Born on this day
Monday, April 2, 1877. : Mordecai Ham, the man who led Billy Graham to Christ, is born.
Mordecai Ham was born on 2 April 1877 on a farm near Scottsville, Kentucky. Coming as he did from eight generations of Baptist preachers, he could not pinpoint the exact date of his conversion, as he was immersed in a deeply devotional life right from childhood. However, from about age 9 he began to have convictions that he was meant to preach. Gaining life experience in a variety of jobs, he again heard the call to preach following the 1899 death of his grandfather, who had pastored in the area for forty years. He began preaching in 1901, and his first sermon was on the absolute Lordship of Jesus Christ.
Wherever Ham preached, he was enthusiastically received, from the well-off to the down-and-out. A powerful and determined preacher, he doggedly pursued the most hardened atheists in town and often saw them saved. In his first couple of years of preaching, thousands made commitments to Christ. Later he endured much opposition and persecution, but still thousands were converted at his revival meetings. But Ham’s best-known convert was a reluctant sixteen-year-old in Charlotte, North Carolina, who hid in the choir loft to escape the direct preaching of Ham. In 1934, Billy Graham, who would later become the most famous Christian evangelist of the 20th century, was convicted and converted by Ham’s preaching.
Born on this day
Thursday, April 2, 1914. : Actor Sir Alec Guinness is born.
Alec Guinness was born on 2 April 1914 in London, England. Guinness first worked writing copy for advertising before making his debut at the Old Vic Theatre in 1936 at the age of 22. After serving in World War II, he returned to acting, appearing in Great Expectations (1946), Oliver Twist (1948) and Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949), in which he played 8 different roles. He became one of the most celebrated actors of the 20th century during the 1950s, gaining coveted roles in The Lavender Hill Mob, in which he gained his first Oscar nomination, Bridge On The River Kwai, in which he won the best actor Oscar, and The Horse’s Mouth, for which he wrote the Oscar-nominated screenplay. Further films of the ’60s and ’70s include Lawrence of Arabia, Dr Zhivago and Murder By Death. Younger audiences know Guinness best as Obi-Wan Kenobi in the Star Wars films.
Guinness died of liver cancer on 5 August 2000. His wife of 62 years died two months later, also from cancer.
Australian History
Tuesday, April 2, 1844. : The first permanent synagogue is built in Australia.
The Jewish people have been part of Australian history since the beginning of official European settlement on the continent. When the First Fleet arrived in New South Wales in January 1788, there were fourteen known Jewish convicts aboard. The first colony on the southern coast, at Sorrento, included eight Jewish convicts. When that colony failed, and the entire party moved across Bass Strait, those eight were among the first to settle on Van Diemen’s Land.
The first Jewish free settlers arrived in New South Wales in 1816, and up until 1817, there were an estimated 20 Jews in Australia. When one of them died, it was necessary to form the first Jewish Burial Society, Chevra Kaddisha. Initially, services were held in the home of Philip Joseph Cohen in George Street, Sydney, until they were moved to a rented room in the same street. It was not until the early 1830s that organised Judaism began in Australia, with the arrival of Aaron Levi, who became the first Rabbi in Australia. The first official synagogue in Sydney opened in Bridge Street in 1837, but was only a temporary home for Jewish worship.
On 2 April 1844, the first permanent synagogue in Australia was opened. Designed by James Hume, the synagogue on York Street had a seating capacity of 500. It served as the centre of Jewish life in Sydney until the Great Synagogue in Elizabeth Street was completed in 1878.
Australian History
Thursday, April 2, 1874. : A major strike is held at Moonta Mines in South Australia.
Moonta, a small mining town in South Australia, was first settled as a farming region in the 1830s. The town’s name is derived from an Aboriginal word, either ‘moontera’ or ‘moonta moontera’ which translates as ‘place of impenetrable scrub’. It is an inhospitable area, but the discovery of copper deposits at Wallaroo and Moonta in 1861 brought prosperity to the region. The town itself was laid out in 1863.
The Moonta Company was established soon after copper was discovered, and during its existence it produced around 5,396,146 pounds worth of copper, and became the first Australian mining company to pay more than 1,000,000 pounds in dividends to its shareholders. The Moonta Mines were worked largely by Cornish miners, with several thousand men from Cornwall migrating to South Australia to work the mines in Moonta, Wallaroo or other nearby mines.
