27 Aug Sister Kate’s Home

Sister Kate’s Home Kids Aboriginal Corporation (SKHKAC) has just taken ownership of a bush block that sits opposite the former Sister Kate’s Children’s Home as a new place of healing and remembrance for Stolen Generations survivors, their families, and the wider community.

The bush block played a huge role in the young lives of Sister Kate’s Homees, who used the bush block to escape the harsh realities of life at the Children’s Home to reconnect with Country, family, and the natural world. The bush block was a place of safety for children who were removed from their families at a young age as part of Australia’s assimilation policies.

The 2.7ha bush block in Queens Park (Perth) is being divested to SKHKAC by the Indigenous Land and Sea Corporation (ILSC), along with a grant from Lotterywest that will see the site developed into a healing place for Stolen Generations survivors and the broader community to come together on Country.

The first children taken to Sister Kate’s in 1934 were from the Moore River Native Settlement at the direction of A.O. Neville, Chief Protector of Aborigines in Western Australia.

SKHKAC CEO Tjalaminu “Tj” Mia said getting the bush block is an opportunity to heal from the trauma that impacted Sister Kate’s Homees taken from their families and placed at the Sister Kate’s Children’s Home from 1934-1975.

“When the Government’s Native Welfare Department placed us in the Home and trained us as young domestic servants this oppressed because it was really about assimilating us into servitude, which was the way of the world for our parents and grandparents over the generations. It was to breed out the white and assimilate us into a white world devoid of any of our Aboriginal identity and cultural heritage,” Tj said.

“When we walk to the bush block and share our Stories, people want to know, they want to understand what happened to us.

“It means everything to us, to get hold of that land and build a place of healing, but it goes deeper than that for us Home kids. It was a place from our childhood that brought us serenity, it brought us connection to Country, it brought us connection to the natural world.”

Wildflowers on the bush block have been brought back to life by the Homees of Sister Kate’s after years of neglect.

“We were just kids. We couldn’t articulate it then, but that’s where we had freedom on that bush block. We could run free in the wildflowers,” Tj said.

“The symbolism of the wildflower heals us. I used to lay in the wildflowers as a kid, I am the living memory of the importance of that bush block.

You can view the concept plan for the place of healing here.

You can also read about the history of Sister Kate’s Home here.

Sister Kate’s Home Kids Aboriginal Corporation is a not-for-profit, charitable status Stolen Generations organisation, that deliver a wide range of cultural healing programs to heal, empower and develop leadership in Sister Kate’s Home Kids and their families, other Stolen Generations groups, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families and their children, and share cultural perspectives with the wider community.