library of Queensland State Library of Queensland (State Library) is the state public reference and research library of Queensland, Australia, operated by the Government of Queensland, state government. The Library is governed by the Library Board of Queensland, whi ...

. Digitised photograph album, with photos dated between 1800 and 1900
Brian Cassey Life in the Torres Strait photographs

{{Authority control Torres Strait Islands Towns in Queensland Torres Strait Islands communities Islands of Far North Queensland Aboriginal communities in Queensland Queensland in World War II Populated places in Far North Queensland Shire of Torres Localities in Queensland