District Commissioner Bill Brown, Deputy District Commissioner
David Moorhouse, and Geoff McKenzie of Rabaul Stevedores
at the District Commissioner's residence high above Kieta Harbour
It began with an innocent inquiry to the Immigration Department in Canberra just months after I had come up to New Guinea: " ... I would like to inquire into the possibility of being naturalized in the not too distant future."
A few weeks later came their reply:
And on and on it went from there until, finally, I sat for a dictation test before Deputy District Commissioner David Moorhouse on 17 May 1971:
Several months and letters later, on 9 December 1971, David Moorhouse called me back into his office to administer the Oath of Allegiance ...
... sign the bottom of my Certificate of Citizenship, and hand it to me.
Thank you, David. You are the man who made me an Australian.
Let's all drink to that!
P.S. Sadly, David Moorhouse passed away on 31 August 2003, aged 66. He had been the youngest cadet patrol officer to join the service in January 1955. In 1960 he led an expedition into the unexplored areas of the Whiteman Range for the National Geographic Society, searching for new species. This resulted in finding the first new genus of the Paradisaea in 26 years (subsequently named phyllosopis rubbicala Moorhousie). In the mid-1960s he served as Assistant District Commissioner at Vanimo, Amanab and Maprik. Then he became Deputy District Commissioner in Bougainville from 1971 until he finally returned to Australia in 1974.
