which followed the passage of the Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897 (61 Vic, No.17), generally cited as the 1897 Act: "... (it) was the first comprehensive Aboriginal protection act in Queensland and, indeed, in Australia; it ushered in the long era of protection and segregation during which Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders lost their legal status as British citizens and became, in effect, wards of the state". "Regional administrative control of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population of the State was achieved by dividing the State into Protectorates. Each Protectorate was administered by a local Protector of Aboriginals who was a police officer in all cases except for Thursday Island. The appointment of local Protectors began in 1898. Local Protectors had many responsibilities including the administration of Aboriginal employment, wages, and savings bank accounts. Local Protectors also played a significant role in the removal of Aboriginal people to reserves". However, analyses of historical and anthropological records show that many of the Kombumerri remained in their traditional country and found employment with farmers, oyster producers and fishermen, timber cutters and mills constructed for the production of resources like sugar and arrowroot, whilst continuing to varying degrees with the Kombumerri cultural practices, laws and customs that were in evidence at the time of the arrival of the colonists. Many of them, both men and women (and sometimes children), found employment as servants or staff in the houses of the wealthy squatters and businessmen. Due to the harshness of the 1897 Act, and the various equally draconian amendments to it in the last century, and with respect to various government administrations, Kombumerri Aboriginal people have to date maintained a relatively low political profile in the Gold Coast region so that they would not be removed from their families, or from their traditional country with which they had (and retain) strong spiritual links. As a result, and since that time, the Kombumerri people have maintained close and generally closed networks of communication amongst themselves regarding their cultural practices and use of language which were not accommodated by the authorities. Early European history English navigator Captain James Cook became the first European to visit the Gold Coast when he sailed past on 16 May 1770. As an explorer under the commission of the Royal Navy he had the foresight to name Mount Warning (a volcanic outcrop inland) as