21 October in Australian history

1800 Where there's a fat sheep there's a fair wether....the good ship Buffalo toddled off to England from Oz with 6 sample Merino fleeces from John Macarthur...er, Mrs Macarthur who did all the hard yakka.

1818 Michael Howe went a' bushranging, changed his title from convict to "Lieutenant Governor of the woods" and ended up in a sticky mess; being shot by Private William Pugh and convict Thomas Worrall will do that, even on the banks of the Shannon River, Tasmania.

1886 - George Chaffey signed a mad-arse agreement with the Victorian Govt to knock together an irrigation settlement at Mildura.

1890 - Proclamation Day on 21 October 1890 was the real beginning of self-government in Western Australia. Proclamation Day was celebrated throughout the Colony; streets were lined with decorations, and events including sports, picnics and, in Perth itself, a 'Monster Tea'. At night fireworks and balls were staged. For many years after 1890 a public holiday known as Proclamation Day was celebrated on 21 October each year and in recent years ceremonies have been arranged on 21 October to commemorate the establishment of the State's Constitution.

1915 -  Vera Deakin, daughter of former PM Alfred Deakin, established Australia's Red Cross Missing and Wounded Enquiry Bureau in Cairo.

1940 Pastor Doug Nicholls made a basic plea for Indigenous Peoples to be treated as equals.

Townsville Daily Bulletin

1957 - Excitement, peoples! Australia's very first automatic telephone weather service made it's grand entrance in Melbourne today.

1969 - Zelda D'Aprano went to the Commonwealth Building, where a number of government offices were located, and chained herself to the entrance of the building in protest for Equal Pay.

1972 - Yippee! The Snowy Mountain Hydro-Electric Scheme was officially done and dusted, opened and online.

1978 – Civilian pilot Frederick Valentich went missing in a Cessna 182 over Bass Strait south of Melbourne, after reporting contact with an unidentified aircraft.

1985 - Throughout October 1985 Australian unions carried out industrial bans targeting the racist regime in South Africa. These covered aviation, shipping, building, mail, telecommunications and other industries, then finished with a march and rally in Sydney outside South African Airways on October 21. Their action came after the 1985 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting(CHOGM) meeting in the Bahamas watered down sanctions against apartheid.

2000 - The newly built Melbourne Museum was officially flung open for the great unwashed masses to mass.

2002 – Two people were killed in the Monash University shooting, while five others were injured.

July 6 in Oz history

 Ha!
Discovered many of my long reliable history bookmarks are now doing the whole,
"404 we don't know you, new webpage, who dis?" 
Keeping me out of mischief hunting down new RELIABLE web sources.

1813 Elizabeth Macarthur, manager of Merino sheep on Elizabeth Farm whilst the troublesome spouse was sticking his oar into all sorts of mischief, sent the first commercial shipment of wool to Britain.

Elizabeth Macarthur 

1841 Edward John Eyre, was out for a Sunday perambulation post Sunday lunch when he tripped over the King's River, just short of his intended Final Destination of King George's Sound. Finding the river too high to cross on horse back, he tip-toed through the tulips and trout to t'other side.

1863 Letters, of the Patent variety not the air-mail sort, were blessed and signed by Queen Vicky annexing the Top End from the Croweaters in South Australia.

1878 The Main South Railway Line (NSW) was flung open from Bethungra to Junee.

1914 The railway line from Crib Point to the HMAS Cerberus Naval Base (Vic) was opened with gay abandon.

1924 The Mount Hope Branch Line (NSW) was closed from Matakana to Mount Hope.

1936 The Final Destination of the Derwent Valley Railway Line, Tasmania, was reached today when they got to Kallista.

1943 Darwin, capital of the Northern Territory, was heavily bombed by Japanese 64 times, today being the last of the heavy bombing although less severe attacks continued.

1955 The Westland District Second World War memorial (RSA building) at Sewell St, Hokitika, NZ was officially opened today by local MP Mr J.B. Kent. The two-storey building incorporated a lobby, the local RSA clubrooms and a social hall. This building was closed because of earthquake risk in June 2013 and demolished in July 2014. The new Hokitika-Westland memorial hall and clubrooms was opened on the site of the old building on 28 February 2017.

1963 The Advertiser (of Adelaide) let it be known to all and sundry that the glorious trolley buses that had toddled about for 31 years were to be no more after the 12th July.

1964 Warrant Officer Kevin Conway from Brisbane became first Australian serviceman to be killed in Vietnam.

1970 Draft resister Karl Armstrong was sentenced in Melbourne to eight days jail for defying the fine imposed for refusing to register.

1971 Three thousand demonstrators caused mayhem at the first ‘Springboks’ match in Sydney at the SCG. There were 59 arrests.

1972 Commonwealth police raided DRU (Draft Resisters Union) headquarters Belmore Street Enmore looking for Peter Galvin.

1979 Brand spanking new LGBT news print media The Star Observer was thrust out into the world.

1983 The AIDS Action Committee (AAC) requested that its role on the NSW advisory AIDS committee be upgraded after it was relegated to merely writing material about AIDS. 

1983 In Lismore, NSW, a local social group, Summerland Gay People, was formed.