Gunaikurnai man who spent time living at Lake Tyers reserve. According to Phillip Pepper Johnson disliked being observed by the non-Indigenous tourists who would come and visit Lake Tyers, so ran away from Lake Tyers. John Bulmer reported Johnson missing and the police were called to bring him back. Tourists travelled to reserves such as Lake Tyers and Coranderrk, signing visitors' books and buying baskets, boomerangs and other items.
See: Phillip Pepper in collaboration with Tess De Araugo, The Kurnai of Gippsland: What Did Happen to the Aborigines of Victoria?, vol. 1, Hyland House Publishing Pty Ltd, South Yarra, 1985, p. 205
Nikita Vanderbyl 2017, 'The happiest time of my life...': Emotive visitor books and early mission tourism to Victoria's Aboriginal reserves', Aboriginal History, vol. 41, pp. 95-120.
Peter Carolane 2008, ‘Parallel fantasies: Tourism and Aboriginal mission at Lake
Tyers in the Late Nineteenth Century’, in Evangelists of Empire? Missionaries
in Colonial History, Amanda Barry, Joanna Cruickshank, Andrew Brown-May
and Patricia Grimshaw (eds), University of Melbourne eScholarship Research
Centre, Melbourne: 161–72
Tommy Johnson
Found in Transcriptions
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Information from John Bulmer, n.d.Pages 3Registration Number XM98Author Bulmer, Reverend JohnPhysical Description Notes and a table, handwritten, undated. One large sheet folded in half with an additional smaller sheet, six pages. Notes are possibly a letter. Fragile condition, insect damage upper edging.