A former Darwin resident , the late Erica McKenna , a New Zealander , was sent to Nauru in 1950 to work as a secretary in the office of the British Phosphate Commission.
It was a real adventure for her as she was 21 , and Nauru , reached by ship , was regarded as being the middle of nowhere. Photographs from her album were run in this blog on November 8, 2011 .They provided an insight into island life at the time when it was coming under increasing international scrutiny.
Snaps she took included a Nauruan wedding , a group of island women posing in national dress , fishing , mining, phosphate being loaded onto a vessel via a cantilever crane, heavy seas, the main office building and living quarters.
* Erica is shown, top left , wearing a hat she designed out of cigarette tins for a party . At the time there was a quarantine station , right, on the island where Chinese workers were processed and a United Nations study team ,above , arrived from the Marshall Islands and spent five days there discussing future plans for the Nauruans .
Most of the phosphate commission office staff were from Melbourne and the photographs displayed below show a huge groper caught in the boat harbour , sailfish and phosphate being mined and loaded onto a truck .
Most of the phosphate commission office staff were from Melbourne and the photographs displayed below show a huge groper caught in the boat harbour , sailfish and phosphate being mined and loaded onto a truck .
Nauru ,23 square kilometres , was settled by Micronesians and Polynesians, annexed by Germany and made into a League of Nations mandated territory after WW1, administered by Australia, New Zealand and the UK. Occupied by the Japanese , the US Army Air Force bombed the island and runway in 1943. Independent in 1968, it became a tax haven, went broke and was forced to sell its one jet and properties in Australia .
Mrs McKenna , 95, died March 19 in a Brisbane nursing home and it is understood she will be cremated , her ashes brought to Darwin to be placed with those of her husband , Bob McKenna , a well- known electrician , who is believed to have been involved in the asbestos mining at Wittenoom , Western Australia , later suffering cancer.
