Timeline: 1901 – 1910
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1901 |
January 1 |
Federation of Australia comes into being with the Federal Constitution proclaimed. Historical documents relating to Federation. |
January 30 |
Victorian pensioners follow those of NSW in receive one shilling a day pension. |
January |
BHP builds a port at Hummock Hill, SA, for shipment of iron ore from its Iron Knob mine. The town becomes Whyalla. |
March 31 |
Frederick Slade Drake-Brockman sails from Fremantle to Wyndham at the beginning of an exploratory trek through the Kimberley region. |
March 31 |
Australia’s first census as a united country reveals its population at 3,773,801. |
April 1 |
Caretaker Prime Minister Demand Barton confirmed as Prime Minister in the first National General Election. |
April 25 |
Australian troops return to Australia from the Boxer rebellion in China. |
May 9 |
Former South Australian Premier, Frederick William Holder, becomes the Speaker in the Federal House of Representatives. |
May 9 |
Inaugural meeting of the Federal Labour Party held. |
May 10 |
The Duke of York and Cornwall opens the first Federal Parliament. |
June 21 |
An attack at dawn kills 18 Victorian soldiers in the Boer War in South Africa. |
July 11 |
Anthony Horden & Sons emporium in Sydney’s Broadway destroyed by fire. |
July 24 |
The Presbyterian Church of Australia formed. |
September 28 |
‘My Brilliant Career‘ by 22-year old girl from the bush, Miles Franklin, first published. |
September 30 |
The White Australia bill gains support. |
October 8 |
The first Federal Budget is handed down by the Federal Treasurer Sir George Turner. It introduces duties on tea, sugar, alcohol and tobacco. |
November 26 |
Frederick Slade Drake-Brockman returns from a trek to the Kimberley region of WA. |
December 1 |
The Commonwealth Post and Telegraph Act proclaimed. |
December 31 |
Agriculturalist William James Farrer releases his new drought resistant strain of wheat called Federation. |
1902 |
January 8 |
Fingerprinting introduced by New South Wales Police. |
February 20 |
Australia’s first federal battalion sails to take part in the Boer War in South Africa. |
March 9 |
British New Guinea formally transferred to Australian control. |
March 18 |
The High Court of Australia established. |
March 22 |
Flinders Column, Mt Lofty, named 22nd March to commemorate the centenary of Flinders’ sighting and naming of Mt Lofty on 23rd March 1802. The column originally erected as a trig station in 1885. |
April 22 |
The railway line to Crookwell, NSW, opens. |
April 25 |
Commonwealth Franchise Bill denies the right to vote to Aborigines, Asians, Africans, criminals and the insane. |
April 26 |
Brisbane’s new library the first in Australia to use the Dewey Decimal Classification System. |
May 20 |
Perth to Kalgoorlie rail link opens. |
June 1 |
Australian troops head home as Boer War concludes. |
June |
Mundaring Weir on the Helena River and the Number One Pumping Station operational. |
July 17 |
Hallam Tennyson, 2nd Baron Tennyson becomes acting Governor-General. |
July 28 |
Aboriginal artist Albert Namatjira born. |
August 1 |
‘New Idea’ women’s magazine first published. |
August 1 |
96 miners killed in mine explosion at Mt Kembla, NSW. |
August 9 |
Australia celebrates King Edward VII‘s coronation. |
August 28 |
New South Wales women given the right to vote. |
November 5 |
The utopian colony established in 1894 in Paraguay called New Australia collapses. |
November 9 |
SS Elingamite wrecked off king Island with the loss of 43 lives. |
December 2 |
Queensland introduces personal income tax. |
December 9 |
The River Murray Commission established. |
December 26 |
Brisbane, Rockhampton and Townsville, Qld, declared cities. |
1903 |
February 9 |
Businessman Quong Tart dies, age 53. |
February |
Australia’s twenty-fifth Prime Minister, William McMahon, born Sydney. |
March 9 |
Cyclone Leonta damages Townsville, Qld, 10 die. |
March 27 |
An eight year drought across Australia breaks as heavy rains fall in most states. |
April 5 |
Sydney’s ‘Sunday Sun’ begins publication. |
April 15 |
Bendigo’s electric trams brought into service. |
June 22 |
High Court Chief Justice Sir Garfield Barwick born. |
July 17 |
The first Commonwealth postage stamp – bearing the names of all the Australian states and available in 15 values – goes into circulation. |
July 23 |
Horse drawn trams replace Sydney’s steam trams. |
August 8 |
A naval agreement with Britain agrees to joint subsidy of Australia’s defence forces. |
October 1 |
The Federal High Court established. |
October 3 |
The ‘Brisbane Daily Mail’ begins publication. |
October 8 |
