Demonstrating the Stone-Age in Dutch New Guinea

Abstract

What is a colonial officer to do? When the radio he has been waiting for to begin his expedition into uncharted land arrives only to break the first time it is used? When the coolies he has recruited from a nearby coastal settlement announce they are going on strike? When his superiors suddenly decide he should head for an entirely different region than the one he was planning for – a region for which he has no maps and has read no reports? When the scientist along for the expedition, who has never been to this island, changes the route under the mistaken assumption that it is harder to travel by water than to walk? When it becomes apparent that the erstwhile commander of the expedition has little control over its components – and little reason to think that the natives he meets will be impressed by his government's supposed sovereignty over their land? Police commissioner Jan van Eechoud faced all these challenges, and pondered them grimly, while waiting at Pioneer Bivak to begin his third expedition up the Mamberamo River into the Dutch New Guinea highlands, in the hinterland of what was then the Netherlands Indies. What's a colonial officer to do? Here's what van Eechoud did: he built a machine. To pass the time and make himself useful, van Eechoud gathered ethnological data from members of the surrounding tribes, inviting the Papuans into his tent to be interviewed in a mixture of Malay and the little he had picked up of the local tongue. With a crowd of Papuans watching, the individual providing information sat on a petroleum drum, answering questions on kinship, religion and politics in exchange for tobacco and food. Some 'lecturers' as van Eechoud called them, enjoyed the refreshments so much that they rambled on and on. Afraid of offending his informants, he used 'indirect means to end a discussion' (1953: 181). At first, he tricked the entire group into following him outside, then jumped back into the tent and locked the door. Then he came up with a more ingenious solution: The petroleum drum was placed on a plank, so that it was separated from the ground. Attached to the plank was an insulated wire that ran in a wide arc along the wall then outside to where it was attached to the spark plug of a Delco motor [DR: a battery-operated starter motor, presumably from one of the motor boats used by the expedition]. When I wanted a lecturer to go away, without interrupting the discussion or looking up I said under my breath to Dr. Koppeschaar, 'Doc, run it!' After a minute, the doctor vanished outside and pressed the Delco