Beloved Mr Kimberley icon Sam Lovell dies

This allowed the state government to deduct up to 75 percent of an Aboriginal person’s salary, and according to the State Library of Western Australia, Lovell was paid mainly in clothes, food, tobacco and soap.

He took photographs throughout his experience, which were the subject of an exhibition held in his honor earlier this year.

Lovell told the ABC he was forced to stop working in 1962 after an injury he sustained while horseback riding.

“The damn old manager thought I was wearing it,” he said.

“He didn’t send me to the hospital. I had to drive 70 miles in the back of a truck after living on aspirin for three days anyway. [112km] to the hospital.

“The doctor went crazy.

“Anyway, they finished sending me to Royal Perth.”

Lovell founded Kimberley Safari Tours with his wife Rosita in 1981, making it the first Aboriginal tourism business in Western Australia; For this initiative he was later awarded the medal of Member of the Order of Australia.

“I knew everything there and the people in it,” he said.

“When I decided to enter tourism, I visited all the stations, saw all the managers, all the business owners and told them what I wanted to do.

“They said, ‘Go ahead, you’re right, you don’t need anything.’”

Lovell has advised a number of Kimberley Aboriginal tourism businesses, which have become some of the region’s biggest draws for both interstate and international tourists.

The State Library of WA’s exhibition about his life took place earlier this year.

“The importance of Sam Lovell’s collection and his rich contribution to the State cannot be overstated. Sam was able to document his life from a young age with his box brownie camera, offering a unique lens and perspective on life in the North West,” said library director Catherine Clarke.

Lovell was also the subject of Marlanie Haerewa’s award-winning 2023 documentary ‘Mr Kimberley’.