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When Robert Menzies welcomed a 36-year-old queen to Australia in 1963, he was almost half his age and more than a couple of generations had retired.
Menzies was born in 1894, during the reign of his great-grandmother, Victoria. It was before federation, before universal adult suffrage, and before many other civil rights and freedoms were enjoyed today.
Thus, for the Australian Prime Minister, this beautiful young woman represented a revolutionary change and he was more than willing to accept it. A few years earlier she had appointed Enid Lyons as the first woman in a cabinet ministry.
The Queen, Prince Philip and then Prime Minister Robert Menzies in 1963. Credit: Fairfax
Now Menzies is often seen as an old relic from a boring time, but he could see that this queen would survive him for a long time and oversee a time of enormous cultural change. It would be a second Elizabethan age.
Like his contemporary, Winston Churchill, Menzies devoted himself to the young and modern monarch and saw it as an opportunity to redefine the future not only of the monarchy but of his nation’s relationship with it.
In the Canberra Parliament, Menzies delivered one of his most famous addresses to the young queen.
“Mothers will hold their children to watch you as you pass, and they themselves and their husbands will watch you as you pass,” she said.
“This must be almost a task for you now. The only thing I ask you to remember, in this country of yours, is that every man, woman and child who even sees you at a glance as you pass, you will remember it with joy, you will remember it with the words of the old seventeenth century poet of the century who wrote those famous words: “I saw her pass. And yet I love him until I die. “
Princess Elizabeth had grown up in a world where Everest was undefeated and running a mile took more than four minutes for the man. When he ascended the throne, a TV in the living room was rare for the masses and was still virtually pre-rock ‘n’ roll.
Unintentionally, it has become the longest-running television station in the world, giving speeches since the beginning of the medium.
The queen, photographed here during World War II with her sister Princess Margaret, has been a broadcaster for most of her life. Credit: AP
Disposable diapers went on sale just in time for the birth of Princess Anna in 1950. In 1955, a polio vaccine was finally made available. It was good news for seven-year-old Prince Charles and five-year-old Princess Anne.
The queen told the press that her children had been immunized. It remains a critical moment in the wider public acceptance of vaccines.
The same year he visited Australia for the second time in 1963, the first episode of Dr Who was broadcast by the BBC. She is said to have been a big fan from the start.
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It now reigns in an age of the Internet, streaming services, mobile phones and Zoom calls. She has hugged them all.
He saw Nelson Mandela imprisoned, released and elected President of South Africa and witnessed the rise and fall of the Berlin Wall. It has hosted American presidents ranging from World War II general Dwight Eisenhower to former reality TV presenter Donald Trump.
“She’s been the only constant in a rapidly changing world,” says royal biographer Penny Junor.
“We see our politicians as casual, people who are for their own benefit. They lie. They disobey the rules, they are narcissists … All these things are part of politics. The queen is above all that.”
By 1954, the Queen had become the first British sovereign to visit Australia, taking part in the most grueling tour imaginable. With Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, they visited 57 towns and cities during the 58 days of their journey. They traveled across the country by plane, train, boat and car from Cairns in the north to Broken Hill in the west to Hobart in the south.
It was a high point of royal flattery in Australia. About 75% of Australia’s 9 million population said they saw the queen at least once during her eight-week national tour of all state capitals and many regional centers.
Former United States President Barack Obama addressed a common modern issue when he paid tribute to the monarch during his platinum jubilee celebration on Thursday.
Obama called her a “gift” to the world and said she remembered her grandmother.
“When you’re president of the United States, you know a lot of remarkable people and you try to keep your composure under all circumstances,” Obama said in his tribute. “But this is harder than you think when you visit Her Majesty.
“Before I took office, Michelle and I hadn’t been to too many palaces,” he said. “So we weren’t sure what to expect on our first trip to Buckingham [Palace]. But we shouldn’t have worried. His Majesty pleased us with his grace and generosity. So much so that I left thinking that I was a little reminiscent of my grandmother. “
In a recent YouGov poll in Britain, the Queen, who had 75% approval and only 10% of respondents had a negative view of the 96-year-old monarch, was described as “amazing”, “wonderful”. , “beautiful” and “real”. Eight out of 10 Britons (81%) had a positive opinion of the queen, compared to 12% who viewed it negatively, giving the monarch a net score of +69.
The Queen currently has a 75 per cent approval rating on the latest YouGov poll and hundreds of thousands of Britons attended the first day of the Jubilee festivities. Credit: AP
As a sign of this deep respect for the monarch personally, even Sinn Fein Vice President Michelle O’Neill wrote to the Queen to thank her for her “infallible warmth and courtesy” on occasions when the couple s ‘had known and described the’ value ‘. and respect ”for the monarch’s contribution to reconciliation. A few decades ago this would have seemed unlikely, at least.
Perhaps the great love for her is in part because as a queen she has remained unknown and her opinions are discreet, unlike other members of her family.
She also learned of Diana’s mistake when she was accused of misinterpreting the nation’s mood after the death of the Princess of Wales in 1997.
The queen at the shelter provided the homeless for the 2017 Grenfell fire. Credit: POOL PA
Following the Grenfell fire of 2017, which claimed 72 lives, he made an empathetic appearance that was compared and contrasted with the awkward response of then-Prime Minister Theresa May.
More recently, he made a sincere call for national solidarity in the frightening early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Slow to change before Diana, she did so when her people asked her for a new kind of support. In doing so, she has become a grandmother and even a great-grandmother of the nation.
In his Golden Jubilee speech in parliament, he delighted with the British “multicultural and multireligious society”, citing it as “an important development since 1952”.
That’s why the streets of London were lined with nearly a million people on Thursday. People of all nationalities, colors and beliefs. They all say the same things. He is kind, dignified, impertinent, and obedient.
And they all know that this is probably the last time they can celebrate what it means to them.
“Many see her as our greatest sovereign; more popular than Queen Victoria, under whose reign Britain was transformed into an industrialized nation, and her namesake, Queen Elizabeth I, who oversaw a vibrant era of the arts and many new discoveries, “says the veteran royal commentator Rob Jobson.
He said that his constant intervention during the uncertain first days of the first confinement of COVID-19, when he evoked Dame Vera Lynn with his speech “we will meet again”, instilled “trust between people when we need it most.” .
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In this age of change, this Elizabeth would never be the kind of monarch to define an age, like Victoria. But rather it has become the central figure of perseverance in a world that has struggled to keep up with the fastest paces of change we have ever seen.
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