Born on this day
Thursday, September 19, 1839. : Chocolate manufacturer George Cadbury is born.
George Cadbury was born on 19 September 1839 in Edgbaston, United Kingdom. The son of a tea and coffee drinker, he was compelled at an early age to take over the business when both his parents suffered ill health. After 5 years, he and his older brother Richard developed the popular use of cocoa as a drink, sold as a powder so customers could add water or milk. Over time, the brothers improved the quality of the cocoa through developing a new cocoa bean processing technique.
George Cadbury was an employer who truly practised the tenet that if you look after your employees, they’ll look after you. He built homes for his workers among attractive surroundings and gardens, was generous with time off, provided sporting and recreational facilities, provided health treament and a retirement fund. This was a hugely progressive step from the workhouse conditions endured by many employees of the time.
Australian History
Friday, September 19, 1919. : The Great Ocean Road project in Victoria is officially launched.
The Great Ocean Road is a scenic highway in southern Victoria which begins at Torquay and extends west for 243 km, ending at Allansford, just east of Warrnambool. Hailed as an engineering feat for its time, the road was built by around 3000 returned servicemen, or Diggers, following World War I.
The concept of such a road was first put forward as early as the 1870s. Settlers along the coast could only reach the larger communities inland via rough tracks over the Otway ranges, so calls were made for either a rail or road route connecting these otherwise isolated coastal settlements. Shortly after Geelong businessmen E H Lascelles and Walter Howard Smith proposed a road be built between Geelong and Lorne, the Country Roads Board (CRB) was formed in 1912. Following World War I, CRB chairman William Calder suggested that returned Diggers be gainfully employed on various road projects, including a road extending from Barwon Heads to Warrnambool. The plan was soundly approved by Mayor of Geelong, Howard Hitchcock, who saw not only the value in such a road for tourism, but also as a permanent memorial to the many thousands of soldiers who lost their lives in the Great War.
The Great Ocean Road Trust was officially formed on 22 March 1918, and surveying began in August of that year. On 19 September 1919, the project to construct the Great Ocean Road was officially launched by the Premier of Victoria, Harry Lawson. Taking 13 years to complete, the road is regarded as a tremendous engineering feat for the 1920s. With the absence of any machinery at the time, it required back-breaking manual labour as the men had only shovels, picks and horse-drawn carts to hew out the rocky cliffside. The first section, extending from Lorne to the Eastern View section of the Great Ocean Road, was officially opened on 18 March 1922. The second official opening occurred on 27 April 1932, and this celebrated the extension of the road to Warrnambool.
Although modernised since its original construction, the Great Ocean Road continues to stand as the world’s largest memorial to the soldiers of World War I.
World History
Friday, September 19, 1783. : The first hot-air balloon is tested – with a duck, a sheep and a rooster as its passengers.
Jacques Étienne Montgolfier was the French pioneer of the hot air balloon. Montgolfier was born on 6 January 1745. Together with his brother Joseph-Michel, he developed and tested the hot air balloon, progressing to untethered flights. On 19 September 1783, he tested the first balloon to carry passengers, using a duck, a sheep and a rooster as his subjects. The demonstration occurred in Paris and was witnessed by King Louis XVI. The rooster did not survive the landing.
The first manned, untethered balloon flight occurred on November 21 of that year, and carried two men.
World History
Thursday, September 19, 1799. : A huge ball blazing with white light is witnessed throughout England.
Unidentified Flying Objects are not restricted to the twentieth century and later. On 19 September 1799, all of England was apparently witness to a spectacular sight. The “Gentleman’s Magazine” reported that at 8:30pm, a huge ball, blazing with a brilliant white light and the occasional red spark, was seen to pass from the northwest to the southeast. The phenomenon apparently moved quickly and silently, with a gentle “tremulous motion”.
World History
Thursday, September 19, 1985. : Mexico City is hit by the first of two devastating earthquakes.
Mexico City, the capital of Mexico, is built on landfill above the mud and sediment of an ancient lake. In 1985, the city boasted a population of 23 million, larger than the entire population of Australia in the year 2005. On the morning of 19 September 1985 an earthquake measuring 8.1 on the Richter scale struck Mexico’s western coast. It affected an area of 13, 875 square kilometres. The mud of the lakebed acted as a spring in response to the earth’s upthrusts and vibrations. This compounded the damage to buildings, as many had not been built to withstand the force of such movement, and building collapse was the major contributing factor to the high death toll.
Thirty-six hours later, a huge aftershock hit the city, registering 7.3 on the Richter scale. Many more were killed, and buildings which survived the first earthquake came crashing down in the second. Officially, the death toll for the two quakes was around five thousand. Unofficially, it was estimated that the final figure was closer to 30,000.
World History
Thursday, September 19, 1991. : Otzi the Iceman, a 5,300-year-old Bronze Age hunter, is found.
Otzi the Iceman was discovered on 19 September 1991 by two German mountaineers. His frozen, preserved body was found at an altitude of 3,200m in the Alps on the Italian-Austrian border. Samples taken from his stomach indicated that his last meal consisted of meat, probably from an alpine goat, the bones of which were found nearby, wheat, plants and plums. Otzi was found alongside a copper axe, a knife, a bow made out of yew and 14 wooden arrows.
Otzi’s probable cause of death was an arrowhead buried beneath his upper left shoulder. Because he has been so perfectly preserved, scientists have even been able to determine the position from which the arrow was fired, and the fact that it missed vital organs, but probably caused nerve damage and internal haemorrhaging.