Living up to family expectations can be hard enough for most people, but when you’re a member of the famous Parer family that bar
can be set quite high.
For Robert Parer, it meant growing up in the shadow of men such as:

• Damien Parer, who remains one of Australia’s best known war photographers and cameramen;
• Franciscan Father Ferdy (Ferdinand) Parer;
• Warwick Parer, a senator for more than 15
years and a ormer Federal Minister for
Resources between 1996 and 1998 and
• Raymond Parer who, with John McIntosh was the first to fly a single-engine plane from
England to Australia.

However, Robert in his own quiet way has lived up to those expectations, contributing a lifetime of service to the people of his “adopted” country, Papua New Guinea which honored him with an MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) in 1996 and now a CMG (Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George).

The 70-year old who now shares his time between PNG and Brisbane travelled to Port Moresby on 1st November 2006 for an investiture ceremony. As pictured above, Robert received his medal from PNG Prime Minister and good friend, Michael Somare for services to commerce, industry, education and the community of Aitape in PNG’s north.

Robert said he was surprised to hear that he would receive the medal. The news came via a text message sent by one of his daughters holidaying in Spain. Robert said he knew government officials had been trying for years to obtain recognition for his services, but nothing had ever happened on the British side. Then came a mysterious text message from his daughter on the Monday following the Queen’s Birthday in June. It read, “Dad I have to congratulate you, but I don’t know why”.

Robert recalls that he wrote back to her saying, “I don’t know what you are talking about”. She advised that she had received an email from a friend in London who said that The Times carried a story that Robert Lenton Parer was being given an award.

He hadn’t heard anything about it so he rang his office in Aitape and spoke to his staff who told him there was a confidential letter waiting in his office. He discovered he was being awarded the CMG. It had been announced in London before the news had hit Papua New Guinea or Australia.

For more than 50 years Robert has helped develop Aitape from a small colonial settlement to a thriving town with two high schools, a hospital, a vocational centre, a bank sub-branch and a post office. He has supported schools, including St Ignatius College run by the missionaries, financially and materially and served on councils, boards and other organizations throughout the province. He was the largest employer in the town until he sold the trading side of his business about three years ago. He still owns a cocoa plantation in the province.

Along with the Catholic mission based in Aitape, Robert and his family were the first to offer help to victims of the tsunami that hit the area in 1998. More than 1600 people lost their lives with some estimates of fatalities as high as 2200. Another 1000 were seriously injured and 10,000 were displaced to new villages. He has also supported sports teams in the area, the police, the hospital and was Area Commissioner for the Boy Scouts.

He became a naturalized PNG citizen in 1975 and is known by locals as “The Father of Aitape”. What sustained him through the many good and bad years in PNG have been his faith and the many friends he has made over the years since he returned to PNG with his father in 1954. These friends include Bishop Austen Crapp of Aitape who was honored for services to the Church at PNG’s Independence Day celebrations and the many missionaries living at the Catholic mission. He counts Franciscan Friars, Poor Clare Sisters, Presentation Sisters, Patrician Brothers and many others as close family friends.

Robert says, “We were the only expat family apart from the Catholic mission in the province so we would invite them all to our house for parties and other occasions. They were always there for us through rough times, like the death of the first of our five children”.

Robert claims that Catholicism has played a strong role throughout his life. His grandfather was Catalan – very strong Catholics - and both his grandmothers were Irish so he had a very strong background when it came to his faith.

In the late 1800s two Parer brothers married two Irish sisters and they had nine children in each family – 15 boys and three girls who were brought up as brothers and sisters. After the First World War, four members of each family made their way to the goldfields in New Guinea. They arrived one after the other but soon it was known all over the island that if you hit one Parer, you hit the lot.

Raymond Parer was a pioneer of aviation in New Guinea, one of the most hostile environments in which to operate an aircraft. Aviation in the country at the time was chiefly involved with the gold mining industry which was thriving in the 1920s. Raymond set up business there with Robert’s father working as his mechanic and is reputed to have been the first pilot to fly over the Owen Stanley Range.

Something like 18 Parers were born on the goldfields of New Guinea. Robert was born at Wau in 1937 but the family was evacuated back to Australia in 1941 when the Japanese attacked the island. His father was in Bougainville working on the planes of his brother Kevin, father of Senator Warwick Parer and was left behind. Kevin who had been evacuating families was the first man killed in the first air raid on the mainland. His aircraft was shot up on the airstrip as he tried to get away.

Robert’s father made his way to the coast where with a number of other expats, he fixed the engine of a broken down boat and made his way to the Solomon Islands where they were all picked up by an American warship.

After being educated at St Joseph’s Nudgee College where his son also attended, Robert returned to PNG with his father and began developing his business interests. He is the last of the Parers to live in New Guinea.

Robert’s wife, Meg said Robert was “greatly loved” by the people in Aitape and the province. She recalls the local people as saying, ‘He must come back, you must make Rob come back and stand for parliament’. But at 70, Robert said he did not know if that was something he wanted to pursue. For now he is content to share his time and life with his families, those in PNG and those living in Brisbane.