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LOUISA REBGETZ, PRESENTER: 30 years ago the Pintubi people in Central Australia made history by returning to their traditional land - establishing the community of Kintore. The Pintubi were one of the last Aboriginal groups to have contact with white Australians. They had been settled in Papunya but in the early 1980s the Pintubi decided to return home. At Kintore the community recently celebrated its 30th birthday and Tom Nightingale went along to the celebrations.
TOM NIGHTINGALE, REPORTER: At Kintore in the Western Desert, about 600 kilometres from Alice Springs, a major celebration is about to start. It's 30 years since the Pintubi people returned to their traditional land.
LINDSAY CORBY, ELDER: This is settle down country. That's why we come here to stay and teach our children our dreamtime story. When they grow up they can look back to follow the footsteps of grandfathers and grandmothers.
PROF. FRED MYERS, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY ANTHROPOLOGIST: For many other Aboriginal people in Australia this is a beacon of something they want, where Aboriginal people have been able to maintain their culture and language.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: In the 1950s and 60s the Pintubi were among the last Aboriginal Australians to encounter white people. They were moved to government settlements like Papunya, hundreds of kilometres closer to Alice Springs.
PROF. FRED MYERS: The Pintubi were a national story when they came in from the bush in the 50s and 60s. They were depressed in Papunya. Papunya was a settlement that was really oriented towards assimilation long-term.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: Fred Myers is now Professor of Anthropology at New York University. Since the early 1970's he's studied the Pintubi - their culture and art. He says shocking numbers of Pintubi people died at Papunya from disease, alcohol abuse and violence.
PROF. FRED MYERS: A lot of old people died at Papunya. Some of them I think were depressed and that led to a higher mortality rate. There were killings that took place in the order of things. So they felt themselves under attack by these circumstances.
LINDSAY CORBY, ELDER: There was Warlpiri, Arrernte, Pintubi, Anmatjere. That's why they couldn't live there, because a lot of problems going on.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: Today the Pintubi are celebrating their decision in the early 1980s to leave the settlement of Papunya. They returned to their traditional land and established the community of Kintore. Those early days are remembered as a time of great excitement.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: They lived on practically nothing, there was real excitement about hunting and gathering in their own country.
LINDSAY CORBY, ELDER: Getting kangaroo, goanna, bush tucker. They was pretty happy.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: Musician Neil Murray travelled to Kintore to perform at the celebration. In the 1980s he worked as the first school teacher at Kintore. He says establishing a community was tough.
NEIL MURRAY, MUSICIAN, FORMER TEACHER: We just had school under a tree, you know. And conditions were pretty harsh here, but gradually buildings were built and the store was improved, things like that. More services arrived - the clinic.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: Today Kintore is home to about 450 people. The community has developed a thriving Indigenous art business.
PROF. FRED MYERS: Their attachment to their culture was reflected first in their art and the support that they got for their art and the response to it no question buoyed their hopes that their culture had something of value that it could be sustained.
NEIL MURRAY, MUSICIAN, FORMER TEACHER: Where are you going to get a township elsewhere in Australia, of this many people that has this many artists and has supported an art movement that's generated an economy that's been able to help provide services here, you know.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: Art sales have funded a swimming pool and the community's own renal dialysis centre. Western Desert Dialysis now also services four other communities. The unit has enabled those suffering kidney disease to remain at Kintore.
SARAH BROWN, WESTERN DESERT DIALYSIS: People had moved back to Kintore in the 80s, very proudly, from Papunya, and set up their community and then those people - who had been community leaders started to get sick with kidney disease and they were being told that they had to leave their country that they'd fought so hard to get home to.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: For all the local pride, Kintore hasn't been immune to trouble. Lack of adequate housing and real jobs is an issue.
JOE YOUNG, ELDER: We want more houses because they're crowded - maybe 20, 10, just in the one building.
PROF. FRED MYERS: I think it's difficult for young men to find the same kind of meaning in their life that they would have had 30 or 40 years ago. There's really not that much work, work requires a kind of literacy that people haven't had. There's a lot of disconnection.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: Recently several adults and young people from Kintore have tried to take their own lives and over the years many of the community's potential leaders have passed away from illness, alcohol abuse and accidents.
PROF. FRED MYERS: It makes me sad to come and see so many people who were my age who were really gifted people, who really would be leaders here, have died.
TOM NIGHTINGALE: Kintore's elders say the community's future rests with the next generation and they hope this celebration encourages the younger Pintubi to build on their legacy.
JOE YOUNG, ELDER: We need the young people to look after this place. We want something to grow here.
LOUISA REBGETZ: Tom Nightingale with that story.