The Finke River is one of the largest rivers in central Australia. It starts in the MacDonnell Ranges in the Northern Territory. it is formed where Davenport and Ormiston Creeks join together, just north of Glen Helen. The Finke River flows about 600 km to the western edge of the Simpson Desert in northern South Australia. Usually the river is a collection of waterholes, but it can become a raging torrent during rare flood events. In a big flood water from the Finke River can flow into the Macumba River, and then into Lake Eyre, a total distance of about 750 km. Major tributaries include Ellery Creek, and the Palmer and Hugh Rivers. The Finke River flows through the West MacDonnell and Finke Gorge National Parks.
The Finke River was named by John McDouall Stuart in 1860 after William Finke, an Adelaide man, who was one of the people who paid part of the cost of his expeditions. The indigenous name for the river in parts of the Northern Territory is Larapinta. Larapinta Drive is a road which runs west from Alice Springs, and the Larapinta walking trail.
The Finke River has been called ""the oldest river in the world"", particularly by tour operators, and in popular books and brochures. In places such as the James Range, the Finke flows through deeply incised meanders (see Google Maps image). Because meanders only form on flat plains, the river must have formed before the ranges were pushed up. This happened in a mountain building event known as the Alice Springs Orogeny which happened between 400 and 300 million years ago, in the Devonian to Carboniferous Periods. Some parts of the river’s course must have been already in existence around this time. The southern parts of its course must be much younger because the areas where the Finke now flows near the southern edge of the Northern Territory, and further south, were under the sea during the Mesozoic Era, part of the Great Artesian Basin.
The age of the Finke River is not unique. There are other large mountain-sourced river systems in central Australia including the Todd and Hale Rivers where the mountains were formed at the same time. There are other mountain ranges of equal or greater age to the MacDonnell Ranges, both in Australia and on other continents. The rivers in those areas may have evolved from ancestral streams of the same age or older than the Finke.
Anna van Egmont
Anna van Egmont (Grave, March 1533 – Breda, 24 March 1558) was a member of an important and rich Dutch family. She was the first wife of William the Silent, Prince of Orange.
She was the only child of Maximiliaan van Egmond and Françoise de Lannoy. She was also Countess of Lingen and of Leerdam, and Lady of IJsselstein, of Borssele, of Grave, of Cranendonck, of Jaarsveld, of Kortgene, of Sint Maartensdijk, and of Odijk. Because she was the only child, she also got the title of Countess of Buren and Lady of Egmond.
In 1551 she married William the Silent in Buren. Because she was the Lady of Egmond and Countess of Buren, he became Lord of Egmond and Count of Buren. They had three children:
Anna died when she was only 25 years old. She was buried in Breda.
Central Mount Stuart
Central Mount Stuart is a mountain in the south of the Northern Territory, Australia. It can easily seen from the nearby Stuart Highway, which is about 6 km away. The mountain is made from dark red sandstone.
The mountain is named after the explorer John McDouall Stuart who reached the area on 22 April 1860. He worked out that a point about 4 km (2.5 miles) south-southwest of the mountain was the centre of Australia. Modern geographers do not agree with this and now place the centre at Finke.
Stuart climbed to the top on 23 April 1860, writing in his journal:
""Took Kekwick and the flag, and went to the top of the mount, but found it to be much higher and more difficult of ascent than I anticipated...Near the top of the cone I placed a small bottle, in which there is a slip of paper, with our signatures to it, stating by whom it was raised. We then gave three hearty cheers for the flag, the emblem of civil and religious liberty, and may it be a sign to the natives that the dawn of liberty, civilization, and Christianity is about to break upon them.""
The slip of paper was found in 1871 by John Ross during the building of the Australian Overland Telegraph Line. It is now in the Library of South Australia.
Stuart called the mountain Central Mount Sturt, after his former expedition leader Charles Sturt. The name was changed on a suggestion from the Governor of South Australia, Sir Richard MacDonnell. This happened soon after Stuart's return to Adelaide at the end of the expedition. "Central Mount Stuart" is the name that was printed in the published expedition journal.
Louise de Coligny
Louise de Coligny (Châtillon-sur-Loing, 23 September 1555 – Fontainebleau, 13 November 1620) was the fourth wife of Prince William the Silent. She was the daughter of an important French Protestant leader, Gaspard de Coligny.
She married Charles de Téligny when she was 16 years old in 1571. He was a Protestant diplomat who was also friendly with the French king Charles IX. Both her father and her husband were killed during the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in 1572.
In 1583 she (27) married William the Silent in Antwerp. She became the Princess of Orange. Their son Frederik Hendrik was born on 29 January 1584. On the 10th of July that year, William was shot by catholic Balthasar Gerards and died.
She stayed in the Netherlands with her 6 stepdaughters. In 1619, she asked her stepson Maurits to stop the execution of high-placed Johan van Oldenbarnevelt, but he did not listen. She then left Holland and went to France where she (65) died in 1620. On 24 May 1621, she was buried in the crypt of the House of Orange-Nassau in the New Church in Delft.
African National Congress
The African National Congress (ANC), supported by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and the South African Communist Party (SACP), has been South Africa's governing centre-left political party since the establishment of non-racial democracy in April 1994. It defines itself as a "disciplined force of the left". Members founded the organization as the South African Native National Congress (SANNC) on 8 January 1912 in Bloemfontein to increase the rights of the black South African population. John Dube, its first president, and poet and author Sol Plaatje are among its founding members. The organization became the ANC in 1923 and formed a military wing, the Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation) in 1961.
It has been the ruling party of post-apartheid South Africa on the national level since 1994. It gained support in the 1999 elections, and further increased its majority in 2004, with 69.7% of the votes. In 2009 its share of the vote reduced slightly, but it remained the dominant party with 65.9% of the votes.
The ANC was founded in direct response to what was seen as injustices against black South Africans at the hands of their white, mostly Afrikaner government. The ANC had its origins in a pronouncement by Pixley ka Isaka Seme who said in 1911 "Forget all the past differences among Africans and unite in one national organisation." The ANC was set up the next year on 8 January 1912.
The government of the newly formed Union of South Africa began a systematic oppression of black people in South Africa. The Natives' Land Act was issued in 1913. The effect of these laws was to force many non-whites from their farms into the cities and towns to work, and to restrict their movement within South Africa. By 1919, the ANC led a campaign against passes, and in 1929 the ANC supported a militant mineworkers' strike.