` History cannot hurt us, really it can’t, we can learn from it, if we have the courage, but it can’t hurt us, and we don’t need to live in denial.

justice with a resounding ‘Yes’ vote in the 1967 referendum.

Mr Ferguson’s son, John, used to attend Dr Roe’s church in Bourke and before he died, he asked the historian to share his father’s story.

On a separate, unrelated occasion, John had a similar conversation with Mr Doolan.

“John Ferguson took me to his father’s grave in Dubbo and pointed down and said, ‘Dad’s buried there, I still remember the afternoon,’ and I got cold shivers again,” Mr Doolan said.

“I told him, ‘one day Uncle John, everybody in Australia will know who your father is,’ and I cried as I might to get that known, and nobody really wanted to know about it.

“It was ironic and interesting, and I thank God for his sense of humour, because it wasn’t until Paul Roe that the story gained traction.”

The pair worked for almost two years to have a bronze statue of William Ferguson erected in the centre of Dubbo’s main street in 2019 – a monument many locals have probably walked past without noticing nor understanding.

And that’s when Mr Doolan and Dr Roe’s acquaintanceship began to evolve into a friendship.

“I’m not the easiest person to get on with and I’m the first to admit that, and I was trying as I might to find fault in the situation or why we shouldn’t be working together again,” Mr Doolan said.

“Paul was gracious and gave more than he needed too, and we worked for about 18 months on that thing (the statue) and over that whole time, we developed a greater understanding of who each other was, of Indigenous needs as opposed to broader Australian needs and just a healthier respect for each other.”

Dr Roe also asked Mr Doolan for forgiveness.

“There were things in Bourke, I developed attitudes for various reasons, things that the kids did to us, stole my car, or trashed it, and you can get pretty pissed off with it all and you try to do something kind and you just get a back-hander or whatever, you feel very discouraged after trying and trying and trying to do things and getting nothing back but cheek or being called a ‘white so-and-so,’ and so I knew that at moments I had probably had a racist, dismissive attitude too, so I had to apologise and I thought I’d apologise to Frank,” Dr Roe said.

“I said to Frank, ‘I admit that

I have had wrong attitudes and there was no excuse for that, would you accept my apology?’ and he did, and we shook hands.

“Now I’m trying to act in a practical way by doing things like get the statue up or tell the story or go with Frank to schools to actually write a new story, not to pause and stay in the sorry state, but move forward and say, ‘what can we do about it?’”

Mr Doolan described that moment as both “poignant” and “a bit painful”.

Today, the “odd couple” retell the story of William Ferguson and his legacy to school groups and make a habit of gripping one another’s hands each time they meet.

“Even in this time of COVID and elbow shakes, things have changed a lot, a handshake, it’s pure and simple, it’s a gesture of peace, it stems from the earliest of times,” Mr Doolan said.

“When we do that (shake hands) especially when we go into schools and do it in front of young Australians, we find that it frees a lot of them up in that it seems, or appears, to have a profound effect on them and that to me tells me that even though we live in modern times, we are so much more enlightened, so much better informed and all the rest of it, even the simple act of a black man and a white man clasping hands can still make a catch in the kid’s throats.”

The memorial statue of William Ferguson, made by local artist Brett Garling, now stands tall near the rotunda in Macquarie Street, honouring his work in Aboriginal rights activism.

In light of the vandalism and destruction of statues around the world off the back of the Black Lives Matter movement, Mr Doolan echoes Mr Ferguson’s urge to move forward.

“My people would hate it if anybody were to vandalise that iconic figure and the same principle applies with Churchill and Captain Cook,” he said.

“History cannot hurt us, really it can’t, we can learn from it, if we have the courage, but it can’t hurt us, and we don’t need to live in denial.

“Really, what we need to do is learn how to live in this country and live together.”

And for Mr Doolan, the same goes for NAIDOC week.

“I think NAIDOC is an important thing, it just is a week-long of festivities that highlight an Indigenous perspective and we should do these things comfortable in the idea that we are a multicultural nation,” he said.

“I’m really grateful that it is occurring but in reality too we represent 2.6 per cent of the total population and Australia is a multicultural nation, so with that in mind I’m happy that we are celebrating NAIDOC, I ask everyone to come and celebrate with us and enjoy it, but I say to you, that the bottom line is this, simply, I am you are, we are Australian.”