Thelma Martel (Illingsworth 1990:27) recounts that in 1948 “a small tribe, one of the last clans to cling to the bush and carry on a partly traditional lifestyle” used to settle for part of the year by the Strathleven cattle station her husband Eric was managing at the time. “The tribe spent about 6 months of each year on Strathleven and the other 6 on walkabout, following the seasonal fluctuations of plant and animal life as their people had always done” (Illingsworth 1990:29). This was “Johnson’s tribe”, an Olkola man. Johnson told Eric Martel that as a child and later as a young man he and his people had ranged the Palmer’s length from the mining town of Palmerville  downstream to Strathleven and beyond to Drumduff at the Palmer’s junction to the Mitchell. 

Johnson’s daughter, Jessie Shepherd, remembers how “Dad used to talk to us in Aboriginal, in Walkoola language. There were two tribes on the Palmer, the Mikki and the Rok. The Mikki was the owl. ” (Illingsworth 1990:133). “Dad used to sing songs, then make corroboree, dancing. ” (Illingsworth 1990:35).