Long before the internet came into being, Darwin's traditional owners posted a petition across Australia in a bid to get 1,000 Aboriginal signatures in the hands of visiting royal Princess Margaret in 1972.
The Larrakia petitioned for treaty negotiation with the federal government and Queen Elizabeth II in March 1972 after raising their own flag in Darwin, emulating Captain James Cook's flag-planting and claim on Australian soil.
Later that year, the Larrakia sat outside Darwin's Government House for 24 hours waiting to hand the three-metre Gwalwa Daraniki petition to visiting Princess Margaret.
The document was torn in a scuffle with police, but it was eventually mailed to Buckingham Palace.
No response ever came.
But the Top End's traditional owners haven't given up and have come together in a rare appearance to renew the call for treaty.
Good enough for Cook
At the recent 50th anniversary of the flag raising, senior Larrakia custodian and Gwalwa Daraniki Association chair Helen Secretary, one of the three original native title claimants of Darwin, told the story of her grandfather Bobby Secretary, who helped raise the flag.
"He said at the time of raising that flag, if it is good for Captain Cook to raise the English flag and claim our country for his king, then he would raise this flag and take back Darwin for his Larrakia people," she said.
"This and other actions by my grandfather and many others led to a petition to an early land claim on the Kulaluk lease that predated native title and land rights.
"It is our responsibility to speak the truth and remember the stories.
"Bobby always said, 'If you look after country, that country will look after you.'
'United to heal and conquer'
Larrakia Nation deputy chairman Wayne Kurnoth said the raising of the flag was a momentous occasion.
"It would be the start of a movement that would call for treaty with Aboriginal people and the Australian government, and led to the development of the Larrakia petition — a movement that would travel the nation seeking the support of our fellow Aboriginal brothers and sisters calling for land rights and political representation," he said.
"Once again, we must follow the lead of ancestors and come together as a united group as we renew our call for a treaty with the Australian Northern Territory government.
Larrakia Nation, the Larrakia Development Corporation, and the Gwala Daraniki Association have never before shared a stage.
"You will no longer be able to divide and conquer, because we have united to heal and conquer," Mr Kurnoth said.
"We're showing the wider Larrakia community all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people on Larrakia country, the non-Indigenous community, and the government that Larrakia ready to discuss and negotiate a treaty."
'We have survived'
Larrakia Development Corporation chairman Mark Motlop said the petition was a seminal document written in the same year the Tent Embassy in Canberra was built, and when Lord Vestey granted land to the Gurindji.
"Fifty years later, the power behind these incontrovertible words still rings true: This is our unseeded land," he said.
"The degradation of our lands and waters, sacred sites, language, culture, and low and slow has been a slow, yet ever-moving feast.
"Had it not been for our own people and their ancestors, we would have forgotten who we are, where we come from.
"We would have forgotten our stories, our place in this country. We have not — we have survived.
NT Deputy Chief Minister Nicole Manison said the petition was an appeal to the Queen for help.
"The Northern Territory government is proud to be working towards treaty or treaties to achieve long standing, far reaching and long awaited change for Aboriginal people," she said.
"Currently, that thorough consultation process on the treaty, discussion paper, right across the Territory is reaching a conclusion.
