March 3rd all day til midnight

1772 - French explorer, Capt. Marion du Fresne of the Mascarin and Marquis de Castries, sights Van Diemen’s Land where a party goes ashore, one Aboriginal is shot and killed, others wounded.

1799 - Torrential rains broke the drought with the Hawkesbury River busting its banks and flooding the grain stores.
Typical; either feast or famine with the water in Oz!

1816 - Not liking the cut of their jib, Aboriginal people killed off 4 white settlers near the Nepean River, NSW.

1818 - Hamilton Hume and James Meehan set out to find an overland route from Sydney to Jervis Bay.

1827 - Having something to say and determined to be heard G.T Howe started publishing the Tasmanian newspaper in Hobart.

1828 - Several deaths from whooping cough occurred for the first time in Sydney including the death of Gov Ralph Darling's son.

1837 Rejecting syphilitic John Batman and the names Batmania and Bearbrass (goodness knows why?!) the powers that were curried favour when The City of Melbourne was named after William Lamb, British Prime Minister and second Viscount Melbourne.
Sidenote-Melbourne in Florida, USA was named in a competition by a former Melbournian after Melbourne, Australia.

1840 - The first race at Flemington was off and racing.

1840 - The first sale of wool by auction in Australia was held in South Australia on this day.

1842 - On the corner of Elizabeth and Victoria Street (the site of the then Melbourne Cattle Market in fact but better known as The Queen Vic Market) the fledgling The Agricultural and Pastoral Society of Australia Felix held its first show.....which was deemed a failure due to the lack of resources in such a young colony and another event was not held until 6 years later when farmers ran amok with ploughing races on the banks of the Moonee Ponds Creek.

1854 - Australia's first telegraph line was opened.

1869 - William Lanne, supposedly the last Tasmanian Aboriginal male, died on this day. His death sparked a scramble for his remains and his body was mutilated in the morgue prior to burial.

1876 - Dockworkers in sunny Qld were granted an 8 hour work day so they could spend more time (fishing, surfing and playing beach cricket) with the family.

1885 - A contingent from NSW to fight in the Sudan departed from Sydney.

1891 - Ah Chi alias Li Ki Hong, Chinese, murdered Ah Gin, Chinese, at Daliak, York.

1891 - "One people, One destiny" was adopted as the slogan for the call for Federation by the National Australasian Convention in Sydney.

1897 - A liquor licence was granted to the Renmark Hotel and it became the first community owned hotel in the Commonwealth and was administered by a trust.

1911 - Feeling like a change of pace, Palmerston became known as Darwin.

1933 - A major national cancer conference warned that people should stay out of the sun or wear some kind of protection if they had to be out in it.

1934 - Bondi Surf Club opened a new Clubhouse opened in style.

1942 - A Japanese destroyer shelled Direction Island in the Cocos group of islands.

1942 - Broome, in Westralia, was bombed by Japanese aircraft , which resulted in many of the women and children being evacuated from the town, then the Japanese went on to bomb Wyndham.

1942 - A DC-3 took off from Java transporting civilians being evacuated and a box of diamonds. This DC-3 arrived over Australia during the Japanese air raid on Broom where it was hit by gunfire and the port engine was set on fire. During the attack two of the passengers died from bullet wounds. The damaged DC-3 force landed intact on the beach at the north side of Carnot Bay, roughly 60 miles north of Broom.

1943 - A Soviet embassy was established in Canberra and an Australian diplomat was posted to Moscow.

1945 - HMS Illustrious became the first ship to use the newly completed Captain Cook Graving Dock at Garden Island Naval Base, Sydney, NSW.

1946 - Eight died in flooding across north Queensland.

1949 - Aboriginal People gained the right to vote in Commonwealth elections...but only if their state/territory laws allowed it or if they were returned servicemen.
To be seen to be doing a great deal when there's bugger all being delivered at all.

1949 - Harold Blair, Aboriginal activist and marvellously talented tenor, announced his engagement to Dorothy Eden. They met at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music where both were taking singing lessons.

1950 - Qantas Empire Airways commenced a Sydney - Tokyo commercial air service.

1954 - Australia claimed the Australian Antarctic Territory via a 2 shilling blue stamp based on a photo taken on this date.

1966 - Gough Whitlam narrowly survived an attempt by the executive to expel him from the Labor Party after he criticised the Federal Executive over its opposition to government funding for church schools.

1967 - Liza Minnelli got hitched to Aussie singer Peter Allen.

1969 - 103 years of Morse Code on Victorian Railways came to an end with the final Morse Code transmission from Mildura to Melbourne on this day.
Message was probably something like "milk and two sugars stop and a couple of bikkies please stop ohhh some of that home made midera tea cake would go down a treat stop a foot rub would be nice, too stop I don't suppose your mother made scones again did she? stop jam and whipped cream would be delish stop hello? hello? HELLO????".

