When I was quite small I watched my mother making shell necklaces. Apparently before they were too many of us children she spent quite a bit of her time making necklaces on Cape Barron Island. There were ten in my family. Like other women living on the Furneaux Islands, she made them for pocket money and to help help to feed and clothe us kids. As the family grew up she gave it away for a while and then she moved to Launceston out of reach of the shells.
When I found myself living in Launceston near my mother I thought, "If there's one thing I can achieve in my life, it's that I'd like to see her go back and make the necklaces again while she's still alive." However, she wouldn't fly to the island. So I went instead and brought the shells back to her. We would sit around the table and discuss what patterns we would to make and with what kinds of shells.
I made a black and white necklace some years ago and my mum picked out some black and white shells. That was going to be the last necklace she made. Now every time I think about these shells I have to make a black and white necklace in respect and honour to her. I know that it was one of her favourite ways of putting the shells together.
The shells I use are usually collected off the live seaweed floating in the sea. That could take you an hour or two hours to get a cupful, they're getting so scarce now. It needs to be at the time of the lowest tides otherwise you have to wade through too much water and the shells are difficult to see as well.
After the shells dry I need spend a day or more piercing them. Shells like the mareener have to be pierced with a hole. The piercing tool needs to be a fairly solid tool. On the Islands some women were using an old dart from the dartboards. Myself, I've got an old screw that's been filed down with a door handle on it. I've actually got about three different sizes and each maker seems to have sets of favorite tools for their favorite shells.
After the shells are pierced I generally have to spend a day or more sorting the shells. Sometimes it may take a few days to sort the shells into sizes. If you try to mix really big shells with little shells it makes the stringing difficult and the patterns are harder to achieve.
Some of the little shells are so tiny, like the little rice shells, they fit under your fingernail. However, you don't need a heavy tool to make a hole in them. Most often with these shells you'd use a strong needle and thread them at the same time. Your fingers become really sore after a while.
Once when I was doing one long necklace with lots of rice shells, I found that I could probably only do 10 or 20 centimetres a day before my fingers were too sore.
It's so important for this story be told. My mother didn't get to write much about herself, they wouldn't have considered themselves good writers, although she could always write whatever she needed to get by. Too many of the stories are lost and gone with our people.
The shell necklaces are the most significant thing to the Tasmanian Aboriginal history because they are the continuing craft of our community that's never been lost, at least not by the Island women anyway. I'm just so proud of where all my necklaces are, virtually all around Australia. And I now tell my grandkids, you know you can go to the Powerhouse in Sydney and see one of your grandmother's necklaces and their great grandmother's necklaces in the National Galley in Canberra so you know it's pretty special.
Our histories and stories are stored in those places and after a long time they are being told again.
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