The House of Representatives selects Tumut, NSW, as the site for the Federal Capital. This choice is rejected by the Federal Senate a week later, preferring Bombala, NSW. |
October 15 |
Artist and writer Rhona Olive Harris (Pixie O’Harris) born. |
October 24 |
The ‘Border Morning Mail’ is first published in Albury, NSW. |
December 7 |
Immigration Restriction Act used to deny stranded sailors from the shipwreck Petriana access to Australia. |
December 7 |
New South Wales and Victoria set up Automobile clubs. |
December 10 |
Tasmania gives the right to vote to women. |
December 10 |
Caretaker Prime Minister Alfred Deakin given mandate in Federal Elections to continue to govern. |
December 19 |
Miss Vida Goldstein becomes Australia’s first woman politician, representing Victoria in the Federal Senate. |
December 31 |
Australia ends the year as the world’s largest producer of gold. |
1904 |
January 21 |
Henry Stafford Northcote, 1st Baron Northcote (Lord Northcote) appointed as Governor-General. |
March 2 |
The second Federal Parliament opens. |
March 19 |
The first Henley-on-Yarra regatta held in Melbourne. |
April 5 |
New South Wales’ first motor-driven fire engine imported from Britain. |
April 27 |
Centenary Tower, Mt Gambier, SA, commemorating naming and discovery of Mt Gambier by Lieut. James Grant on 3rd December 1800, opens (Foundation stone laid 3rd December 1900). |
May 2 |
Broadcaster Wilfred Thomas born. |
June 6 |
South African War Memorial, North Terrace, Adelaide, unveiled. |
July 1 |
The St Louis Olympic Games open. The games close on 23rd November. Corrie Gardner, from Melbourne, had the distinction of being Australia’s only representative at the St Louis Olympics. |
July 14 |
Sydney’s new electric street lights turned on for the first time. |
July 17 |
Cargo and steamship SS Nemesis wrecked off the NSW coast, 21 lives lost. |
August 9 |
Arthur Stanley Roe is selected as Queensland’s first Rhodes scholar. |
August 9 |
Federal Parliament settles on Dalgety, NSW, as the site of the new Federal capital, but the NSW Government disagrees. |
August 16 |
A Federal political crisis is averted with the formation of a new government under the leadership of George Reid of the free trade Group. |
August 26 |
Queensland exports 26,000 bags of wheat to Britain. |
September 5 |
Norman Lindsay paintings cause a stir at the Royal Art society’s 25th Annual Exhibition. |
September 23 |
Tattersall’s founder George Adams dies, age 65. |
October 14 |
Seven men die in a fire at the Brilliant gold mine, Charters Towers, Qld. |
October 20 |
Toowoomba, Qld, proclaimed a city. |
December 2 |
1,139 mile long rabbit proof fence across Western Australia from north and south under construction. |
December 3 |
Ipswich, Qld, proclaimed a city. |
December 5 |
Tungsten discovered on King Island, Tas. |
December 15 |
The Arbitration Court established. |
1905 |
January 12 |
Federal Government constitutes the Australian Naval Board. |
February 27 |
An inaugural motor vehicle reliability test sponsored by Dunlop Tyres held between Ballarat and Melbourne. |
March 1 |
Richard Butler becomes Premier of South Australia. |
March 22 |
Zinc refining commences at Cockle Creek, NSW. |
April 1 |
Governor-General Sir Paul Meernaa Caedwalla Hasluck born in Fremantle, WA. |
May 24 |
Empire Day inaugurated on the late Queen Victoria’s birthday. |
July 5 |
The Federal crisis continues with Alfred Deakin re-establishing a new government. |
July 24 |
The Bubonic plague spreads across the country. |
August 1 |
The Victorian Supreme Court admits its first female barrister and solicitor. |
September 2 |
Hobart’s General Post Office opens. |
September 6 |
The Australian National Defence League calls for the introduction of compulsory national service. |
October |
A tramway service commences in Fremantle, WA, with a number of lines which begin from the Fremantle Railway Station. The tranway is closed in 1952. |
November 10 |
New South Wales reintroduces assisted immigration. |
December 1 |
Steam buses begin operating between Prahan and Malvern in Melbourne. |
December 18 |
Architect Ray Grounds born. |
December 20 |
Widespread protests over new restrictive immigration laws. |
December 21 |
Motor buses brought into service in Sydney. |
December 29 |
Poet Victor Daley dies, age 47. |
1906 |
January 1 |
Importation of opium banned, except for medical purposes. |
January 19 |
William Kidston becomes the Premier of Queensland. |
January 28 |
February 6 |
Historian James Bonwick dies, age 88. |
March 15 |
Record wool sales of more than 1 million bales recorded. |
May 22 |
Three Japanese warships visit Sydney Harbour. |
May |
Alfred Wernam Canning establishes the longest stock route in Australia from Kimberley Ranges to Wiluna, WA. |
June 1 |