1971 - In Darwin the T&G Building on Smith Street was officially opened by the Hon H.C. Chaney CBE AFC.

1976 - Senior Const. Kevin John Laube, Victoria Police, died whilst on duty.

1978 - Former Governor-General Sir John Robert Kerr resigned from his new appointment as Australia's ambassador to UNESCO in Paris on the day he was supposed to have taken up the post. The resignation followed an outburst of public disapproval over the appointment.

1983 - The Socialist Homosexual Conference Planning Collective was first listed at Surrey Hills, NSW.

1983 - The Commonwealth Minister for Home Affairs and the Environment announced payments to twenty scuba divers for recognition of the help they provided towards protection of Australian maritime heritage.

1990 - The Bombala Railway Line (NSW) was closed.

1990 - Gay & Lesbian Rights Lobby organised a march to protest against the rise of anti-gay violence

1997 - The Holiday Inn opened on The Esplanade in Darwin.

2001 - The Sydney Mardi Gras was dancing through the streets to the theme of Out There, Everywhere.
The lead float was titled Behind the Pink Picket Fence and was intended to send a strong political message about gay and lesbian parents and their children.

2006 - The NSW Supreme Court approved an out-of-court settlement offer made by the Immigration Department to the family of Shayan Badraie, a five-year-old boy who was detained for one year in Woomera and six months in Villawood between 2000 and 2002, resulting in severe psychological trauma. A $400,000 compensation payout was made for the psychological harm he suffered.

2007 - Sydney's Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras was shimmering in style, the theme was Objects of Love.

2008 - A new study by the National Centre in HIV Epidemiology and Clinic Research estimated that HIV infection rates could rise 73 percent in Victoria and 20 percent in Queensland by 2015 if current trends continued. Rates in New South Wales were predicted to decline.

2010 - ACON calls on the Government to introduce rapid testing for HIV following disturbing survey results from a study in Queensland which showed that there are still a proportion of men who remain unaware that they have contracted the virus.

2012 - Mardi Gras in Sydney was adored near and far to the theme of Infinite Love.

2012 - Thousands of Australians were ordered to evacuate their homes in Sydney's northwest and elsewhere in New South Wales state as heavy rainfall flooded rivers and waterways.

2014 - The United Nations' highest court banned Australia from making any use of documents it seized from a lawyer working for East Timor in an arbitration case over a multibillion-dollar oil and gas deal between the two nations.

2015 - Ghillar Michael Anderson, leader of the Euahlayi people and ambassador of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra, wrote an open letter to the United Nations in which he stated that the proposed closures of remote communities were to open up the land for mining.

2018 - HAPPY MARDI GRAS!!!
40 years of Evolution

2nd March in The Fair Isle of Oz through history

1788 - Governor Phillip went for a not-so casual stroll as he was a picky bugger and was looking to see if the agricultural grass was greener at Broken Bay than Sydney Cove.

1829 - Daniel Brown was Hanged at Hobart for murder of a fellow-convict named Stopford at Macquarie Harbour.

1829 - John Salmon was Hanged at Hobart for murder of a fellow-convict named Stopford at Macquarie Harbour.

1839 - Joseph Redman was a greedy bugger when he applied to marry Frances Ann Nevin . The application was knocked back as the greedy bugger was already married with 7 children.

1840 - Patrick Leslie was a leader amongst men...or a drover amongst pastoralists when he drove the first mob of sheep overland from NSW to Moreton Bay.

1840 - The first competitive Agricultural Exhibition was held at Fordham's Hotel in Grenfell Street, Adelaide, where people were flashin' their fancies.

1850 - Mystery was the ships name but there was no mystery as to her fate; she struck a rock when the wind changed whilst sheltering under Swan Island, Tas. and her crew abandoned ship. During the following day the lighthouse keepers assisted the crew to salvage the cargo and much of the gear and fittings, before the Mystery broke up in a gale.

1851 - Excitingly the very first census of Victoria revealed that man had been successfully doing the horizontal limbo with the population hitting 77,345.
I have an idea how they were spending their free time....

1857 - Chu-Ah-Luk was Hanged at Melbourne Gaol for the murder of Ah Pat at Campbell's Creek.

1860 - Stuart departed Chambers Creek on the first of his expeditions to cross from the south to the northern coast.

1860 - The Hall of Commerce was a large iron building in Watt St, Newcastle until it caught alight on this day, was consumed by the flames within an hour and ceased to be a large iron building.

1863 - Const. Thomas Cavanagh (NSW) died whilst on duty.

1865 - The Jardine Expedition north from Carpentaria Downs to establish a settlement at Cape York named Somerset completed its 1,600-mile journey after five months of peril and hardship, travelling over difficult country, and several clashes with the Indigenous residents without loss of human life. Twenty-one horses, the mule, and many of the cattle were lost.

