Jabez Wright (25 April 1852 – 10 September 1922) was an English-born Australian politician. Wright was born at

Greenwich Greenwich ( , , ) is an List of areas of London, area in south-east London, England, within the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Greater London, east-south-east of Charing Cross. Greenwich is notable for its maritime hi ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, the son of Jabez Gladstone Wright. He worked in

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

and

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

before moving to

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

, eventually settling in

Broken Hill Broken Hill is a city in the Far West (New South Wales), far west region of outback New South Wales, Australia. An inland mining city, it is near the border with South Australia on the crossing of the Barrier Highway (A32) and the Silver City Hi ...

around 1888. On 15 January 1878 Wright married Honora Kearney, with whom he had four children. He worked as a carpenter and then as an undertaker, and was a member of the

Australian Workers' Union The Australian Workers' Union (AWU) is one of Australia's largest and oldest trade unions. It traces its origins to unions founded in the pastoralism, pastoral and mining industries in the late 1880s and it currently has approximately 80,000 ...

. From 1896 to 1902 Wright was an alderman at

. He rose to be mayor from 1900 to 1901, the first Labor Mayor in the world. He was elected to the

New South Wales Legislative Assembly The New South Wales Legislative Assembly is the lower of the two houses of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The upper house is the New South Wales Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament House ...

in 1913 as the

Labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

member for Willyama. With the introduction of

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to any electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to political divisions (Political party, political parties) amon ...

in 1920 Wright was defeated running for Sturt, but filled the vacancy caused by the murder of Percy Brookfield in 1921. Wright himself caused a vacancy a year later when he died at Bondi.

References

1852 births 1922 deaths Members of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly British emigrants Immigrants to Australia Colony of South Australia people People from Greenwich Mayors of Broken Hill People from Broken Hill, New South Wales Australian carpenters Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of New South Wales {{Australia-Labor-NewSouthWales-MP-stub