Where Americans are still welcome

The Beeb must assume people know about ,or can find out about cargo cults.
The notion of John Frum started in the 1930s, if John Frum was a "US Navy paymaster who paid local workers" what was he doing on the island of Tanna in Vanuatu in the 1930s when no US Naval presence was there until WW2?
The islanders in the 30s might have heard radio broadcasts or seen American magazines to stoke their spirit visualisation, or met a generous wandering American?

The paymaster element is from the WII period. One docu had a photo portrait of a black navy offcier, venerated by the cargo cult participants. The concepts do add elements over time, it is not like there a Cargo Cult Pope to keep the faith pure and wilthout additions or changes.

By now the cargo cult concept is sufficiently obscure so that people who have not had Sociology 101 or some experience with the Pacific will probably miss the reference.

But this is the age of the Internet and Google. However, it does take some curiosity to do the actual clicks to find the information.

One of the links on the right of the page has an older BBC article with a little more background about the John Frum devotees.
Culture clash in the South Seas

Cargo cults saw black and white Americans working and living together in WW2 which reinforced their earlier visions, and repudiated the earlier belief that blacks and whites were from different gods. Sociologically, it is very interesting, and it does make me wonder about the story from America of people arriving by a Thunderbird.

#8, don't apologize. I had the exact same reaction when i read this article a few days ago. it IS ironic.

There is a web page on the BBC site linked to from the just mentioned Culture clash in the South Seas page about Cargo Cults.
An excerpt -
<blockquote>Quote
<hr>In the native view, the Christians worshipped the god Anus. He created Adam and Eve and gave them cargo of canned meat, steel tools, rice in bags and matches. He took it all away when they discovered sex and he sent a flood to destroy them, but he gave Noah a big wooden steamboat and made him the captain so he would survive. When Ham disobeyed his father his cargo was taken away and he was sent to New Guinea. Now his descendants were being given a chance to reform and regain their cargo. All through the twenties the natives patiently worked hard, sang hymns and prayed to Anus. But by the thirties it became clear that the missionaries were lying; they had been good Christians and worked hard, but it was the foreign bosses who did no work that got all the cargo.<hr></blockquote>

I remember a story from years back about some Australians who tried to convince a leader that the cargo cult was bogus (and perhaps that Christianity wasn't; I forget.) They took him to Australia to try to show him how the cargo was actually manufactured. While there, they took him to an anthropological museum, which included a number of items from his own and related people.

The lesson he took from it was that the whites had stolen his people's tradtional gods and housed them in the most impressive building in town, and that that's how they got all their cargo. So his people should forget both Jesus and John Frum and go back to the traditional gods and the cargo would start flowing.

On this link BBC: Cargo Cults they write about something similar to what you heard Vinny. <blockquote>Quote
<hr>The greatest of all Cargo Cult prophets was Yali, who was mentioned in the introduction to Jared Diamond's book Guns, Germs, and Steel. Unlike his contemporaries, he remained loyal to Australia during the war. As a reward, after the war ended he was taken to Australia on a grand tour.

He became fascinated by the Queensland Museum, which contained many of the New Guinea gods which had been seized by missionaries, apparently being worshipped by thousands of Australians and tended by priests in white coats. The conclusion was clear - the Australians had stolen the New Guinea gods and were using them to get cargo.

While in Brisbane, Yali made another startling discovery: the Australians kept hundreds of animals in the Brisbane Zoo, which they carefully fed and tended. He also noticed the large number of dogs and cats kept as pets in homes. It wasn't until a conference in Port Moresby5 that he was able to solve this puzzling behaviour. The solution came when he witnessed a book which showed a succession from monkeys into humans. It became clear the depth to which the missionaries had lied: they had claimed Adam and Eve were men's ancestors when they clearly believed that their ancestors were animals who needed to be treated with respect. It was obvious the missionaries had made up such lies in order to hide this truth from the New Guineans, who had held such beliefs before their arrival. Upon returning home, Yali was convinced by the prophet Gurek that the Queensland Museum was actually Rome, that the gods had been taken captive there, and that in order to lure them back the natives had to stop their foolish acceptance of the lies of Christianity.<hr></blockquote>

It's not just the Americans who don't know what to make of Aussies.