Dr. Derek Pugh OAM

Dr. Derek Pugh OAM joined Coral Expeditions as a guest lecturer in 2021. He is an educator and award-winning author with books on NT history, science, travel and YA fiction. Most well-known is his history series on the settlement of the NT, the Overland Telegraph Line, and a memoir of his time living in Maningrida. Derek was the presenter in the award-winning feature documentary ‘Twenty to the Mile’, about the Overland Telegraph Line, and can be found on numerous podcasts speaking on Northern Territory History. Derek has also written two novels, one of which (Tammy Damulkurra) is a year 9 reader for the entire country of Kiribati.

Derek arrived in the Northern Territory in 1982 and worked for several years in land conservation and with Kakadu National Park. He holds five university degrees or post-graduate qualifications and an honourary doctorate from Charles Darwin University. Now ‘professionally retired’, Derek spends his days lecturing, and writing books and screenplays on Territory History.