Brilliant Women of VU: Alma Thorpe

Alma Thorpe

Alma Thorpe was a central figure at the Victorian Aboriginal Health Service. In the words of Bruce McGuinness: ‘no Alma Thorpe, no Aboriginal health service in Fitzroy’. As Melva Johnson, a founding member of the Echuca community-controlled service suggests, it was Alma Thorpe who ‘was always there fighting, always listening to us’. As Kelli McGuinness explains, Alma was the glue that held VAHS together: ‘she was the silent worker, not only on a local scene but nationally’. Indeed, for many of the younger generation Alma Thorpe was the person they aspired to be. She was their ‘mentor’ and their ‘teacher’. From ‘A History of the Victorian Aboriginal Health Service’ pp 32-33

Alma Thorpe is a Gunditjmara woman and Aboriginal rights activist. She is the daughter of the legendary Edna Brown and mother and grandmother to two more generations of activists. Born in Fitzroy in 1935, she has ever been a stalwart of community engagement and empowerment in those streets. In 1973 she was instrumental in the establishment of the Victorian Aboriginal Health Service (serving as the unpaid Administrator through its early years). She was also involved in setting up many other Aboriginal community organisations such as the Aboriginal Funeral Service, the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service, the Yappera Children’s Service and the Fitzroy Stars Gym.

In 1976 Alma was a foundation member of the National Aboriginal and Islander Health Organisation (NAIHO). For the next decade NAIHO was an extremely effective country-wide network through which progressive strategies were developed, exchanged, co-ordinated and disseminated. Later, Alma was involved in the development of the Aboriginal Health Workers Program, based on the Chinese Barefoot Doctors program, and presented through Koori Kollij, an Aboriginal controlled educational facility. This program built on the philosophy that Alma has always espoused, that ‘health’ was a much larger issue than that of just being cured of a particular sickness. She is a life member of the Victorian Aboriginal Advancement League and was inducted on to the Victorian Government’s Aboriginal Honour Roll in 2011.

Alma received an Honorary Doctorate from Victoria University on March 5th 2025 recognising her substantial contribution to the theory and practice of holistic Aboriginal community controlled health, which she developed as part of local and national collectives VAHS and NAIHO. 

Source: Aboriginal History Archive, Moondani Balluk, Victoria University
 

Alma Thorpe 2023 Alma Thorpe and Bill Roberts