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https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/aug/28/the-little-known-political-confidant-who-helped-steer-our-nations-leaders-is-finally-remembered>
"During the decades I lived in and wrote about Canberra, perhaps the most
intriguing person I came across was Gamilaroi and Darug man Alfred – “Alf” –
Stafford.
When I say I “came across” Alf, I mean that I encountered him archivally,
thanks to his granddaughter, Michelle Flynn, and the Australian Institute of
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, which gave me access in 2015 to
his extensive collection of correspondence, photographs, voice recordings and
ephemera.
When I was first asked if I wanted to write about a little-known Aboriginal man
who’d been a personal driver for 11 Australian prime ministers, opened for a
cricket team that listed Donald Bradman further down the batting order and who
became a lifelong confidant to our longest-serving PM, Robert Menzies, I
couldn’t quite believe such a person had existed.
But Alf Stafford had. And he was a one-off. Larger than life. But he was so
discreet and so modest that history – and its first drafters, journalists –
seemed to overlook him when gazing at the penultimate office of Australian
power.
Appropriately, on 5 September, a park at Canberra’s Kingston foreshore will be
formally named in Stafford’s honour. This results from a significant effort by
Alf’s granddaughter and others to have his remarkable – though always discreet
and humble – contribution to Australian public and political life more widely
recognised."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
