Born on this day
Saturday, April 14, 1860. : George Robertson, co-founder of Australia’s largest bookseller, Angus and Robertson, is born.
George Robertson was born on 14 April 1860 in Scotland. At age 21 he emigrated to Australia, arriving in February 1882, and within four days had secured himself a position working at a Sydney bookshop. Within a year he was joined by fellow Scotsman David Angus, who also worked at the bookstore until he decided to open his own bookstore in Market Street, Sydney, in 1884. Robertson joined Angus in 1886, investing his savings into the bookshop, and thus began the great partnership of Angus & Robertson.
Within ten years the bookstore had grown into a thriving enterprise, and it moved into larger premises in Castlereagh St, Sydney, where it branched out into publishing as well. Robertson had an intuitive flair for recognising talent, and was largely responsible for the surging careers of such Australian writers as Henry Lawson, AB ‘Banjo’ Paterson, Norman Lindsay, May Gibbs and CJ Dennis. Robertson continued alone with the business after partner Angus retired in 1900. In 1907 the partnership was converted into the public company of Angus & Robertson Limited, which was spearheaded by Robertson until he died in 1933.
Born on this day
Saturday, April 14, 1866. : Annie Sullivan, teacher of deaf-blind student Helen Keller, is born.
Annie, or Anne, Sullivan was born on 14 April 1866 in Feeding Hills, Massachusetts, the daughter of Irish farmers who left Ireland in 1847 because of the Irish Potato Famine. When Annie was eight, her mother died from tuberculosis, and when she was ten her father deserted her and her siblings, leaving them at the Massachusetts State Infirmary in Tewksbury. Annie was partially blind as a result of contracting the eye disease trachoma at age five. In 1880, she entered the Perkins School for the Blind where she underwent surgery and regained some of her sight. After graduating as class valedictorian in 1886, she began teaching Helen Keller.
Helen Keller lost her senses of sight and hearing as a result of a fever, possibly scarlet fever or meningitis, in February 1882 when she was 19 months old. Her loss of ability to communicate at such an early developmental age was very traumatic for her and her family. Subject to severe tantrums, Helen was a challenge for Annie Sullivan, then merely a 20-year-old. Her first task was to instil discipline in the spoiled girl. Annie’s big breakthrough in communication with Helen came one day when Helen realised that the motions Annie was making on her palm, while running cool water over her palm from a pump, symbolised the idea of “water”. From that point on, Helen nearly exhausted Sullivan by demanding the names of all the other familiar objects in her silent, dark world.
Annie was able to teach Helen to think intelligibly and to speak using the Tadoma method, which involved touching the lips and throats of others as they spoke, feeling the vibrations, and spelling of alphabetical characters in the palm of Helen’s hand. She also learned to read English, French, German, Greek, and Latin in Braille. In 1888, Keller and Sullivan attended the Perkins Institution together, then New York City’s Wright-Humasen School, the Cambridge School for Young Ladies, and Radcliffe College. Keller graduated from Radcliffe in 1904, after which the two moved together to Wrentham, Massachusetts, and lived on a benefactor’s farm. After a short, unhappy marriage to Harvard University instructor John A Macy, Sullivan returned to live with Keller. Annie Sullivan died on 20 October 1936, having left the legacy in Helen Keller of a deaf/blind author, activist and lecturer who inspired many others to success.
Australian History
Thursday, April 14, 1870. : Gold is discovered near the present-day town of Gulgong, sparking a major goldrush.
Gulgong is a small town in the Central Tablelands of New South Wales. Its name is believed to be derived from the Wiradjuri word for “deep waterhole”. The earliest European forays into the Gulgong region occurred within a few years after William Cox completed the first inland road to Bathurst, following the successful expedition of Lawson, Blaxland and Wentworth across the Blue Mountains. Cox’s own sons expanded their property from the Mudgee region into Gulgong, establishing ‘Guntawang’ cattle station in 1822. Although conflicts with the Wiradjuri caused problems, white settlement continued to expand.
Gold was first discovered in the Gulgong region in 1866, but early discoveries were not promising. However, a significant find was made on 14 April 1870 by shepherd Tom Saunders, from Guntawang station. A major goldrush in Gulgong ensued, with the region’s population swelling by 500 within a few weeks. When the town of Gulgong was officially gazetted in 1872, the population was around 20000.
