Kavieng post office turns 100
Followng my appeal for members to asist Jim Reeves with material for an exhibition to mark the Centenary of the Post Office at Kavieng I can now report that this event opened on 1st January 2004 and was duly reported in the
Post-Courier, on Friday January 2, 2004.
Here's a transcription of that article written by Jum himself:
Kavieng post office turns 100
By Jim Reeves
ON JANUARY 1, 1904 a new Postal Agency for Kaewieng in Deutsche Neu Guinea was established, only the second in the Bismarck Archipelago, the first being at the Government headquarters at Herbertshöhe (Kokopo), where the only full time official of the Imperial German Post Office was stationed.
The new postal services would be looked after by a German official as part of his other duties, as in those very early days of colonial develop­ment on Neu Mecklenburg (New Ireland) there were few officials and planters to receive and send mail and parcels.
It was truly remarkable that in the short period from 30th June 1900, with the arrival of the first German official Franz Boluminski, with his wife Frida and eight volunteer policemen at Kaewieng (a district renowned throughout the colony for the fierce cannibalistic natives, who for 20 years had been attacking and burning the few trading posts - and killing the traders and eating their workers trying to buy coconuts and make copra) that it was recog­nised as a booming development area with enormous economic potential to become a model German district and deserving a Post Office.
Copra was profitable, and when the very energetic Boluminski banned fighting, payback, sorcery and can­nibalism, and promised protection from the unscrupulous white traders, as well as free justice for all who reported their troubles to the Administration, the people with­in easy reach of Kaewieng became peaceful.
To occupy them and ensure that they had little time to think of other matters, Boluminski had conceived the plan that on a coast where there were no natural safe har­bours, and sailing was dangerous, a road along the coast was necessary if trade was to develop.
He inspired and bullied the people, used competition between groups and in what seemed almost no time, compared with efforts in other places, a magnificent road snaked out from Kaewieng, joining all the stations of the whites as far as Fissoa 100km from Kaewieng. Not only that but by the end of three years, all the temporary bridges were replaced by permanent bridges constructed of kwila and different villages and clan groups maintained their own stretch of road.
It was the most famous road in the whole Pacific, not only then but also for years to come, and in due course, certainly by 1906, was given the name of the German Emperor himself, the Kaisser Wilhelmstrasse. It was the “gavman” road and everyone travelling on it was safe and protected, so even the local people, previously limited to their own community areas, started to use the road they had built.
The people then improved on their already good reputation as preferred labourers for recruitment on plantations, by demonstrating that, as with the road, they were capable of working well in their own home area, something hitherto thought to be impossible with plantation labour.
It has been Kaewieng, Käwieng, Kawieng and finally Kavieng ever since, and that name for the Post Office on the cancellation date stamps in what was the Territory of New Guinea after the Germans left, is the oldest in continual use, without change. Other town names with postal services from German times were either changed or discontinued.
In the days before telephones, radio, television and aircraft in New Guinea, (in fact it was only in December 1903 that the very first flight was ever made) the written word was the only means of communicating over a distance.
Except for overland on foot or horse, ships provided the lifeline to supply all the overseas news, in the form of newspapers, packages and letters, that kept people in touch and provided the means for business, mission and government affairs to be transacted.
This meant that close watch was kept on the arrival/departure dates of ships, especially those carrying overseas mail from Herbertshöhe and boats connecting with it to and from Käwieng.
I am indebted to collectors Messrs. Baumann, Provinski, Kaiser, Klein and Loughran for allowing me to share their enthusiasm for seeing history through the eyes of the people who were sending and receiving mail at Kavieng all those years ago.
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