History of the Australian Flag

1901 saw the first hoisting of an Australian flag after it became a nation.

The current national flag hasn’t been changed since 22 May 1909. For about fifty years there were two versions of the national flag of Australia.

They had the same design but one had a blue background and the other was red. On April 14, 1954 the “blue ensign” flag became the official flag of Australia. The blue was chosen because many people believed red stood for communism.

Australia’s flag is only one of two countries in the world that has a seven point star, the other is Jordan.

During the late 1800’s there was a competition to design a flag for Australia and there was a cash prize for the winning entry.

There were 32,823 entries and six of them were extremely similar. The final design was based on those six entries and the six designers shared the 150 pounds prize. The inclusion of the Union Jack was a mandatory guideline of the contest.

From time to time there have been movements to remove the Union Jack but that was last defeated in 1999.

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