Guru Ken Colbung
Kenneth Desmond 'Ken' Colbung was born on 2 September 1931 and belonged to the Bibbulman people in the South West region. Also known by his bush name Nundjan Djiridjarkan, Ken referred to himself as a 'Desert Aboriginal'. He enlisted in the Australian Army in 1950 when he was 19. There he became a successful middleweight boxing champion and a good rugby player.
Ken became Convener of Aboriginal Opinions for the Aboriginal Education Council and continued to advocate for civil rights, involving himself in the Australian Black Power movement. As a respected Noongar Elder of the Bibulmun people, he quickly became a First Nations leader in Western Australia. He was instrumental in developing the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1972, that governed the protection of Indigenous Heritage sites of significance in Western Australia and was on many committees for progress of Indigenous rights later in life.
In recognition of his efforts, he became an Honorary Fellow of the Western Australian Museum in 1976. He became a Member of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1980, the same year he became a Justice of the Peace (JP), and a Member of the Order of Australia (OAM) in 1982. In 1984, Ken was elected Council member and became first Indigenous chairman of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS).
Alongside political activism, Ken spent over 20 years searching for his ancestor's remains, the Noongar leader and resistance fighter Yagan. Having been held in a British museum for some years and then buried in a nearby cemetery, the severed head of Yagan was finally repatriated by Ken in 1997 and reburied in the Swan Valley in 2010.
Ken was a foundation member of the Western Australian Museum Aboriginal Advisory Committee, serving on the committee for over 30 years. In 2010, he was appointed as a Fellow of the Western Australian Museum, acknowledging his commitment to Aboriginal heritage values.
During his visit to India in 1997, he met Mr. Hirasingh Markam, a Gond tribal from Bilaspur in Madhya Pradesh and an MLA and head of the Gondwana Parishad. Ken believed that their people shared a common ancestry as they were trying to know each other better during Ken Colbung's exhibition of aboriginal artifacts in Bhopal. Markam talked about tribal art and Colbung wanted to teach Gonds how to throw a Boomerang. Vivek Montrose became his only Indian disciple whom he taught all about the tribal life and tools of the aborigines. To realize of his Guru’s dream of bringing the Boomerang back to life in India, Vivek Montrose has dedicated his life to the aim.