"Advance Australia Fair" is the official national anthem of Australia. Created by the Scottish-born composer, Peter Dodds McCormick, the song was first performed in 1878, but did not gain its status as the official anthem until 1984. Until then, the song was sung in Australia as a patriotic song. In order for the song to become the anthem, it had to face a vote between the Royal anthem God Save the Queen, the "unofficial anthem" Waltzing Matilda and Song of Australia. Other songs and marches have been influenced by Advance Australia Fair, such as the Australian Vice-Regal salute.
The earliest known sound recording of Advance Australia Fair appears in "The Landing of the Australian Troops in Egypt", circa 1916, a short commercial recording dramatising arrival of the Australian troops in Egypt en route to Gallipoli.
Read more about Advance Australia Fair: Lyrics, Copyright, Orchestral Version, Development of Lyrics, Alternative Christian Verse
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“I advance it therefore as a suspicion only, that the blacks, whether originally a distinct race, or made distinct by time and circumstances, are inferior to the whites in the endowments of both body and mind.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
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—Alex Atkinson, British humor writer. repr. In Present Laughter, ed. Alan Coren (1982)
“The heavens hold firm
The walls of thy dear honor; keep unshaked
That temple, thy fair mind, that thou mayst stand
T’ enjoy thy banished lord and this great land!”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)