Dr George Nott
9 December 1872 Dr George Nott Dr George Nott who died at Semaphore on the 9 December 1872 arrived in South Australia in May 1852 and settled at Gawler. In 1859 a society to expose ‘humbug’ was started and he was made an honorary member, making many contributions to their paper Humbug Society Chronicle . In October 1861 he began The Bunyip newspaper, which is still going, with the object of exposing ‘sham and hypocrisy’ in all areas of society. Nott was a great philanthropist and was dedicated to helping all kinds of people and was connected with most of the Friendly Societies. On 15 July 1865 he made an impassioned plea for funds to search for the ill-fated Ludwig Leichhardt, lost on a trip organized in 1848 to cross Australia from Queensland to Western Australia, whose fate is till a mystery. He was greatly interested in botany and was an amateur artist, often giving lectures on a variety of subjects to the people of Gawler. George Loyau, The Representative Men of South Australia , Adel. 1883, pp. 185-7.
Sir Mark Oliphant
1 December 1971 Sir Mark Oliphant Sir Mark Oliphant was the first South Australian born Governor of the state when he took office on 1 December 1971. Born in Adelaide in 1901 he gained first class honours in science at Adelaide University and was awarded a scholarship to Cambridge in 1927 where he did research in physics under Sir Ernest Rutherford. From 1937-50 he was Professor and head of the Physics Department at the University of Birmingham. He was one of the scientists involved in the development of atomic energy and in 1943 worked with the Americans on the Manhatten Project, which produced the first atomic bomb. In the years since then he has spoken out strongly against the misuse of atomic energy. He returned to Australia in 1950 to establish the Research School of Physical Science at the Australian National University and in 1954 was appointed first President of the Australian Academy of Science. 100 Famous Australian Lives , Paul Hamlyn, Sydney, 1969, pp. 463-66
Fw Kleinschmidt
10 December 1884 F.W. Kleinschmidt F.W. Kleinschmidt, who was born near Bremen in 1810, was one of the early arrivals in South Australia as he came to work for the South Australian Company, at first on Kangaroo Island. Shortly after the move to the mainland he left the company and went into business for himself. He knew something of the building trade and contracted to build the first government offices in Adelaide. When other German immigrants settled at Hahndorf he began farming there but in 1843 moved to Lobethal where he built the Lutheran mission. In 1851, in partnership with others, he built a brewery, which operated until he went into partnership with two other Germans and converted the brewery into the Lobethal Tweed Factory in 1873, but this venture failed. Fortunately for him he had tried hop growing in 1869 which was successful and this crop enabled him to pay of his debts. For several years he was a councillor and one time chairman of the Onkaparinga Council. He died on 10 December 1884. George Loyau, Notable South Australians , p.53.
Judge Jeffcott
12 December 1837 Judge Jeffcott In November 1837 a party including Lieutenant Hutchinson and T.B. Strangways set out to reach Encounter Bay overland. There they met with Captain Blenkinsop who had a whale fishery, and sending a crew in a whaleboat ahead by sea, they made for the Murray mouth in their bullock cart. After travelling for some distance up the river, discovering Currency Creek and holing the boat in the process and having to make temporary repairs, they returned to the mouth and found that Sir John Jeffcott, the Colonial Judge, had arrived to join the group. It was 12 December when the party set out on the return journey and it was intended that the boat should attempt to find a passage over the sandbar to the sea. Hutchinson gave up his place to Jeffcott although he tried to persuade the judge clad ‘in dress coat with suitable attenuations’ not to go. Blenkinsop was sure he could take the boat out the same way as he had come in but there was a heavy sea running and when nearly clear of the breakers a large wave swamped the rather overloaded boat and he, Jeffcott and two seamen were lost. H.M. Cooper, A Naval History of South Australia , Hassell, Adelaide, 1950, pp.60-1.
Murray Floods
13 December 1870 Murray Floods On 13 December 1870 Mounted Police Sergeant J.R. Ewens, officer in charge of the Blanchetown police station, wrote in his diary: ‘River higher than ever’. His record of the worst flood in the settled history of South Australia began as early as April that year when the sergeant wrote that the river was rising and steamers were moving again down the Darling with wool. After an extremely wet winter the river continued to rise until all the flat country along its banks was flooded drowning thousands of sheep and cattle. The Moorundie Police Station was destroyed and in Mannum rowboats could be taken in and out of the windows of the Bogan Hotel (now Mannum) and it was possible to step from the deck of the steamer Ariel on to the balcony of the hotel. The peak marked on a door at Walker’s Mill showed the waters to be roughly fifteen feet above normal and barges could sail up the main street to load flour at the mill. The river gradually fell in 1871 until by June it was apparently back to normal. Of course in 1870 there were no locks on the river and it was before the irrigation settlements of Renmark and Berri. News , 10 July 1956.
Opening Of Hallett To Terowie Rai
14 December 1880 Opening of Hallett to Terowie railway line On 14 December 1880 a special train carrying the Governor, Sir William Jervois, left Adelaide for the northern town of Terowie. The occasion was the opening of the rail line from Hallett to Terowie, the town chosen as the important break of gauge station between the broad gauge to Adelaide and the narrow gauge extension to Pichi Richi through Peterborough (then called Petersburg). Terowie was chosen because it was near the pastoral lands and the line passed through agricultural lands to the south. The South Australian Railways were building more lines in the north in this period: 1879 had seen the Port Augusta – Quorn track opened, 1880 Quorn – Hawker, 1881 Hawker – Beltana, 1882 Beltana – Farina and 1882 the line running between Terowie and Port Augusta via Orroroo and Quorn was established. With the building of the rail link to Broken Hill in 1887 ore was transshipped through Terowie en route to Adelaide. When coal was discovered in Leigh Creek, Terowie saw a new lease of life moving the coal to Port Augusta. From the 1950s on, with the closing of many lines and the extension of the broad gauge system Terowie has been on the decline. Australian Railway Historical Society Bulletin , Feb 1971, pp.25-35.
