Born on this day
Monday, September 12, 1910. : Alexander Langmuir, the man credited with saving thousands of lives through his work on epidemiology, is born.
Alexander Duncan Langmuir, born on 12 September 1910, is considered to be the father of infectious disease epidemiology. Epidemiology is the science of studying the causes, distribution, and control of disease in populations. Because it is the science of connecting disease or injury with a cause, it enables the possibility of eliminating that cause.
In 1949, Langmuir created and headed up the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) at the National Communicable Disease Center in Atlanta, now known as the Federal Centre for Disease Control and Prevention. He has been credited with saving countless lives with his innovative research and analytical approach. His work contributed significantly to the virtual elimination of polio in the United States. Dr David Henderson, deputy of the assistant secretary of health at the Department of Health and Human Services, led the World Health Organization’s (WHO) program to eradicate smallpox. However, Henderson maintained that the real credit should have gone to Langmuir.
Langmuir died on November 22, 1993. His legacy lives on in the better quality of life enjoyed by millions throughout the world, thanks to his powerful contribution to the science of epidemiology.
Australian History
Tuesday, September 12, 1854. : Australia’s first steam train makes its maiden voyage in Melbourne.
Melbourne is the capital city of Victoria, Australia. Although it was established as a settlement in 1835 and the new township surveyed and named in 1837, Melbourne quickly grew to rival Sydney. The discovery in 1851 of the Victorian goldfields which were richer than those discovered in New South Wales spurred the city on to even greater wealth, and greater rivalry.
Victoria became the first Australian state to have a completed railway line. Although South Australia had begun operations of horse-drawn trains on 18 May 1854 between Goolwa and Port Elliot, mechanical railways were first established in Victoria in 1854, with work on the line commencing in March 1853. At first, trains were ordered from Robert Stephenson and Company of the United Kingdom, but shipping delays meant that the first trains had to be built locally. Robertson, Martin and Smith built Australia’s first steam locomotive in ten weeks at a cost of £2700.
The first steam train in Australia, consisting of two first-class carriages and one second-class carriage, made its maiden voyage on 12 September 1854. It ran along the four-kilometre track from Flinders Street to Sandridge, now Port Melbourne, a ten-minute journey. Aboard the first train were Lieutenant-Governor Sir Charles Hotham and Lady Hotham. Upon arriving at its destination at Station Pier, the train was met with gun-salutes by the warships HMS Electra and HMS Fantome.
The following year, the locomotives ordered from the UK arrived, and were named Melbourne, Sandridge, Victoria and Yarra.
Australian History
Monday, September 12, 1892. : Ambulance services commence in Queensland, Australia, the first such service anywhere in the world.
The Queensland Ambulance Service in its current form was established on 1 July 1991, with the amalgamation of 96 individual Queensland Ambulance Service Transport Brigades (QATB). However, Queensland’s first ambulance service began operations almost a century earlier.
The need for an ambulance service in Queensland became apparent following an incident at the Brisbane Show in August of 1892. Stories vary, but the common element is that a rider fell from his horse and broke his leg at the showgrounds. The injury was either exacerbated when helpful bystanders assisted the rider, walking him from the field or, according to other accounts, when first aid personnel rushed onto the field and threw the man into a stretcher before bundling him off the field without due care for his condition. Witnessing the event was Military medic Seymour Warrian of the Army Medical Corps. Seeing how the victim should have been immobilised, Warrian canvassed support to form the new City Ambulance Transport Brigade, or CATB.
The first meeting of the brigade was held on 12 September 1892. Operations of Queensland’s first ambulance station were initially conducted from the Brisbane Newspaper Company. Officers on night duty spent the night on rolls of newspaper on the floor rather than beds. Transportation of victims was limited to being on foot as, while there was a stretcher, there was no vehicle. As donations flowed in, more equipment was able to be purchased. After first aid kits were put together, one of the first major changes was a stretcher attached to a set of cart wheels, which could then be conveyed by two men at a running pace. Later, the first horse with harness for a cart was purchased.
Warrian’s vision of a professional ambulance service was innovative, and the service was the first of its kind anywhere in the world. Soon other cities, both in Australia and around the world, followed suit.
World History
Thursday, September 12, 1878. : Cleopatra’s Needle, an ancient Egyptian obelisk, is erected on London’s Thames Embankment.
Cleopatra’s Needle is an ancient Egyptian obelisk of red granite, about 20m high, and inscribed with hieroglyphics. The obelisk has no actual connection with Cleopatra, but was originally erected in the Egyptian city of Heliopolis on the orders of Thutmose III. Rameses II added further inscriptions commemorating his military victories some 200 years later. There are in fact two Cleopatra’s needles; one in London, the other in New York.
Cleopatra’s needle in London was presented to England in 1819 by Mehemet Ali, viceroy of Egypt, in recognition of the victories of Lord Nelson at the Battle of the Nile and Sir Ralph Abercromby at the Battle of Alexandria in 1801. Transporting the obelisk was to prove too costly for the British government. It was not until 1877 that anatomist and dermatologist Sir William James Erasmus Wilson, sponsored its transportation to London at a cost of around £10,000. Engineer John Dixon designed a special iron cylinder, 28m long and 5m in diameter for transporting the obelisk. However, the obelisk was nearly lost at sea when it became separated from the ship towing it during a gale in the Bay of Biscay. After drifting for many days, it was rescued by an English ship and taken to Spain for repairs. The obelisk arrived in Gravesend on 21 January 1878, and was erected on the Embankment on 12 September 1878.
World History
Wednesday, September 12, 2001. : US President George Bush declares war on terrorism.
In the wake of the terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001, US President George Bush declared that the USA would use all of its resources to wage a war on terrorism. Bush acknowledged that such a war would be a long-term, sustained conflict, and formally declared war on terrorism on 12 September 2001. The war on terror began on 8 October 2001, as British and American forces staged an air bombardment of Afghanistan, where the perpetrator of the terror attacks, Osama bin Laden, was believed to be hiding.
Osama bin Laden was shot numerous times and killed at his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan by US Navy Seals on 2 May 2011.