Gday...

1799  -     The Rosetta Stone is discovered, holding the key to unlock the secrets of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. 

The Rosetta Stone is a dark grey-pinkish stone of granite, although it was originally thought to have been basalt. It was discovered on 19 July 1799 by French Captain Pierre-François Bouchard during Napoleon Bonaparte's campaign in Egypt. The irregularly shaped stone inscribed with ancient writing was found near the town of Rosetta, approximately 60km north of Alexandria.

The stone contained fragments of passages written in three different scripts: Greek, Egyptian hieroglyphics and Demotic Egyptian. The Greek passage stated that all three scripts were identical in meaning. Because Greek was well known, the stone was the key to deciphering the hieroglyphs, a language that had been considered dead for two thousand years. Twenty five years later, French Egyptologist Jean Francois Champollion successfully deciphered the hieroglyphics, using the Greek as a guide. This enabled further study of Egyptian hieroglyphics which had previously been indecipherable. It was the first time that the world became aware of the depth of the history and culture of ancient Egypt.

1814  -     Matthew Flinders, the first explorer to circumnavigate Australia, dies.

Matthew Flinders was born in Lincolnshire, England, in 1774. Flinders and George Bass did much sea exploration around Australia, adding to the knowledge of the coastline, and producing accurate maps. As well as being the first to circumnavigate Australia, Flinders, together with Bass, was the first to prove that Van Diemen's Land, or Tasmania, was an island and not connected to the mainland. Australia was previously known as New Holland, and after Captain Cook claimed the continent for England in 1770, the entire eastern half became known as New South Wales. Flinders was the one who first proposed the name "Terra Australis", which became "Australia", the name adopted in 1824.

Flinders was captured by the French, on the island of Mauritius, in 1803. He was kept prisoner until 1810 on the grounds that he was a spy. He was finally released to return to England, but his health began to fail and he died young, on 19 July 1814. (Some accounts say Flinders died on 15 July 1814.) Before his death he completed a book on his travels called 'A Voyage to Terra Australis', and died on the day that his book was published.

1916  -     Australia begins its worst 24 hours in history, with the loss of almost 2000 men in a single night.

The night of 19 - 20 July 1916 is sometimes referred to as Australias worst day in history. This is the day the nation lost almost 2000 men in a single night, during World War I.

The Battle of Fromelles was the first significant battle fought by Australian troops on the Western Front. Begun 19 days after the Battle of the Somme began, the main purpose of the Fromelles was to draw German troops away from being redeployed to the Somme from areas of the Western Front where less fighting was taking place. The main battle commenced with an attack at 6:00pm by troops of the 5th Australian and 61st British Divisions. The Australian troops were to attack from the north, from a point known as the Sugarloaf while the British were to come in from the west. The problem was that the Australian Division was inexperienced, while the British Division were under strength. Although small sections of the German trenches were captured by the 8th and 14th Australian Brigades, the attack lacked the necessary element of surprise to be effective, as it was preceded by seven hours of artillery bombardment. German machine-gunners inflicted heavy damage on the Allied troops and, by 8:00am the following morning, the Battle of Fromelles was all but over, and the troops forced to withdraw.

The Battle of Fromelles was a categorical failure. Insufficient communications, together with misreading of the situation by distant headquarters and lack of local knowledge, resulted in inadequate retrieval and evacuation of the casualties. Many Australian troops who were wounded died because of the delay of several days in arranging a truce so they could be collected. The 5th Australian Division suffered a total of 5,533 casualties, including over 1900 deaths, while the 61st British Division suffered 1,547 casualties, to the Germans 1,000.

1935  -     The world's first parking meter is installed in Oklahoma City, USA.

The parking meter was originally invented by Carlton Cole Magee, the head of Oklahoma City's Chamber of Commerce, in response to growing parking congestion. Magee filed for a patent for a "coin controlled parking meter" on 13 May 1935. He then formed the Magee-Hale Park-O-Meter Company to manufacture his invention.

The first parking meter in the world was installed in Oklahoma City, USA, on 19 July 1935. It is estimated that there are now over five million parking meters in the USA. England received its first parking meter some 22 years later, on 10 July 1958. In all, 625 parking meters were installed in England that day. 

1941  -     The 'V for Victory' campaign is inaugurated by Winston Churchill.

Winston Churchill had been Prime Minister of England for less than a year, during the early stages of World War II, when he inaugurated the 'V for Victory' campaign, on 19 July 1941. The BBC used the opening notes of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, which matched the dot-dot-dot-dash Morse code for the letter V, playing it before news bulletins and in its overseas transmissions. On the radio program that launched the campaign, Churchill announced, "The V sign is the symbol of the unconquerable will of the occupied territories and a portent of the fate awaiting Nazi tyranny. So long as the people continue to refuse all collaboration with the invader it is sure that his cause will perish and that Europe will be liberated."  

Cheers - John