Vale the mule.

1866 - Surprise by name and surprise by nature; the ship Surprise left the Gippsland Lakes for Melbourne on this day and was not seen again.
Surprise!

1884 - Pizarro was sailing from Barrow, England to Cooktown, Queensland with railway material; she passed Gabo Island, Victoria on this day and was never seen again.

1889 - Long Jimmy alias Jimmy Long, a Malay, was Hanged at Fremantle Prison for the murder of Claude Kerr on board a pearling lugger 'Dawn' at Cossack.

1891 - A group of colonial representatives had a knees up in Sydney to form the rules of the Aussie constitution. They tagged Sir Henry Parkes as the president. 

1904 - The second parliament opened and closed with the same Prime Minister, but there were four changes of government and three different Prime Ministers between the 1903 and 1906 federal elections. This was the most unstable of Australia's 40 parliaments.

1916 - Sgt 1/C William Bowen (NSW) died whilst on duty.

1919 - The Main South Railway line (NSW) was opened.

1929 - More than slightly displeased with the reduction in their hard won wages, NSW coal miners staged a strike that lasted all through winter (brrrr) until June the following year.

1933 - The coastline of NSW felt the effects of a tsunami that had originated in Japan.

1942 - Sianta was sank after being torpedoed and shelled by a Japanese submarine 250 nautical miles west of North West Cape, WA. Forty of her crew of sixty-one survived.

1946 - A cyclone generated weather that caused damage to Cairns to Townsville some loss of life.

1949 - A major cyclone hit Gladstone, doing extensive damage to the town.

1955 - Const. McManus (WA) was killed whilst on duty.

1956 - John (King) Kelly, half-brother to Ned, former WA policeman, WW1 ANZAC, and circus stunt rider died in Buenos Aires.

1959 - Standing around leaning on shovels wasn't allowed as work officially began on the Sydney Opera House, although the old tram shed at Bennelong Point had gone the way of the Dodo the year before.

1967 - Prime Minister Holt introduced legislation for a referendum to be held on May 27, 1967.

1971 - Radio station 8HA Alice Springs began broadcasting music.

1971 - Leadbeater's Possum was proclaimed the official animal emblem of Victoria, Australia.

1972 - The last RAAF flight out of Vietnam.

1972 - The first Australian Falcon, the Ford XA, was introduced.

1973 - Boyne was a work boat that was rammed and sunk by the dredge Sir Thomas Hiley at the mouth of the Brisbane River, with one life lost.

1986 - QEII put pen to paper and signed on the dotted line to cut some (but not all, of course) apron string constitutional ties between Australia and Britain.

1987 - The first Aria Awards was held in Sydney but was not televised so therefore did not put anyone off their stroke.

1992 - The Gwabegar Railway Line (NSW) was closed.

1992 - Open Learning University began playing with peoples minds when it started broadcasting on the ABC TV.

1994 – A parcel bomb exploded at the Adelaide office of the National Crime Authority, killing Detective Sergeant Geoffrey Brown and injuring lawyer Peter Wallis.
Dominic Perre was charged but released due to lack of evidence.

1995 - Gay and Lesbian Teachers and Students split as two Executive Committees seek to take control of the Association.

1996 - John Howard became PM of Oz and put everyone right off the very thought of procreation.

1996 - The Oh So Fabulous Mardi Gras glittered its way through Sydney.

1998 - Channel 10 TV won its timeslot with a broadcast of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade.

1999 - Dominic Davies, co-author of The Sexual Politics of Disability, presented a lecture on disability and sexuality.

2002 - The theme of the spectacular Mardi Gras on this day was Happy Mardi Gras!

2004 - And not a can of baked beans in sight...Cyclone Monty shared its lovin' with 210 kmph winds in Westralia.

2005 - A competition for the design of the National Police Memorial in Canberra was launched today.

2009 - In southern Australia rescuers used jet skis, backhoes and human muscle to save dozens of whales and dolphins stranded on Naracoopa Beach on Tasmania state's King Island. Rescuers refloated 54 whales and five bottlenose dolphins. A total of 194 pilot whales and seven dolphins became stranded the previous evening.

2010 - Today was Queensland's wettest day on record, with an area average of 32mm.

2010 - In Australia Seth Enslow, an American motorcycle stuntman twice, broke the world record for the longest distance jumped on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, sailing through the air near Australia's Sydney Harbor to shatter the previous 10-year-old record. Bubba Blackwell set the previous record with a 157 foot (47.85 meters) jump in Las Vegas in 1999.

2012 - Multicultural Affairs became a Ministerial portfolio, with Senator Kate Lundy being promoted to the position of Minister for Multicultural Affairs.

