Opinion Tom McLaughlin
Tom Harrisson
We now get to the part of the Sarawak Museum Journal where Tom Harrisson has written many of the articles. He was a British subject who was appointed head of the Sarawak Museum and the Sarawak Museum Journal in 1949 by the British Colonial Authorities. His writings had ideas that were often others, mainly his wife, Barbra Harrisson. He freely stole research notes from people and said they were his own.
Niah caves was a cavernous open cave with a large guano deposit. People had been going there for centuries to harvest the bat manure and the bird’s nests, a Chinese delicacy.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the archaeological world sought an animal known as the missing link. The missing link was the part of the human who connected the apes with the humans. It was thought to be the animal that joined a straight line from apes to humans. The person who found a skeleton or remains of this being would gain fame and fortune. Tom Harrisson thought he would be that person.
Somehow, Tom Harrisson realized there was an old graveyard beneath the floor of the Niah Caves. When the Niah Cave skeletons were found, Tom Harrisson, hoping the missing link was there, went berserk. He ordered men to quickly dig up the graveyards, searching frantically for the missing link. Bones were thrown everywhere. Men then collected them, and a Shell helicopter flew in to fly them in baskets lowered from the craft to the Sarawak Museum. Another helicopter absconded from the Malaysian military was also put into use. This mixture of human bones was never sorted out. However, Barabra Harrisson, his wife, who wrote the majority of the papers, contributed ideas and proceeded with the radiocarbon dating of the 1960s. Very little can be attributed to Tom Harrisson, although his name was on those articles.
Tom Harrisson also refused to allow other anthropologists and experts to come to the caves, desperately wanting to secure credit for any findings for himself.
Tom Harrisson allowed two people to write with him. Stanley J. O’Conner was an art historian from Cornell University in New York. Harrisson probably realized he needed some academic credentials and chose him. However, which sections were written by O’Conner and which were written by Harrisson and which were written by his wife will require expertise from others. He was later to come to Cornell as a visiting scholar.
Lord Medway was another person blessed by Harrisson to write with him. Harrisson specifically liked his title as he was “peer of the realm”, a hereditary title. He thought he would bring fame to the researcher. Again, we cannot tell which parts of the article were Medway’s and which part was Harrissons.
Two researchers working in No Nak Ta Thailand heard about the research in Niah. They flew to the site and began excavating. They somehow acquired bones and had them sent to the University of Nevada at Las Vegas. However, these were not complete skeletons. There is a leg bone here and an arm bone there with their companions back in Kuching. There was no complete skeleton. Dr Sheilagh Brooks and her husband published one small paper ten years later about the bones and radiocarbon dating. Why the Brooks was chosen to remove the bones from Sarawak and store them in their garage is not clear.
Two researchers have since been asked to re-evaluate Harrissons work in the later 20 teens. Both have not answered my many e-mails. The Museum hired a French researcher, Dr Daniel Perret, to have the site at Sungai Jaong re-evaluated. He told me that he found beads and other artefacts at the site. There was a paper printed about the work, but all it did was rehash Tom Harrisson. There was no mention of the new beads and other artefacts he told me he had found.
Dr Curnoe began re-evaluating the Niah site but went on to look at other locations in the area. He and his students told me there would be a major find announced soon. That was three years ago. He could have reported it, but I just missed it.
The Most Offending Soul Alive by Judith Heineman
This sympathetic biography of Tom Harrisson claims that Tom Harrisson did not steal anything from Sarawak or the Museum. However, she fails to explain why the Harrissons showed up at New York’s Kennedy Airport with 23 suitcases. What was in those 23 suitcases from Sarawak? Were they valuables stolen from the Museum?
Other notes from her book:
Tom never advanced linguistically beyond the rudimentary Bazaar Malay, and then the author questioned how advanced Margret Mead was in Samoan. p. 260
He collected a colossal hoard of 900 bird skins, a few live birds, 200 mammals many pots, jars and bowls from the Kelabit. p.264
Wrote articles for the Sarawak Museum Journal, which was a mix of scholarly materials, gossipy, serious and amusing for a local audience. p. 266
He only liked people who stood up to him. p.271
He would shout and go into towering rages at the staff. p. 273
Developed the Museum into an institution of world standing.?? p.274
He did not consult the Malays or become friends with them. p. 277-278
Tom had a celibate life in Sarawak. ??? p. 280
Put in a request for office equipment but put paintings in the Museum instead. p. 281
Played rowdy games by throwing turtle eggs from turtle island p. 285
Tom was not overly conscientious about giving others credit for their work. p.286
Wild drinking in Singapore p.291
It must be conceded to Tom’s detractors; Tom hesitated to have experts come and steal his thunder and often found ways to keep archaeologists away from Niah. p.292
Enjoyed having Lord Medway work with him as he was a peer of the realm. p.311
Objected to Sir Steven Runciman because he was a homosexual p.314
Niah Cave was already there, and a path was drawn to it by guano diggers. p.312
Tom’s crew had been going down down down digging great trenches in hopes of finding “Borneo Man” of million years ago. p. 313.
More scholarly work might have been done on the Sarawak orangutans if not for Tom’s bout of bad behaviour. p. 338
Tom counted on Lord Medway to be an almost assistant curator and would ask his help to handle occasional problems with the museum staff. p. 339
Its silver box held lots of gold pieces with a solid gold emblem of the Hindu god Shiva p.350
It isn’t easy to pick out which is true and which is fantasy from his articles. There may be a nugget of information in the articles which could add to Sarawak history. I will study them and choose which could be true and give them due credit.
