Broome (part 2) - Pearling

The past few days have been about pearling. While the Labs were guests of the local vet/boarding kennel, I jumped on a motorised tram for a short tour of Broome's historic buildings and precincts, focussing strongly on the pearling industry. Then in the afternoon, I boarded a former pearl lugger named Willie to cruise from Gantheaume Point and along the length of Cable Beach while the sun set over the Indian Ocean. It was a magical afternoon and evening on the water and definitely one of the best experiences we've had on our travels so far.

Much of Broome's history is built around pearling. When William Dampier wrote about his exploration of the West Australian coast aboard the HMS Roebuck in 1697, he described seeing Aboriginal people wearing large pearl shells as body adornments.But it wasn't until the 1860s that Europeans realised that the shell beds off Eighty Mile Beach were rich with pearl shells. By 1881 pearl luggers equipped with brass diving suits began arriving in the area. The town of Broome was gazetted in 1883 and named after Frederick Napier Broome, who was the Governor of Western Australia at the time. He was apparently horrified that his name was given to a scruffy shanty town full of pearling camps, bars and brothels.

The early pearlers quickly realised that the local Aboriginal people were excellent pearl divers. In particular pregnant women were used to dive for pearls because they could hold their breath for a long time. For a while the early settlers and the local Aboriginal people worked together well. Locals were given medicine, food and clothing in return for diving for pearl shells. But as word spread about the burgeoning pearling industry, unscrupulous European settlers began holding the Yawuru people captive and forcing them to dive for pearl shell. This practice was called "Black-birding", and prompted the government to regulate the industry.

By 1914 Broome was supplying 80 percent of the world's pearl shell. There were around 400 pearl "luggers" - purpose built wooden boats - and 3500 people involved in the industry. Under the WA Pearling Act of 1913, only British citizens were allowed to own pearl luggers and this resulted in a rigid class system in the town, with Japanese workers doing the diving; Malays working as deckhands and crew; and Chinese working as cooks and shopkeepers. Eventually the majority of people working on luggers were Japanese, working as indentured labour.

The White Australia Policy adopted early in the twentieth century led to the government recruiting twelve British navy divers to work as pearl divers. But pearl diving was dangerous work and most of them perished, resulting in Broome receiving an exemption to the policy to allow the Japanese divers to continue their work.

Production all but ceased during both World Wars, and when Japan entered WWII most of the Japanese pearl divers were interned in prisoner of war camps. In the 1950s the development of plastic buttons meant that the demand for mother of pearl dropped dramatically. This led to the decline of the pearling industry until Kokichi Mikimoto became the first person to successfully culture a pearl and the industry transitioned to farming cultured pearls.

The pearl lugger Willie was built in 1984 and is now used as a cruise vessel, sailing people like me around Broome in the winter months, and around Fremantle in the summer. It was a wonderful cruise and we were treated to beautifully calm waters, blue skies and while the sun was setting on one side of the boat, the full moon was rising on the other. Hard to decide which photos to share. I've probably gone a bit over the top. Enjoy.