Arnie

Arnie Duffield recalls the halcyon years of the famous pearling boats, the luggers of Torres Strait, in Northern-most Australia. At age ten he journeyed from his home in Brisbane, with his parents and elder brother Jim, to the remote township on Thursday Island - Waiben in traditional language of the region. In those Depression years, his father Ernest had been offered a new, high paying job as principal marine engineer with a pearling company. With his two sons, Ernest later built his own pearling fleet of eight boats, doing most of the work themselves. Arnie remained in the 'straits' for 70 years. In war-time he worked preparing defences against the inevitable attacks on the islands. Evacuated to Brisbane he was apprenticed to an engineering company, repairing allied warships, becoming, he said, a "proficient ship engineer". He prospered during boom periods in the diving industry, and in cultivation of pearls, then suffered through down-turns. His sea adventures were complemented by long land journeys across Australia's "top end". His later occupations were connected with tourism, offering sustainable relations with both sea and the bush. Indefatigable, Arnie would become a leading personality in the remote North, a humourist and yarn spinner. He married, raised a family, and, after the last working luggers had put to sea, moved into late retirement at Buderim in South-east Queensland. He collaborated writing this book with a younger cousin, Lee Duffield, a long-time journalist with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Lee Duffield had been the first news editor on the ABC's youth network Triple-Jay, and its European Correspondent at the fall of the Berlin Wall. He later taught Journalism at the Queensland University of Technology, writing articles and books across many subjects, including communications issues in the South Pacific islands - and would also spend much time on boats.