From today's featured article
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Fremantle Prison was built in Fremantle, Western Australia, between 1851 and 1859 using convict labour. Royal Commissions in 1898 and 1911 instigated some prison reforms, but after World War II, significant reforms lagged behind those occurring elsewhere in Australia and the world. Improvements in the late 1960s and early 1970s included an officer training school, social workers, welfare officers, and work release and community service programs. Punishments varied over the years, with flogging and leg irons eventually replaced by lengthening of sentences and restriction from visitors or entertainment. More than 40 hangings were carried out at Fremantle Prison, which was Western Australia's only lawful place of execution between 1888 and 1984. There were major riots in 1968 and 1988; in the second one, guards were taken hostage, and fire damage totalled $1.8 million (in 1988 Australian dollars). The prison closed in 1991, replaced by the new maximum-security Casuarina Prison. Since then, Fremantle Prison has become a tourist attraction and World Heritage Site. (Full article...)
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Did you know...
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Female Figure by Giambologna
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In the news
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Bidhya Devi Bhandari
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On this day...
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October 30: Mischief Night in some areas of the United States
Jean Shrimpton
- 1806 – War of the Fourth Coalition: Believing they were massively outnumbered, the 5,300-man German garrison at Stettin, Prussia (now Szczecin, Poland), surrendered to a much smaller French force without a fight.
- 1888 – King Lobengula of Matabeleland granted the Rudd Concession to agents of Cecil Rhodes, setting in motion the creation of the British South Africa Company.
- 1938 – The radio drama The War of the Worlds, based on the science fiction novella by English writer H. G. Wells, frightened many listeners in the United States into believing that an actual Martian invasion was in progress.
- 1965 – English model Jean Shrimpton (pictured) wore a controversially short minidress to Derby Day at Flemington Racecourse in Melbourne, Australia – a pivotal moment of the introduction of the miniskirt to women's fashion.
- 1995 – In a referendum, 50.58 percent of voters supported the province of Quebec remaining a part of Canada, narrowly averting sovereignty.
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