Natural gas used to light up the streets of Roma, Qld, but the supply runs out after 10 days. |
July 13 |
Victoria-Tasmania wireless link opens. |
July 17 |
Celebrated bush painter Frederick McCubbin‘s work, ‘The Pioneer‘, bought by the National Gallery of Victoria. |
August 6 |
August 12 |
Tennis coach Harry Hopman born. |
August 14 |
New South Wales Government approves free education for all children. |
August 30 |
The first Australian drivers licence is issued to W.A. Hargreaves in Adelaide. |
September 2 |
British New Guinea passed into Australia’s control, re-named Papua. |
September 26 |
Western Australia determines to hold a referendum on secession from the Commonwealth. |
November 23 |
Bondi, NSW, becomes the world’s first lifesaving club. |
November 27 |
Statue of Col. William Light, Victoria Square, Adelaide, unveiled. It is moved in 1938 to Montefiore Lookout, which is renamed Light’s Vision at the suggestion of the Pioneers’ Association, and a plaque added to the pedestal bears an extract from Light’s Brief Journal. |
October 1 |
Australia signs a trade agreement with South Africa. |
October 10 |
The South Australian Government’s assembly is dissolved when the Houses become deadlocked on franchise reform. |
December 3 |
Media proprietor Sir Frank Packer born. |
December 13 |
Alfred Deakin‘s Government re-elected for another three year term. |
December 19 |
Commonwealth legislation authorises the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Scheme. |
December 24 |
Repatriation of Australia’s 3,600 Kanakas under way; they are being returned to the Solomon Islands by boat. |
December 26 |
The world’s first non-documentary feature film, Charles Tait’s ‘The Story of the Kelly Gang‘ is screened at the Athenaeum Hall, Melbourne. |
December |
The Kiwi Boot Polish Company established. |
December |
The lifesaving reel invented by Lyster Ormsby used for the first time at Bondi Beach. |
1907 |
January 22 |
Cooktown, Qld, devastated by a tropical cyclone. |
February 15 |
Queensland allows Italian migrants to replace Kanaka labour on sugar plantations. |
March 29 |
Miner Modesto Vareschetti rescued from Coolgardie mine after nine days. |
April 9 |
Hubert Murray becomes the Administrator of Papua. |
May 8 |
Carlton and United Breweries is formed by the amalgamation of six smaller breweries in Victoria. |
July 16 |
Broken Hill, NSW, proclaimed a city. |
July 17 |
Federal Government embarks on a programme to attract migrants from Britain to Australia. |
July 25 |
Australian wins its first Davis Cup tennis competition. |
July 29 |
Postmaster General’s Department sets goal to have a telephone service in every Australian home. |
August 12 |
Swimmer Andrew (Boy) Charlton born. |
August 16 |
Outcry as MPs award themselves a £600 a year pay rise. |
August 19 |
New Zealand’s All Blacks Rugby Union team beats New South Wales 12 points to 8. |
August 27 |
American born F. Peters commences the manufacture of Peters Ice Cream in Sydney. |
September 6 |
Sydney University geologist Professor Tannath William Edgeworth David joins the National Antarctic Exploration expedition headed by Captain Ernest Henry Shackleton. |
September 17 |
The northern NSW town of Murwillumbah was burnt out because it had no fire brigade. |
October 2 |
Sir Charles Gregory Wade becomes Premier of New South Wales. |
October 18 |
Eight clubs join to form the Surf Bathing Association of NSW. |
November 9 |
Basic wage set at 7 shillings a day. |
December 20 |
Women given the right to vote in Western Australia. |
1908 |
January 1 |
Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology opens its first office in Melbourne. |
January 27 |
Australia’s first Lifesaving Club carnival held on Manly Beach, NSW. |
February 14 |
Newspaper proprietor David Syme dies, age 80. |
February 23 |
Australia’s 25th Prime Minister, William McMahon, born Sydney. |
March 16 |
Cockatoo Island shipbuilding yard in Sydney Harbour opens. |
March 30 |
The Federal Government establishes the Commonwealth Quarantine Service with stations at major ports in each state. |
April 22 |
A train packed with holidaymakers crashes as Sunshine station in suburban Melbourne, killing 44. |
April 27 |
The London Olympic Games open. By their close on 31st October, Australia will have won four medals. |
May 7 |
The Commonwealth Coat of Arms is adopted. |
May 16 |
The steamship Orion disappears between Smithton, Tas, and Melbourne, with 27 lives lost. |
July 1 |
The Australian Labour Party becomes the official political wing of the Labour movement. |
July 1 |
Queensland introduces an old age pension scheme. |
August 5 |
Australia’s 22nd Prime Minister, Harold Edward Holt, born Sydney, NSW. |
August 9 |