Railway Line Between Port Augusta
15 December 1879 Railway line Between Port Augusta and Quorn The railway line between Port Augusta and Quorn was opened without ceremony on 15 December 1879. As early as 1861 officials of the Great Northern Mining Company had sought a railway to facilitate transport of ore, but it was not until 27 June 1876 that an Act for the construction of a line from Port Augusta to Government Gums (later Farina) was assented to. Work began in November 1877 on the line to go through Pichi Richi Pass to the eastern side of the ranges then through Quorn to Hawker and on to Government Gums. The contract was worth £578,944. Because of the shortage of labour many Chinese workers from Victoria were brought to the line and they and other men lived in tents along the way. The first twenty-four mile section from Port Augusta to Quorn was completed by July 1879, the next forty-four miles to Hawker opened for traffic on 28 June 1880, Hawker to Beltana, seventy-nine miles by 1 July 1881 and the last fifty-five miles to Government Gums opened on 22 May 1882. Later the line was extended a further thirty-three miles to Hergott Springs, now Marree, by 7 February 1884 and the final section to Oodnadatta was completed on 7 January 1891, some 478 miles from Port Augusta and 688 miles from Adelaide. Quorn and District Centenary , Lynton Publications, 1978, pp.63-5.
Carols By Candlelight
16 December 1979 Carols by Candlelight Heavy rain on 16 December 1979 washed out the annual Carols by Candlelight held in Elder Park and for the first time in thirty-six years the event was cancelled. On the previous Thursday night a runaway truck caused damage to the steel-scaffolding stage, but by using additional workers and working until 10 pm the stage had been rebuilt in time. Then the rains came. Carols by Candlelight began in the dark days of the war when some 50,000 people attended the first festival on Christmas Eve 1944, held in aid of the Adelaide Children’s Hospital and the Somerton Sick and Crippled Children’s Home, and arranged by the Commercial Travellers Association and 5AD. Since that the concert has become an integral part of Adelaide’s Christmas observance and many of Australia’s best singers have appeared there. In 1950 the guest artist was Joan Sutherland and record crowd of 70,000 heard her sing. 125 Years of The Advertiser , Advertiser Newspaper, 1983, 140,156, 203.
Copper Discovered
17 December 1859 Copper Discovered James Boor, a shepherd, is credited with the discovery of copper minerals at Wallaroo on 17 December 1859 and in 1861 another shepherd, Patrick Ryan, found similar rocks in a wombat hole near Moonta. He reported his find to Joseph Johnson, the publican at Port Wakefield, who applied to the Registrar of Mines in Adelaide for a lease. Walter Watson Hughes, a pastoral lessee, also applied but both parties were refused for lack of information on the exact location of the find. The two groups returned to Moonta to obtain the necessary details and then raced back to Adelaide to lodge the claim. W.A. Horn who rode down for Hughes travelled non-stop for twenty-two hours and exhausted eight horses in order to get the new application in first. However, a legal battle over lease ownership ensured for several years until 1868 when the court ruled in favour of Hughes. Moonta Mining Company began operations in 1862 and by 1876 dividends totaling £1 million had been paid. The mine made Hughes a fortune. The Wallaroo Mines were worked by the Wallaroo Company in which Hughes and his friends Thomas Elder and Robert Barr Smith were also involved. The Wallaroo Smelters were constructed on the coast in 1861 and most of the Moonta ore was also handled there. The three men later contributed generously to many of Adelaide’s institutions, the University of Adelaide being a major recipient. John Drexel, Mining in South Australia , Dept of Mines and Energy, 1982, p.52.
Votes For Women
18 December 1894 Votes for Women Women gained the right to vote in South Australia, on the eighth attempt, when the Constitution Amendment Act was passed on the 18 December 1894. By changing the word ‘man’ to ‘person’ in relation to both Houses of Parliament the franchise and the ability to stand for election to parliament were extended to women. This came after some years of effort by many women and men who believed that ‘it is the foundation of all political liberty that those who obey the law should have a voice in choosing those who make the law’. The main advocate for this legislation was the Women’s Suffrage League, which was strongly backed by the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union. Among the men who supported the movement were Dr Edward Stirling, a university lecturer and Dr John Cockburn, Minister for Education. In June 1893 Charles Kingston became Premier. He had previously opposed proposals for women’s suffrage but finally gave in to his colleagues’ arguments, probably because he also saw an advantage for Labor in having women voters in city electorates, and in July the Attorney-General John Gordon introduced an unencumbered Bill to the Legislative Council. There were lengthy debates in both houses and many members spoke on the Bill, but eventually the supporters of women’s suffrage won out and the bill was passed. South Australia was the first Australian colony to grant this right and one of the first in the world. Helen Jones, ‘South Australian women and politics’, in Dean Jaensch (Ed), The Flinders History of South Australia Political History , 1986, pp.414-48.