William Edward Harney was a bushman, raconteur and author who gathered a great deal of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal myth, legend and lore in Australia’s Top End. He publisheddmuch of this material in a series of popular books, notably Life Among the Aborigines (1957) and, with anthropologist A P Elkin, Songs of the Songmen (1949).
His papers in the NLA at https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/3293839 and https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/1186152, together with his autobiography. The NLA also has photographs and other illustrative materials and copies of interviews with him.
His ADB entry is at https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/harney-william-edward-bill-10428, another at https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/archived/hindsight/bill-harney/5955476 and he has an entry on Wikipedia
