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Kurt Johannsen (bush Mechanic)
Kurt Gerhardt Johannsen (11 January 1915 – 23 January 2002) was an Australian bush mechanic and inventor who developed the world's first commercial road train. He was also an aviator, fencing contractor, labourer, mailman and miner and known a "true son of the Red Centre", referring to the southern desert region of the Northern Territory in Australia. Early life Johannsen was born at Deep Well Station, 80 km south of Alice Springs, to Gerhardt and Ottilie Johannsen. Gerhardt had emigrated from Denmark and Ottilie was of German descent and the family often experienced discrimination throughout Kurt's childhood, the period in between the two World Wars, and Gerhardt was often referred to as "The German" or "The Hun". In 1922, when Johannsen was 7, the family moved to Hermannsburg Mission Station where Gerhardt worked as the station manager; this was following the sudden death of Pastor Carl Strehlow in October 1922. The family remained there until 1924 before return ...
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Bush Mechanic
A bush mechanic (Australian slang) is somebody who out of necessity and with immediately available materials, solves practical problems using sometimes untraditional and inventive techniques. Generally an inventive technique is required due to a lack of spare parts or tools required for normal repair procedures. Due to the vast distances, underdeveloped infrastructure, hostile natural environment of the Australian outback, spare parts, resources and tools may take months to be delivered to remote locations. Examples include using a tree branch to fix a broken vehicle axle, or grass and leaves to plug a leak. Bush mechanics may also be known as "bushies". In media The 2001 Australian television show ''Bush Mechanics'' displayed bush mechanic skills used by a group of Indigenous men from Warlpiri Country as they travelled through the rugged central region of Australia. See also *Culture of Australia *Shadetree mechanic *''Bush Mechanics'', the Australian television documentar ...
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Carl Strehlow
Carl Friedrich Theodor Strehlow (23 December 1871 – 20 October 1922) was an anthropologist, linguist and genealogist who served on two Lutheran missions in remote parts of Australia from May 1892 to October 1922. He was at Killalpaninna Mission (also known as Bethesda) in northern South Australia, from 1892 to 1894, and then Hermannsburg, west of Alice Springs, from 1894 to 1922. Strehlow was assisted by his wife Friederike, who played a central role in reducing the high infant mortality which threatened Aboriginal communities all over Australia after the onset of white settlement. As a polymath with an interest in natural history, and informed by the local Aranda people, Strehlow provided plant and animal specimens to museums in Germany and Australia. Strehlow also collaborated on the first complete translation of the New Testament into an Aboriginal language (Dieri), published by the British and Foreign Bible Society in 1897. He later translated the New Testament into t ...
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1915 Births
Events Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix. January *January – British physicist Sir Joseph Larmor publishes his observations on "The Influence of Local Atmospheric Cooling on Astronomical Refraction". *January 1 ** WWI: British Royal Navy battleship HMS Formidable (1898), HMS ''Formidable'' is sunk off Lyme Regis, Dorset, England, by an Imperial German Navy U-boat, with the loss of 547 crew. **WWI: Battle of Broken Hill: A train ambush near Broken Hill, Australia, is carried out by two men (claiming to be in support of the Ottoman Empire) who are killed, together with four civilians. * January 5 – Joseph E. Carberry sets an altitude record of , carrying Capt. Benjamin Delahauf Foulois as a passenger, in a fixed-wing aircraft. * January 12 ** The United States House of Representatives rejects a proposal to give women the right to vote. ** ''A Fool There Was (1915 film), A Fool There Was'' premières in the United States, starring Theda Bara as a '' ...
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National Road Transport Hall Of Fame
The National Road Transport Hall of Fame is an Australian transport museum in Alice Springs, Northern Territory, owned by the Road Transport Historical SocietyAbout Us
National Road Transport Hall of Fame
and opened in 1995. The , which the society also operates, is on the adjoining site. As a community-based volunteer organisation, the museum is dedicated to preserving Australia's road transport heritage. Many forms of road transport – from camel trains of old to
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Yankalilla, South Australia
Yankalilla is an agriculturally based town situated on the Fleurieu Peninsula in South Australia, located 72 km south of the state's capital of Adelaide. The town is nestled in the Bungala River (South Australia), Bungala River valley, overlooked by the southern Mount Lofty Ranges and acts as a service centre for the surrounding agricultural district. In the early stages of the colonisation of the state, Yankalilla was a highly important location, but its close proximity to Adelaide and the advent of fast transport has greatly diminished this position. Etymology The origin of the town's name is unclear, but it is known that John Hindmarsh, Governor Hindmarsh recorded the Kaurna pronunciation of "Yoongalilla", as applied to the District and noted this in dispatches of 1837. William Light, Colonel Light, however wrote about it as Yanky-lilly and Yanky Point, giving rise to the unsubstantiated idea that it was named after an American whaling, whaler or an American ship named ' ...
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Library & Archives NT
Library & Archives NT is the "state" library and archives for the Northern Territory of Australia. It has three venues located in Darwin (on the ancestral lands of the Larrakia people) and Alice Springs (on the land of the Arrernte people). It is the premier public research and archival organisation focused on the history, development and culture of the Northern Territory. The library holds more than 108,000 books and 30,000 items. The archive holds Northern Territory Government records, which are normally opened 30 years after they were created. The institution resulted from a 2020 merger of the Northern Territory Library and the Northern Territory Archives Service. It is within the Department of Families, Housing and Communities.At the time of the merger, the department's name was Department of Tourism, Sport and Culture. Library & Archives NT provides its services to the public through the Northern Territory Library at Parliament House; the Northern Territory Archives Cent ...
