Alec Donald Ross OAM (6 April 1936 – 30 March 2017) was an Australian tour guide, member of the

stolen generation The Stolen Generations (also known as Stolen Children) were the children of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent who were removed from their families by the Australian federal and state government agencies and church miss ...

and custodian of the story of the Alice Springs Telegraph Station in the Northern Territory of

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Early life

Ross was born on 6 April 1936 at Mosquito Creek near

Barrow Creek Barrow Creek is a very small town, with a current population of 11, in the southern Northern Territory of Australia. It is located on the Stuart Highway, about 280 km north of Alice Springs, about halfway from there to Tennant Creek. The m ...

at Neutral Junction Station the son of the Scottish cattle station owner. Ross is the great-grandson of explorer John Ross, who came to Central Australia as part of the surveying teams for the Overland Telegraph Line, its most famous repeater station, the place where his great-grandson Alec later worked for a large part of his life. He fell seriously ill at the age of three and was taken from his mother to The Bungalow, an institution for part-Aboriginal children based near the telegraph station in

Alice Springs Alice Springs ( aer, Mparntwe) is the third-largest town in the Northern Territory of Australia. Known as Stuart until 31 August 1933, the name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William Whitfield Mills after Alice, Lady Todd (''née'' Al ...

. He lived there for most of his childhood, attending school. Ross was moved to Croker Island in 1941. When the Japanese started bombing northern Australia in 1942, he and the other children, walked from Barklay Bay on the Arnhem Land coast right to Pine Creek through the bush. From there he was transferred to Alice Springs where he took the train to Adelaide and on to Sydney. He was then returned to Croker Island after the war, but when he was old enough returned to Sydney. He was eventually reunited with his mother, just two years before she died. Of the meeting he said:

''The truth is that I only felt sad for my mother. There was no bond of any type there because we just didn't know each other.''

Working life

Ross married in 1994, and although separated, remained good friends with his wife. Ross worked as a tour guide at the Alice Springs Telegraph Station. He retired in 2004 but returned for special events. He then worked as a house parent at Wangkana Kari Aboriginal Hostel in Tennant Creek.

Legacy

Ross was awarded an Order of Australia in 2013. He is the subject of a book, ''Alec, A Living History of the Alice Springs Telegraph Station'' by Shirley Brown. Ross died on 30 March 2017 and is buried at the Alice Springs Garden Cemetery.

References

External links

Video: Alec Ross shares his memories of the Alice Springs Telegraph Station
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ross, Alec 2017 deaths 1936 births Recipients of the Medal of the Order of Australia People from the Northern Territory Members of the Stolen Generations Tour guides