50 Fun Facts About Australian History

Which Dutch ship made the first documented European landing in Australia in 1606?

Captained by Willem Janszoon, it belonged to the Dutch East India Company; the Dutch called the continent New Holland.

Which Dutch navigator's 1642 voyage first reached Van Diemen's Land and New Zealand?

The same voyage was the first to sight Fiji; Van Diemen's Land was renamed Tasmania in 1856.

Which English buccaneer landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688 and again in 1699?

His published descriptions of Aboriginal people were widely read in Britain.

In what year did James Cook chart the east coast and claim it for Britain?

He took formal possession on 21–22 August on Possession Island, off Cape York.

Where did Cook's Endeavour anchor ten days after reaching the east coast in April 1770?

Joseph Banks, who sailed with Cook, recommended it as a penal settlement site in 1779.

On which date in 1788 was the settlement at Sydney Cove established?

The Australian Natives Association later lobbied successfully to make it the national day.

Who was the first Governor of New South Wales, arriving with the First Fleet?

In 1788 he also set up a subsidiary settlement on Norfolk Island, hoping for naval timber and flax.

What killed about half the Aboriginal population of the Sydney region in April 1789?

The source of the outbreak remains controversial, with settlers and Indonesian fishermen both suggested.

Which governor was deposed in the 1808 Rum Rebellion?

It remains the only successful armed takeover of government in Australian history.

Which wool pioneer worked closely with the Corps that overthrew Bligh?

His wife Elizabeth Macarthur was one of the colony's most successful agriculturalists.

Who served as the last autocratic Governor of New South Wales, from 1810 to 1821?

Under him the colony began its transition from penal settlement to civil society.

Who crossed the Blue Mountains in 1813, opening the way to the Central Tablelands?

A road across the mountains was completed in 1815, opening the pastures west of the Great Dividing Range.

Who led the first circumnavigation of Australia in HMS Investigator in 1801–02?

A few years earlier he and Bass had sailed around Tasmania to prove it was an island.

Which explorer discovered the Darling River in 1828 and followed the Murrumbidgee into the Murray?

His 1828 expedition went along the Macquarie River; the second, in 1829, reached the Murray.

Which 1860 expedition made the first south–north crossing of the continent to the Gulf of Carpentaria?

Both leaders died in 1861 at Coopers Creek, hours after their support party had left.

In 1824 a penal settlement was founded at Moreton Bay on the site of which modern city?

By 1850 its population had reached 8,000, with pastoralists spreading into the Darling Downs.

The Swan River colony of 1829, at modern Fremantle and Perth, was notable for being what?

Western Australia later accepted convicts and was only granted self-government in 1890.

The Province of South Australia (1836) was based on whose theory of "systematic colonisation"?

It was a privately financed settlement rather than a penal colony.

In 1835 John Batman negotiated the transfer of 40,000 hectares from which people, at Port Phillip?

The Port Phillip District separated from New South Wales as the colony of Victoria in 1851.

Approximately how many convicts were transported to Australia between 1788 and 1868?

They went to New South Wales, Van Diemen's Land and Western Australia; transport to NSW was suspended in 1840.

Van Diemen's Land officially changed its name to Tasmania in which year?

Convict transportation to the island had ended three years earlier.

Who discovered gold near Bathurst in February 1851, sparking the gold rushes?

The population jumped from 430,000 in 1851 to 1,170,000 in 1861.

At which goldfield town did miners build the Eureka Stockade in 1854?

The Ballarat Reform League demanded manhood suffrage, licence reform and land for small farms.

Which colony separated from New South Wales in 1859 and was immediately self-governing?

Britain had agreed to the separation in 1857.

In what year was bushranger Ned Kelly captured and executed for murder?

Several Kelly gang members were the sons of impoverished small farmers, which fed his folk-hero image.

Which NSW premier's 1889 Tenterfield Oration was pivotal to the federation cause?

He spoke in 1890 of "the crimson thread of kinship" running through all Australians.

Who was sworn in as Australia's first prime minister when the Commonwealth was proclaimed in 1901?

Governor-General Lord Hopetoun proclaimed the Commonwealth the same day.

Which city was the seat of federal government from 1901 to 1927?

The Federal Capital Territory was carved from New South Wales in 1911 for the planned capital.

In what year did women gain the vote in Commonwealth elections?

The same law excluded most Aboriginal people from the franchise.

Which act, among the first passed by the new parliament in 1901, underpinned the White Australia policy?

Its dictation test was only replaced by an entry-permit system under the Migration Act 1958.

On what date in 1915 did the Anzacs land on the Gallipoli peninsula?

The date became Anzac Day, a national holiday centred on nationhood, brotherhood and sacrifice.

Which Australian general took command of the Australian Corps in May 1918?

The five Australian divisions had been united into the Corps in November 1917.

Which prime minister split Labor after losing the October 1916 conscription referendum?

He and 23 supporters left Labor to form a Nationalist government with the opposition.

Which racehorse dominated Australian racing from 1929 to 1931, winning fourteen races in a row?

He won the 1930 Melbourne Cup after an assassination attempt, then the Agua Caliente Handicap in 1932.

What first-class record score did the 21-year-old Don Bradman make at the SCG in 1930?

He made the runs in just 415 minutes in a Sheffield Shield match.

In which year was the Sydney Harbour Bridge officially opened?

The opening came in the depths of the Depression, when unemployment is often cited as peaking at 29 per cent.

Which city suffered the first enemy attack on the Australian mainland, in February 1942?

Japanese mini-submarines also raided Sydney Harbour later that year.

Along which track in New Guinea did Australians repulse Japanese advances in 1942?

The fighting ran from July to November in the highlands, defending Port Moresby.

Which wartime prime minister died weeks before the war ended and was replaced by Ben Chifley?

Curtin had warned in 1936 that depending on British forces for defence was too dangerous a hazard.

Who founded the Royal Flying Doctor Service, the world's first air ambulance, in 1928?

Kingsford Smith, meanwhile, flew the Pacific from the US to Australia that same year in the Southern Cross.

Which prime minister became Australia's longest-serving, dominating politics from 1949?

His Liberal–Country coalition won every federal election until 1972.

Which prime minister drowned while swimming at a surf beach in December 1967?

He had replaced Menzies in 1965 and was succeeded by Gorton and then McMahon.

What did the 1967 referendum change about the constitution?

It also let the federal parliament legislate for Aboriginal people.

Which Governor-General dismissed the Whitlam government on 11 November 1975?

Whitlam's government had not controlled the Senate, which blocked much of its legislation.

Which Labor leader beat the coalition in March 1983 and won again in 1984, 1987 and 1990?

His government floated the dollar and deregulated capital markets.

Which 1992 High Court decision held that Indigenous native title survived the arrival of English law?

It led to the first national Native Title legislation.

A mass shooting at which Tasmanian site prompted the Howard government's national gun laws?

The site had been a notorious convict settlement in the 19th century.

In which year did Australians vote in a referendum that rejected becoming a republic?

Keating had set up a Republic Advisory Committee in 1993 to examine the options.

Which prime minister issued the apology to Aboriginal Australians for past policies?

His government also ratified the Kyoto Protocol and dismantled Work Choices.

Who became Australia's first female prime minister in June 2010?

Enid Lyons had been the first woman elected to the House of Representatives back in 1943.