Record ID:
58772394 (Libraries Australia Authorities)
Authority type:
  • Name.
Description conventions:
  • rda
LC number:
  • nr 89015466
Heading:
Birth:
  • 18980702
  • Arltunga (N.T.)
Death:
  • 19900614
  • Alice Springs (N.T.)
Associated with:
  • Simpson Desert Central Australia Northern Territory
Occupations:
  • Australian bushmen
Used for:
  • Purula, Walter, 1898-1990
  • Perrurle, Walter, 1898-1990
  • Smith, Walter, 1893-1990
Notes:
  • Kimber, R.G. Man from Arltunga, 1986: t.p. (Walter Smith) p. iv (b. 7-2-1893)
  • Australian Dictionary of Biography (online) 9 October 2019: Smith, Walter (1898-1990). Walter Smith (1898-1990), cameleer, prospector and bushman, was born probably on 2 July 1898 at Arltunga, Northern Territory, eldest child of eleven children of William Smith, a goldminer of Welsh descent, and his wife Topsy White, of Arabana-European descent. He was also known as Walter Purula (Perrurle) and Wati Yuritja (Man of the Water Dreaming). he had no formal education. He attended the last great Simpson Desert Aboriginal gathering, before the 1914-15 drought and the influenza epidemic. His family moved to Alice Springs and he worked as a camel driver and bushman, and he was initiated at a Pitjantjatjara ceremony. He worked as a fossil and meteorite collector in the Simpson Desert for several museums. He understood over thirty desert languages and dialects and learned the traditional law, customs and songs of many groups. He was the last of the Red Centre’s cameleers, retaining working animals into the 1970s, mainly for prospecting expeditions. He died on 14 June 1990 at Alice Springs.) http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/smith-walter-15740/text26928
Local system number:
  • (AU-CaAIA)XX30941
Cataloguing source:
  • AIAS eng rda NjP VJTL
Authentication code:
  • anuc