Australian History
Monday, September 18, 1797. : Coal is officially discovered in New South Wales, Australia, providing the foundation for the establishment of Newcastle.
Newcastle is the second largest city in New South Wales, Australia. It was not a settlement at the time when a group of convict escapees discovered the first-known coal deposits in 1791. The discovery was not made known, as the convicts sought obscurity rather than notoriety. It was a British soldier, Lieutenant John Shortland, who found a coal seam while looking for the escapees in 1797.
Shortland first found a river which had been overlooked by Captain Cook who had charted the eastern coast 27 years earlier. Shortland named this river the “Hunter”, after Governor Hunter, but then discovered a rich seam of coal, on 18 September 1797. For some time after this, the river was known as the Coal River. Shortland took a sample of the coal back to Sydney. Within a year, worker on ships began collecting coal from the riverbanks and selling it in Sydney. The first export of local coal took place in 1799.
In order to have sufficient workers to mine the coal and cut timber, a convict camp for particularly hardened criminals was established in 1801. It was initially known as King’s Town, after Governor King. From this settlement came the thriving city of Newcastle.
World History
Monday, September 18, 1876. : A sea monster is reported to have been seen in the Straits of Malacca.
Reports have abounded of sightings of sea monsters for thousands of years. Usually, such sightings involve only a small number of witnesses. However, occasionally such creatures have been seen by large numbers of people. On 18 September 1876, the ‘Straits Times Overland Journal’ ran an editorial, reporting on an unusual sea creature which had been seen by a Captain and his shipload of passengers one week earlier.
The “monster” was seen in the Malacca Straits, which link the Indian and Pacific Oceans between the Malay Peninsula and the Indonesian island of Sumatra. In his log, John W Webster, Captain of the SS Nestor, described the creatures as having a body which was “quite fifty feet broad” and its total length “over two hundred feet”. Its head “was about twelve feet broad and appeared … about six feet above the water.” It had a “long dragon tail with black and white scales”. The monster continued its course alongside the ship, taking no note of either ship or occupants, who were entertained by its presence for about half an hour.
World History
Wednesday, September 18, 1895. : Daniel Palmer, founder of chiropractic treatment, makes the first chiropractic adjustment on a patient.
Daniel David Palmer was born on 7 March 1845 near Toronto, Canada. His family moved to the United States when he was very young. Originally, he worked as a magnetic healer in Davenport, Iowa, but two patients who both presented with problems associated with spinal disorders changed his focus. Palmer corrected the spinal dislocation of the first patient, whose deafness immediately cleared up. This occurred on 18 September 1895. Palmer’s second patient, who was suffering from heart disease, also improved after adjustment of a spinal dislocation which Palmer believed exerted pressure on the nerves leading to the heart.
From this, Palmer extrapolated the theory that decreased nerve flow could cause disease, and that misplaced spinal vertebrae could cause pressure on the nerves. Thus, he developed the theory of chiropractic treatment.
World History
Monday, September 18, 1961. : UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld is killed in a plane crash.
Dag Hammarskjöld was born in Sweden on July 29 1905. His distinguished career in public service included Swedish financial affairs, Swedish foreign relations, and global international affairs. He was Secretary-General of the United Nations from 1953 to 1961. An excellent diplomat, in 1954-55 he personally negotiated the release of American soldiers captured by the Chinese in the Korean War. During the Suez Canal crisis of 1956, he was instrumental in getting the UN to nullify the use of force by Israel, France, and Great Britain following Egyptian President Nasser’s commandeering of the Canal.
Hammarskjöld was on a peacekeeping mission the night he was killed, September 18, 1961. His plane crashed near the border between Katanga and North Rhodesia. It was never established whether his plane was deliberately shot down or the crash was accidental.
World History
Thursday, September 18, 1997. : Media tycoon Ted Turner establishes the United Nations Foundation with a pledge of one billion dollars.
Ted Turner, born Robert Edward “Ted” Turner III on 19 November 1938, is a media tycoon and philanthropist. As co-founder of CNN, Turner Classic Movies, and Cartoon Network, together with a series of shrewd business purchases, Turner has become one of America’s wealthiest men. On 18 September 1997, Turner pledged one billion US dollars, an estimated third of his wealth, to establish the United Nations Foundation. The UN Foundation supports the charter of the United Nations to address issues such as prevention of the spread of HIV/AIDS, environmental conservation and the prevention of deadly conflict.