![\"John](\"http:\/\/www.jcucollections.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Gaggin.jpg\")
<\/a>Photo sent by John Gaggin to his friend J.A. Boyd, inscribed \u201cTo my old chum with seasons compliments and to wish him & his a jolly Christmas and pleasant New Year. John Gaggin Dec 1918\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n
Author:<\/strong> Rosita Henry<\/p>\n Collector:<\/strong>\u00a0John Gaggin<\/p>\n Born:<\/strong>\u00a0Ballycotton, Ireland, circa 1841<\/p>\n Died: <\/strong>Melbourne, Victoria, 8 June 1920, aged 79<\/p>\n Active :\u00a0<\/strong>John Gaggin began collecting Aboriginal artefacts in the Wet Tropics region during the 1880s. He continued to collect in the region into the early twentieth century.<\/p>\n Background biography: \u00a0<\/strong>John Gaggin came to North Queensland on 26 August 1883, having been persuaded by his friend, John Archibald Boyd (Archie) to join him at Ripple Creek Plantation near Ingham. The two had met in Fiji in 1869 where they had become fast friends.<\/p>\n After Gaggin joined Boyd, he initially worked as the storemaster at Ripple Creek Plantation, which Boyd managed for his brother, Mitchell Boyd. \u00a0According to J.A. Boyd\u2019s diaries, Gaggin spent much time with him exploring the countryside and generally enjoying life, hunting and fishing.<\/p>\n Gaggin accompanied Boyd to Java, Indonesia, in 1890 to search for labour for the plantation. The two men maintained a lifelong friendship. Gaggin was a witness at Boyd\u2019s wedding to Jeanie in 1894 and even dedicated his book, Among the Man-eaters<\/em> (1900), to Boyd, \u2018old chum and comrade<\/em>\u2019.<\/p>\n Although the nature and extent of Gaggin\u2019s collecting practices are unclear, there is evidence that he was interested in a least one type of artefact, the carved and painted anthropomorphic firemaker from the North Queensland rainforest region. \u00a0Gaggin visited A.J. North, of the Australian Museum, in 1896 and gave him one of these objects as a gift. In a letter dated 8th<\/sup> February 1896, North wrote to J.A. Boyd of Gaggin\u2019s visit that\u00a0 \u201cHe<\/em> gave me one of his Tikowinnas, a charm which now descends from the handle of the dilly-bag you gave Mrs North when passing through to England<\/em>\u201d.<\/p>\n This particular artefact is probably one and the same as the artefact labelled E11411, in the Australian Museum, Sydney. The firemaker (E11411) which is described as a tikovina<\/em> was offered to the Museum by a Dr J. Sanders in exchange for two boomerangs on 5 March 1903. Dr Sanders\u2019 address at the time was c\/- A.J. North.<\/p>\n John Gaggin provided information to the Curator of the Australian Museum, R. Etheridge, on this particular artefact (Letter from R. Etheridge to J.A. Boyd, 4 March 1903).\u00a0 Gaggin also was the informant who told the anthropologist A.W. Howitt about the narrative beliefs and practices of Aboriginal people of the Herbert River region associated with this uniquely shaped firemaking tool. From his account it is clear that these objects had symbolic significance for people of the Herbert River that went well beyond their utilitarian value (Howitt 1904: 498-99).<\/p>\n A photograph of one such\u00a0firemakers given to Howitt by Gaggin appears in Howitt (1904: 499). this particular firemaker is now held in the Victoria Museum, Melbourne (Registration no. X983)<\/p>\n