2012 - Sen Const David James Rixon (NSW) died whilst on duty.
Posthumously awarded Commissioner's Valour Award.

2013 - Mardi Gras once again prettified the streets of Sydney with the theme of Generations of Love.

2016 - Pukumani poles, which tell a traditional Tiwi story about the creation of rituals to help the dead enter the spirit world, were restored and placed at the new Australian Centre for Indigenous Knowledges and Education.

Grim, Grand and Gay with a side serving of Gory, Glory and Groovy was March 1st in The Fair Isle of Oz.

Let's not beat about the bush on this one; she's packed with enough content to sink the Titanic 6 times over!

The Gory & The Grim

1816: Thomas Hill was hanged for cutting and maiming a police constable near Parramatta.

1816: William Langford was hanged for highway robbery on the Parramatta Road, robbing Wm. Wright of a silver watch.

1828: William Fowler was hanged at Hobart for the murder of a little girl.

1828: Henry Williamson was hanged at Hobart for the murder of Malcolm Logan at Green Ponds (Kempton).

1858: Edward Brown and William Jones were hanged at Melbourne Gaol for Robbery With Violence at Ararat Racecourse.

1870: A riot occurred in Adelaide during a recession. Men offered "starvation wages" for digging trenches rushed the Treasury Building and were dispersed by mounted police using the flat of their swords.

1943: Senior Constable Frederick Edward Jones, Victoria Police, died whilst on duty.

1982: Const. Stephen Henry, Victoria Police, died whilst on duty.

2016: A coronial inquest into the death of an Aboriginal woman in police custody in Broome (2012) led to vital changes in local custodial procedures.

🎖️ The Grand & The Glory

1862: The Police Regulation Act passed; all existing forces amalgamated to establish the NSW Police Force under Inspector General John McLerie.

1901: Federation fever! The Postmaster-General's Department (PMG) became effective, controlling all postal and (later) telecommunications services.

1901: The Australian Navy was "pupped" as naval and military forces of the States transferred to Commonwealth control.

1914: Australian military aviation was born when Lieutenant Eric Harrison flew a Bristol Boxkite from Point Cook, Victoria.

1940: Establishment of the Australian Legation in the US; Richard Gardiner Casey presented his credentials as Envoy Extraordinary.

1942: HMAS Perth was sunk in the Sunda Strait alongside the USS Houston. 353 of Perth's 680 crew were killed in the battle.

1970: The Indian Pacific transcontinental train successfully completed its first journey, covering 3,961km in 65 hours.

2012: The 150th Anniversary of Policing in NSW.

🌈 The Gay & The Groovy

1965: The nation was stunned when the Australian Amateur Swimming Union banned Olympic champion Dawn Fraser from competition for ten years following the Tokyo Olympics.

1967: Go-Set headlined with The Bee Gees signing to Brian Epstein's NEMS, while the annual Moomba pop concert was banned by Trustees.

1971: Federal Labor frontbencher Bill Hayden backed gay law reform.

1975: Life changed forever as Colour TV was officially introduced. ABC’s The Aunty Jack Show was the first full show in bright technicolour.

1975: Olivia Newton-John won the Grammy for Record of The Year for I Honestly Love You.

2003, 2008, 2014: The Sydney Mardi Gras marched through history with themes like "25 Years of Fabulous" and "Kaleidoscope," drawing hundreds of thousands to the streets.

2010: 5,200 people embraced stark naked on the steps of the Sydney Opera House for a Spencer Tunick photo shoot.

🛤️ The "G-Side" Serving (Progress & Pitfalls)

1836: The Newcastle Breakwater was inspected and declared a "decided failure." When those pioneers set out to fail, they did it spectacularly.

1845: Taswegians busted open their mattresses to deposit pennies in the Hobart Savings Bank on its first day of business.

1856: Civil registration started in New South Wales (including Queensland).

1869: Thousands of pigeons went hungry as Sydney teemed with people trying to spy the Duke of Edinburgh on his visit.

1910: RC Banks unsuccessfully attempted the first powered flight in Australia at Digger's Rest.

1919: The extraordinary Smith's Weekly hit the newsstands, leaving many speechless with its fury and laughter.

1954: Adelaide was rockin' and rollin' to a 5.4 magnitude earthquake.

1993: The Federal Disability Discrimination Bill made discrimination unlawful on the basis of AIDS/HIV.

2015: The Matagarup Aboriginal Refugee Camp was set up on Heirisson Island in Perth.


💡 Did You Know?
While we celebrate Australia Day in January, March 1st is arguably the day the nation actually started "acting" like a single country.
On this day in 1901, the individual colonial militias were officially disbanded and reborn as the Commonwealth Military Forces. It was the first time Australians from every state wore the same badge and answered to one single government. Essentially, March 1st is the Australian Army’s official birthday—over 120 years of service that started with a simple paperwork transfer!