Thomas Mayo is a Torres Strait Islander man
born on Larrakia country in Darwin. As an Islander growing up on the
mainland, he learned to hunt traditional foods with his father and to
island dance from the Darwin community of Torres Strait Islanders. In
high school, Thomas’s English teacher suggested he should become a
writer. He didn’t think then that he would become one of the first ever
Torres Strait Islander authors to have a book published for the general
trade. Instead, he became a wharf labourer from the age of seventeen,
until he became a union official for the Maritime Union of Australia in
his early thirties. Quietly spoken in character, Thomas found his voice
on the wharves. As he gained the skills of negotiation and organising in
the union movement, he applied those skills to advancing the rights of
Indigenous peoples, becoming a signatory to the Uluru Statement from the Heart and a tireless campaigner. Following the Uluru Convention, Thomas was entrusted to carry the sacred canvas of the Uluru
Statement from the Heart. He then embarked on an eighteen-month journey
around the country to garner support for a constitutionally enshrined
First Nations voice, and a Makarrata Commission for truth-telling and
agreement-making or treaties. Thomas is the author of Finding The Heart of The Nation, Dear Son and the children’s books - Finding Our Heart and Freedom Day.