Agreement reached on the Yass district as the site for Australia’s new Federal capital. |
August 20 |
Twenty US warships visit Sydney Harbour on a goodwill visit instigated by Prime Minister, Alfred Deakin. |
August 27 |
Cricketer Sir Donald Bradman born in Cootamundra, NSW. |
September 5 |
Dorothea McKellar‘s poem, ‘My Country‘, is published for the first time in Britain. |
September 5 |
Seven miners die in a rock fall at Mount Morgan, Qld. Five more die on 4th November. |
September 8 |
Lord William Dudley replaces Henry Stafford Northcote, 1st Baron Northcote, as Governor-General. |
September 10 |
The first journey by car from Adelaide to Sydney via Darwin completed by a Clement Talbot motor car. |
September 1 |
Women in Victoria are given the right to vote. |
November 13 |
Andrew Fisher, the leader of the Australian Labour Party, becomes Australia’s Prime Minister. |
1909 |
January 16 |
British Antarctic expedition team under Captain Ernest Henry Shackleton reaches the South Magnetic Pole. |
February 9 |
Artist Charles Conder dies, age 40. |
February 13 |
Aviator and businessman Reginald Myles Ansett born. |
March 9 |
Electric trams begin operating in Adelaide, SA. |
March 26 |
Actor Chips Rafferty born John William Gaffage. |
April 9 |
Ballet dancer and choreographer Robert Helpman born. |
May 1 |
Half-day Saturday retail trading introduced in Melbourne. |
May 24 |
A five month long miners’ strike at Broken Hill, NSW, ends. |
June 2 |
Prime Minister Andrew Fisher resigns, is replaced by Alfred Deakin. |
June 5 |
Street trams introduced in Rockhampton, Qld. |
June 30 |
Perth Children’s Hospital opens. |
July 1 |
The Commonwealth Government agrees to pay aged pension. |
July 28 |
Australia granted the right to establish its own navy. |
July |
Australia’s first taxi service using motor cars introduced in Sydney. |
July |
The Victorian Government opens its first coal mine at Wonthaggi. |
August 8 |
Mother Mary McKillop dies, age 67. |
August 23 |
Sydney’s Long Bay Gaol opens. |
September 20 |
The first hotel in the Australian Alps opens at Mt Kosciusko. |
October 18 |
The state of New South Wales has granted 911 square miles of land to the Federal Government as the future site of the Federal capital. |
November 6 |
Thirty unionists are gaoled during a coal miners strike in New South Wales. |
November 8 |
12,000 NSW coal miners strike. |
December 5 |
George A. Taylor of Narrabeen, NSW, makes the first glider flight in Australia in a glider he built himself. |
December 9 |
The first powered air flight took place at Victoria Park Raceway when Colin Defries flew his machine at a height of between 2 to 15 feet. |
December 10 |
Queensland University founded. |
December 13 |
Military training becomes compulsory. |
December 16 |
The former Prime Minister George Reid appointed as Australia’s first High Commissioner in London. |
December 21 |
British Field-Marshall Horatio Herbert Kitchener arrives in Australia to advise on the make-up of Australia’s new military forces. |
1910 |
February 8 |
Radio compare John (Jack) Davey born. |
March 9 |
Mitchell Library, Sydney, opens. |
March 16 |
Railway extended to Wonthaggi, Vic. |
March 31 |
The liner Pericles sinks after hitting a reef off Cape Leeuwin, WA. 400 crew and passengers rescued. |
April 13 |
Andrew Fisher‘s Labour Government returned with a record majority. |
April 13 |
The Commonwealth Government takes over state debts. |
April 14 |
The University of Queensland is established. |
June 3 |
John Verran becomes the first Labor Premier of South Australia. |
July 16 |
The first flight by an Australian built aeroplane. |
July 18 |
A major railway crash at Richmond, Vic, sees 18 killed and nearly 500 injured. |
August 9 |
Government gives go-ahead for the printing of paper currency. |
October 21 |
James Sinclair Taylor McGowen becomes the first Labor Premier of New South Wales. |
November 3 |
Berri, SA, set aside for a Murray River irrigation scheme. |
November 23 |
The first two ships of Australia’s own Navy – the destroyers HMAS Parramatta and HMAS Yarra – make their first Australian port of call at Fremantle, WA. |
November 29 |
Broome, WA, hit by a cyclone, killing 40 people and destroying 26 pearling luggers. |
November 25 |
The Naval Defence Act comes into force and the Commonwealth Naval Forces are formed. |
December 4 |
Australia’s second ski resort opens at Mt Buffalo, Vic. |
December 8 |
Geelong, Vic, declared a city. |
December 12 |
Mt Stromlo selected as site for a new observatory. |
December 16 |
Ford sells its 400th Model-T car in Australia. |
December 16 |
Invalid pensions first made available Australia wide. |
December 28 |
The Murrumbidgee Irrigation Trust formed to develop the irrigation of NSW’s Riverina district. |