Anniversaries and commemorations come and go daily. Most of us, even the best historians, miss most occasions. If we think of history as events then we are faced with a continually showering in the grains of sand. Nevertheless, we do pick out certain patterns in the remembrance of historical dates. The blog here reminds us of some dates where the local, state, national, and global perspectives entwine.
What Time is It? It is flow of a sandstorm that will on each day compress somewhere into a structure – sandstone, selected and only remembered in the longue durée.
On Tuesday, 31 August 1920, The High Court of Australia rules in the case of Amalgamated Society of Engineers v. Adelaide Steamship Co. Ltd., commonly known as the “Engineers’ Case”, that decisions of the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Court were binding on State governments.
On Friday, 31 August 1945, WWII: Allied troops arrest German field marshal Walther von Brauchitsch.
On Friday, 31 August 1945, A team at American Cyanamid’s Lederle Laboratories, Pearl River, New York, led by Yellapragada Subbarow, announces they have obtained folic acid in a pure crystalline form. This vitamin is abundant in green leaf vegetables, liver, kidney, and yeast.
On Sunday, 31 August 1980, Victory of the strike in Gdańsk Shipyard, Poland. The Gdańsk Agreement is signed, opening a way to start the first free (i.e. not state-controlled) trade union in the communist bloc, “Solidarity” (Solidarność).
On Thursday, 31 August 1995, The cast bronze statue of the dog Larry La Trobe situated on the northern end of Melbourne’s City Square is stolen.
On Monday, 31 August 2015, Unions Royal Commissioner Dyson Heydon rules that he will not step aside from the Commission over a speaking engagement at a Liberal fundraiser.
Images Citations in Composite: ID 17208541 © Anhong | Dreamstime.com; ID 35001957 © DiversityStudio1 | Dreamstime.com; ID 156394527 © Gerd Zahn | Dreamstime.com
Neville Buch