A downturn in world copper prices led the Directors of the Moonta Mines to post warning of an impending reduction in wages at Moonta Mines on 2 April 1874. As a result, the men at Moonta mines went out on strike. Wallaroo miners joined the strikers and, following a joint meeting on 9 April, a delegation of miners travelled to Adelaide to meet with the Directors. The meeting was successful, with the Directors agreeing to maintain rates for a further two months, and to review rates after that, depending on world markets. The strikers went back to work on 21 April.
This event was a catalyst to the formation of the United Tradesmen’s Society, which later became the Labor League of South Australia.
Australian History
Saturday, April 2, 2011. : Thousands of people in Sydney rally against the proposed “carbon tax”.
A carbon tax is a pricing on carbon levied on the use of non-renewable energy sources, such as those derived from coal. It requires that businesses and companies pay a set levy for each tonne of carbon they release into the atmosphere. The then proposed legislation referred to it as a fixed carbon credit scheme, but ‘Carbon Tax’ is the term by which Australia’s politicians and political commentators generally referred to it, and was the topic of the rally.
On 24 June 2010 Julia Gillard, member for Lalor, Victoria, was sworn in as Australia’s first female Prime Minister. The previous PM, Kevin Rudd, had seen a huge decline in popularity for a variety of reasons. He was forced to stand aside after then-Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard called for a leadership ballot, gaining the support of the ALP Caucus. Immediately after this, the Opposition began calling for a Federal election, which was held in September. During the election campaign, one of Ms Gillard’s key promises was that there would be no carbon tax under a government that she led. The election resulted in a hung parliament with neither party gaining a majority. Ms Gillard was only able to form government with the support of three Independent MPs and the Greens Party. A key factor in her securing Greens support was the commitment to introduce a carbon tax, in direct conflict with previous promises.
Australians from all walks of life were angered at the broken promise and fearful of the increase in cost of living which it would mean for them personally. Numerous surveys held at different times through 2011 indicated between 60% and 72% of Australians opposed the legislation.
On 2 April 2011, a huge rally was held in Sydney in which thousands of people protested the proposed carbon tax. Estimates of attendees ranged between 5000 and 8000. In Hyde Park, a petition containing 25,000 signatures was presented to Senator Eric Abetz, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate and a member of the Tasmanian Liberal Senate Team. This was the first of many anti-carbon tax rallies held across Australia throughout 2011.
Interestingly, on the same date of 2 April at Belmore Park a short distance away, another large rally was held in support of the carbon tax, sponsored by the Getup organisation.
World History
Wednesday, April 2, 1800. : Beethoven’s first symphony premieres in Vienna.
Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn, Germany in December 1770. One of the world’s greatest composers, he was known especially for his rich and powerful symphonies. Beethoven had a talent that was recognised when he was very young, but only began to develop fully after he moved to Vienna in 1792 and studied under Joseph Haydn. This marked his “Early” composing career, when he tended to write music in the style of his mentors, Haydn and Mozart.
Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1, Op. 21, in C Major was written during this period. Begun in 1799, the first of Beethoven’s famous symphonies premiered at the K.K. Hoftheater nächst der Burg in Vienna on 2 April 1800. The composition was dedicated to Baron Gottfried van Swieten, one of Beethoven’s early patrons. Although largely written in the Classical style, Symphony No. 1 shocked the audience with its dissonant opening chord, while its powerful use of wind instruments demonstrated Beethoven’s willingness to develop a new style in orchestral music, which eventually ushered in the Romantic Era.
World History
Saturday, April 2, 2005. : Pope John Paul II, the Pope who contributed significantly to the fall of communism in the Twentieth century, dies.
Pope John Paul was elected to the papacy on the third ballot of the 1978 Papal Conclave, but the popular man who came to be known as the “Smiling Pope” died after just 33 days in office. Pope John Paul was succeeded on 16 October 1978, by Cardinal Karol Wojtyla of Poland, who took the name of Pope John Paul II in deference to his predecessor. At just 58 years old, the new Pope also became the youngest pope to be elected in the twentieth century.
In his later years, Pope John Paul II’s health began to suffer, particularly after he developed Parkinson’s Disease during the 1990s. He died on 2 April 2005. His reign was marked by his untiring ecumenical approach to accommodate other Christian sects as well as to forge a better understanding with the Islamic world, without compromising his own Catholic stance. A major theme of his papacy was also his fight for freedom of religion in the Communist bloc: during his term as Pope, he was significant for his contribution to the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe.