By the New Message Tree Alliance
A recent Championing Change Through Allyship event brought together 125 people on Boon Wurrung Country at the Royal Yacht Club of Victoria to explore ways to actively support Aboriginal communities and foster reconciliation.
Through panels, storytelling, music, and discussions, participants learned how to stand alongside Indigenous people, deepen understanding, and take meaningful action. The event was organised by the New Message Tree Alliance, and exhibitors included First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria, Bronwyn David, Yarn Strong Sista, and Hauz of Dizzy.
Together, we celebrated learning, connection, and allyship. Fay Stewart-Muir’s Welcome to Country beautifully grounded the event in culture, and the story of Williamstown’s 1856 Message Tree reminded us that these connections are living today.
Professor Peter Radoll, co-convenor of Message Tree Alliance Inc., a reconciliation group in Koort Boort Boort, took us back in time and invited us into a new future. Here is his reflection:
I want you to imagine standing here in Williamstown—not today, but 200 years ago. No cars. No bitumen roads. No sound of espresso machines in the background. Just open sky… the smell of saltwater drifting in from the bay… and the wind moving gently through the long needles of a single she-oak tree.
That tree, known as the Message Tree, stood on the corner of Thompson Street and Nelson Place. To some, it was just part of the landscape. But to others, it was the centre of their world.
For the Yalukit-willam clan of the Boonwurrung people, this tree grew on Country they had cared for over countless generations. It shaded gatherings where decisions were made… where elders spoke and children listened… where ceremony connected the people to each other and to the land. Its roots reached into stories as old as time itself. Standing there, you would have been on ancient ground, among a people who knew every curve of the coastline, every shift of the tides, every season by heart.
Then came the ships.
And with them, the settlers. They didn’t know the old stories of this land, but they too came to see the tree as a gathering place. Without newspapers to keep them informed, they nailed messages to its trunk—advertisements, notices, news from far away. They sat on the bench built around its base, swapping information, telling yarns, watching the life of the town pass by.
In its branches and shade, two very different worlds overlapped.
By the mid-1850s, Williamstown was expanding, and plans were drawn for Nelson Place to run straight through where the tree stood. It could have been removed without a second thought. But something unexpected happened—over 50 residents signed a petition to save it. They understood that this was no ordinary tree. They knew it had meaning beyond themselves.
It’s powerful to think about that moment—settlers, in the very early years of this place, recognising and defending a piece of Aboriginal heritage. A rare glimpse of respect, of connection, of shared humanity.
But the protests weren’t enough. In 1857, the Message Tree was cut down. The road went through. And with it, one of the few physical places where the lives of First Peoples and settlers had met on equal ground… was lost.
Yet, the story didn’t disappear. It’s been kept alive by community memory, by local historians, by Boonwurrung custodians. And in recent years, a New Message Tree has been planted—not to replace the old one, because you can’t replace something like that—but to carry forward its spirit. A place for gathering, for listening, for sharing messages once again.
When I think about the Message Tree, I think about how easily stories can be lost if we don’t tell them. How quickly important places can vanish if we don’t fight for them. And how reconciliation isn’t just about big policies or national headlines—it’s about standing together under the same shade, hearing each other’s voices, and understanding what matters to the other.
So I invite you to pause for a moment. Picture that tree—the way the afternoon sun would catch in its branches… the sound of children laughing nearby… the low voices of elders passing on wisdom. Imagine the hands that nailed messages into its bark, and the hands that touched it in ceremony, seeking connection with the spirit of the land.
The Williamstown Message Tree reminds us that history is not just in books—it’s in the land beneath our feet, and in the stories we choose to carry forward. Let’s keep telling this one.
And let’s remember—what we choose to stand for today will become the stories they tell about us tomorrow.
This story has not yet reached its conclusion. An interpretative installation set up on the corner of Thomsons Street and Nelson Place by Hobsons Bay City Council tells a story, but the New Message Tree Alliance is still seeking recognition of the cultural site at the foot of this intersection, in front of the Royal Victorian Yachting Club at 120 Nelson Place, Williamstown.
For the whole story, see the submission lodged with the Yoorrook Commission.
www.yoorrook.org.au/submissions/submission-new-message-tree-alliance-inc#AdditionalMaterials