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Diamond T980
The M19 tank transporter ( US supply catalog designation G159) was a heavy tank transporter system used in World War II and into the 1950s. It consisted of a 12-ton 6×4 M20 Diamond T model 980 truck and companion 12-wheel M9 trailer. Over 5,000 were produced, and employed by Allied armies throughout all theaters of war. It was superseded in the U.S. military by the M25 tank transporter during the war, but usefully redeployed in other tasks. It was superseded by the Thornycroft Antar in British service by the early 1950s, though a few remained operational in units through 1971. History Designed as a heavy prime mover for tank transporting, the hard-cab Diamond T 980 was the product of the Diamond T Company in Chicago. In 1940 the British Purchasing Commission, looking to equip the British Army with a vehicle capable of transporting larger and heavier tanks, approached a number of American truck manufacturers to assess their models. The Diamond T Company had a long history of buil ...
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Tennant Creek
Tennant Creek () is a town located in the Northern Territory of Australia. It is the Northern Territory#Cities and towns, seventh largest town in the Northern Territory, and is located on the Stuart Highway, just south of the intersection with the western terminus of the Barkly Highway. At the , Tennant Creek had a population of 3,080 people, of whom 55% (1,707) identified as Indigenous Australians, Indigenous. The town is approximately 1,000 kilometres south of the capital of the Northern Territory, Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin, and 500 kilometres north of Alice Springs. It is named after a nearby watercourse of the same name, and is the hub of the sprawling Barkly Tableland – vast elevated plains of black soil with golden Mitchell grass that cover more than 240,000 square kilometres. Tennant Creek is also near well-known attractions including the Karlu Karlu / Devils Marbles Conservation Reserve, Devils Marbles, Mary Ann Dam, Battery Hill Mining Centre and the Nyinkka ...
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Hermannsburg, Northern Territory
Hermannsburg, also known as Ntaria, is an Aboriginal Australians, Aboriginal community in Ljirapinta Ward of the MacDonnell Shire in the Northern Territory of Australia, ; west southwest of Alice Springs, Northern Territory, Alice Springs, on the Finke River, in the traditional lands of the Arrernte people, Western Arrarnta people. Established as a Lutheranism, Lutheran Aboriginal mission in 1877, linguist and anthropologist Carl Strehlow documented the local Western Arrernte language during his time there. The mission station, mission was known as Finke River Mission or Hermannsburg Mission, but the former term was later used to included a few more settlements, and from 2014 has applied to all Lutheran missions in Central Australia. The land was handed over to traditional ownership in 1982 under the ''Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1976'', and the area is now heritage-listed. Geography Hermannsburg lies on the Finke River within the rolling hills of the MacDonnell Ranges in the ...
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Road Train
A road train, also known as a land train or long combination vehicle (LCV) is a semi-trailer used to move road freight more efficiently than single-trailer semi-trailers. It consists of one semi-trailer or more connected together with or without a prime-mover. It typically has to be at least three trailers and one prime-mover. Road trains are often used in areas where other forms of heavy transport ( freight train, cargo aircraft, container ship) are not feasible or practical. History Early road trains consisted of traction engines pulling multiple wagons. The first identified road trains operated into South Australia's Flinders Ranges from the Port Augusta area in the mid-19th century. They displaced bullock teams for the carriage of minerals to port and were, in turn, superseded by railways. During the Crimean War, a traction engine was used to pull multiple open trucks. By 1898 steam traction engine trains with up to four wagons were employed in military manoeuvres ...
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Gerhardt Johannsen
Gerhardt Andreas Johannsen (14 November 1876 – 4 April 1951) was a stonemason, builder and pastoralist in the Northern Territory. Early life Johannsen was born in Denmark on 14 November 1876 and, in 1899, he left to emigrate to Australia: working his passage as a crew member. He had originally planned to emigrate to South Africa but the Second Boer War, Boer War prevented this. When he arrived in South Australia he went to the Barossa Valley where he met and married Marie Ottilie (Tilly) Hoffmann in 1905. In 1909 Johannsen responded the a call for help from the Hermannsburg, Northern Territory, Hermannsburg Mission and the family, which now included a three-year-old daughter Elsa Margaret Johannsen (born 21 June 1906), travelled by horse and buggy to Central Australia. Life in the Northern Territory In Hermannsburg Johannsen erected buildings, stockyards and performed general repairs. He was often assisted by and taught Aboriginal men building skills. In 1911 the fam ...
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Alice Springs
Alice Springs () is a town in the Northern Territory, Australia; it is the third-largest settlement after Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin and Palmerston, Northern Territory, Palmerston. The name Alice Springs was given by surveyor William Mills (surveyor), William Whitfield Mills after Alice, Lady Todd (), wife of the telegraph pioneer Sir Charles Todd (pioneer), Charles Todd. Known colloquially as The Alice or simply Alice, the town is situated roughly in Australia's Geographical centre, geographic centre. It is nearly equidistant from Adelaide and Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin. The area is also known locally as to its Indigenous Australians, original inhabitants, the Arrernte people, Arrernte, who have lived in the Central Australian desert in and around what is now Alice Springs for tens of thousands of years. Alice Springs had a population of 33,990 as of June 2024. The town's population accounts for approximately 10 percent of the population of the Northern Terr ...
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