Margaret Tucker

Margaret Lilardia Tucker (18 March 1904—23 August 1996)^[1] was an Indigenous Australian activist and writer.

Margaret Tucker was born at Warrangesda Mission to William Clements, a Wiradjuri man and Teresa Clements, née Middleton, a Yulupna women.^[2] She spent her childhood at Cummeragunja Mission until at the age of 13 she was forcibly removed to the Cootamundra Girls' Home where she was badly treated.^[3] After training at Cootamundra in 1919 she was sent out at work with a white family where she was abused. The Aborigines Protection Board intervened and she was given another placement from which she ran away. In 1925 the Board release her and she moved to Melbourne.^[4]

In the 1930s Tucker began campaigning for Indigenous rights with William Cooper, Bill Onus and Douglas Nicholls and in 1932 was one of the founding members of the Australian Aborigines' League.^[2] During this time she married and gave birth to a daughter.^[3] At first influenced by the Communist Party of Australia, she gravitated later towards the conservative Moral Re-Armament movement.^[4] In the 1960s she founded the United Council of Aboriginal and Islander Women and in 1964 was the first Indigenous appointee to the Victorian Aborigines Welfare Board.

Tucker was award an Order of the British Empire in 1968, recognising her service to her community. Her 1977 autobiography If Everyone Cared was one of the first books to bring to light the mistreatment of her people.

References

1. ^ "Patron of VACCA – Margaret Elizabeth Tucker, MBE". Victorian Aboriginal Child Care Agency. http://www.vacca.org/resources-information/patrons. Retrieved 10 May 2010. 
2. ^ ^{a b} Land, Clare (4 May 2009). "Tucker, Margaret Elizabeth (1904 - 1996)". The Australian Women’s Register. Australian Women's Archives Project. http://www.womenaustralia.info/biogs/IMP0093b.htm. Retrieved 9 May 2010. 
3. ^ ^{a b} Wilde, William H.; Hooton, Joy and Andrews, Barry (1994). The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature. Melbourne: Oxford University Press. pp. 760–61. ISBN 019553381X. 
4. ^ ^{a b} Jones, Jennifer (October 2001), "The Black Communist: The Contested Memory of Margaret Tucker", Hecate 26: 135–145, ISSN 0311-4198, http://www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-28720668_ITM 

External links

• As Long as She Got Her Voice article on editing If Everyone Cared

Persondata
Name	Tucker, Margaret
Alternative names
Short description	Indigenous Australian activist and writer
Date of birth	18 March 1904
Place of birth	New South Wales, Australia
Date of death	23 August 1996
Place of death