TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILWAY

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 102, 16 September 1912, Page 5

TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILWAY

PORT AUGUSTA EN FETE. A MOMENTOUS OCCASION. By Cable—Press Association—Copyright. Received 16, 12.35 a.m. Adelaide, September 15. Port Augusta is en fete at the turning of the first sod of the transcontinental railway to Kalgoorlie at an estimated cost of four millions. There is a great influx of Federal and other Parliamentarians and distinguished visitors. Accommodation is overtaxed, and many Parliamentarians slept in tents. Lord Denman, in performing the ceremony, read a message from the King expressing his keen sense of the importance of this great national enterprise to "my people of the Commonwealth." He also read a message from the Imperial Government as follows:—'We are convinced that this great undertaking will redound to the strategic and commercial advantages of Australia." speeches were made by Lord Denman, Admiral Bosanquet. Mr. Fisher, Mr. O'Malley, Mr. Pearce and others. Mr. O'Malley characterised the function as one of the supreme occasions; prophetic of Australia's future greatness. Not in mammoth lighting machines on land and sea or aerial instruments had Australia placed her hopes, but in unhampered political and social progress. The great Christian party to which he belonged was determined to afford every person an opportunity to make good. The building of the railway outward was an expression of the Government's ambition.