In the decade between 1870 and 1880, an estimated 15000 kg of gold was extracted, but the diggings were being exhausted. Gulgong’s population had dropped to 1212 by 1881, after which it relied on wheat and sheep to sustain the local economy.
Australian History
Monday, April 14, 1986. : The winning entry is selected for the design of a flag for the Australian territory of Christmas Island.
The Territory of Christmas Island is a small, non-self-governing Territory of Australia located in the Indian Ocean, 2,360 km northwest of Perth in Western Australia and 500 km south of Jakarta, Indonesia. It was named by Captain William Mynors of the East India Ship Company vessel, the Royal Mary, when he arrived on Christmas Day in 1643. Following the discovery of nearly pure phosphate of lime caused the island to be annexed by the British Crown in 1888. After World War II, the United Kingdom transferred sovereignty to Australia: the first Australian Official Representative arrived in 1958 and was replaced by an Administrator in 1968. Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands together are called Australia’s Indian Ocean Territories (IOTs) and since 1997 share a single Administrator resident on Christmas Island. As of 2011, the population of Christmas Island was approximately 2000.
In 1986, a competition to design a flag to represent Christmas Island was held. The winning entry was selected on 14 April 1986, and former resident of Silver City and Rigging Supervisor with the Phosphate Mining Company of Christmas Island, Tony Couch, was awarded the prize money of $100. However, the flag was not designated as the official flag of Christmas Island until Australia Day 2002. As a territory of Australia, Christmas Island still carries the Australian flag as well.
The flag is divided into two triangles: blue for the sea and green for the vegetation. The Southern Cross features in the blue half, while the image of a Golden Bosun Bird, endemic to Christmas Island, is seen in the green triangle. A green map of Christmas Island on a gold disc is positioned in the centre of the flag.
Australian History
Wednesday, April 14, 1999. : A supercell dumps hail and wreaks havoc on Sydney, Australia.
Large hail is not an uncommon phenomenon in New South Wales, and during the summer months, Sydney, the capital city of New South Wales, is often beset by wild thunderstorms, although they are less likely in Autumn. On the evening of 14 April 1999, a supercell of a ferocity previously unparalleled in the city’s records, hit Sydney. Hailstones hit at over 200 kph, damaging over 35,000 buildings, destroying roofs and damaging thousands of cars. There were reports of hailstones up to the size of cricket balls. Within a few hours of the storm hitting, the Government declared a state of emergency. The total insured damages bill exceeded AUD$1.4 billion, making it the most costly natural disaster in Australian history at the time, surpassing the cost of the 1989 Newcastle earthquake and the cost incurred when Tropical Cyclone Tracy hit Darwin in 1974.
World History
Monday, April 14, 0070. : Nearly 1,000 Jewish Zealots commit mass suicide at the desert fortress of Masada, rather than be captured by the Romans.
Masada is an ancient mountaintop fortress in Israel, located atop a high mesa at the edge of the Judean Desert and on the western shore of the Dead sea. The name Masada comes from the Hebrew word “metzude”, which means “the mountain castle” or the “stronghold”. It was transformed into a fortress palace by Herod the Great who, in 40 B.C., sought to escape from Mattathias Antigonus, who had been made king by the Parthians.
For centuries, the Jews had revolted against Roman rule in their land, and the Romans became increasingly violent in their suppression of Jewish revolt. Jewish Zealots took control of Masada, which had been occupied by the Romans after Herod’s death in 4 B.C., dispensing with the garrisons of Roman soldiers there in a surprise attack. The Zealots then fortified themselves against Rome. In 70 AD, the Romans conquered Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple, but Masada remained a fortification of the Jewish Zealots. Three years later, Roman General Flavius Silva marched on Masada with between 10,000 and 15,000 soldiers who, after failed attempts to breach the fortress’s wall, built a circumvallation wall and then a rampart against the western face of the plateau, using thousands of tons of stones and beaten earth, whilst the Jews held siege in the fortress. On top of this ramp, a siege tower was erected from which the fortress was attacked with flaming torches, missile-throwing machines called ballistae, and a battering ram.