Many people are familiar with the voice and songs of musician and songwriter Archie Roach, but few would know that Archie’s family were originally from Lawrence.

Archie is writing his memoirs and keen to learn more about his Lawrence family history. He travelled to Lawrence to meet with museum staff Roz & Marie to research family history.

The Roach family lived in Lawrence in the 1930’s. The Museum has a few photographs of various members of the family including Archie’s father, also Archie, as a young child.

The Museum has a small display of Aboriginal artefacts and Archie was pleased to provide a good demonstration of the ‘Woomera’, a spear thrower.

A film crew accompanied him to record the events.

It was Archie’s second visit to Lawrence Museum. The first, a few years ago, he met with the late Doug Suprain, who told him the story about Archie’s grandmother and two other ladies who tried to swim across the Clarence River. It was this story that prompted Archie to write the song, ‘Mighty Clarence River’.

Archie and the film crew stayed the afternoon at the museum, and on leaving, Archie presented museum staff with a signed copy of his CD Concert Collection 2012 – 2018.

Archie has been a successful singer/ songwriter since the 1980’s and has many ARIA awards to his name. In 2015, Archie Roach was honoured in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for services to music as a singer-songwriter, guitarist and a prominent supporter of social justice.