Margaret Hills

DOB: c.1924 -
BORN: Old Doomadgee
LANGUAGE GROUP: Gangalidda/ Lardil
COMMUNITY: Gunana, Mornington Island, QLD

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Margaret Hills is what is known as a historical person on Mornington Island. She was removed from her family because of harsh living conditions in the mainland Gulf communities and relocated to the mission on Mornington Island. Here she was placed in the dormitory and grew up working for the missionaries in the garden and doing general household chores.

As a young woman, she married a Lardil man called Alec Hills, who was an important lawman and keeper of cultural knowledge.  She learnt the laws and customs of the Lardil people and became a master weaver of grass and hair and learnt to make grass dilly bags and spin hair to make the iconic Mornington Island dance hat worn by Lardil men for dance and ceremony. 

She has taught her daughter, nephews and grandsons how to spin grass and hair and how to make the dance hats. Quite often the marking of the hats is a collaborative process of the younger ones collecting the bark and then Maragaret spinning and supervising the hats completion and decoration.