Stanley R. Whitford (5 January 1878 – 13 December 1959) was a unionist and

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 ...

politician in the State of

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 ...

History

Stanley Whitford was born the youngest son of Richard Whitford (ca.1835 – 27 April 1898) and Emma Prior Whitford (the widow Prior), née Matthews, (1835 – 28 July 1908) of Moonta. His parents emigrated from

Gunnislake Gunnislake () is a large village in east Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is situated in the Tamar Valley approximately north of Plymouth The first woman cabinet minister in the British Empire, Mary Ellen Smith, was born here in 1863. G ...

Cornwall Cornwall (; or ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is also one of the Celtic nations and the homeland of the Cornish people. The county is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, ...

on the ''Sir Richard Burlington'', arriving in Adelaide on 14 February 1856. They spent three years in Burra before settling in Moonta. Stanley R. Whitford, as he became known, was educated at the State school and attended night classes at the Moonta School of Mines in 1897 and 1898. He was employed by a blacksmith for seven years, then from 1899 to 1908 worked on the goldfields in Western Australia. then started working for the

South Australian Railways South Australian Railways (SAR) was the organisation through which the Government of South Australia built and operated railways in South Australia from 1854 until March 1978, when its non-urban railways were incorporated into Australian Natio ...

at Mount Gambier and became active with the South Australian Railways and Tramways Association. He moved to

Adelaide Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. The name "Adelaide" may refer to ei ...

sometime before 1918, living at Gilles Street.

Politics

He was an (unsuccessful) candidate for membership of the Mount Gambier Council in 1915 and 1916. He stood unsuccessfully as Labor candidate for the Young ward of the Adelaide City Council in 1918. but succeeded at the following poll and served 1922–1924, when he was narrowly defeated – by this time he was living in Osmond Street, Adelaide. He succeeded as the

candidate for

North Adelaide North Adelaide is a predominantly residential precinct (Australia), precinct and suburb of the City of Adelaide in South Australia, situated north of the River Torrens and within the Adelaide Park Lands. Laid out in a grid plan in three section ...

in the

South Australian House of Assembly The House of Assembly (also known as the lower house) is one of two chambers of the Parliament of South Australia, the other being the Legislative Council. It sits in Parliament House in the state capital, Adelaide. Overview The House of Assem ...

in 1921 and again in 1924 but was beaten in 1927. In 1929 he was elected to the

South Australian Legislative Council The Legislative Council, or upper house, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of South Australia. Its central purpose is to act as a house of review for legislation passed through the lower house, the South Australian House of Assembly, H ...

to fill a vacancy left by the death of John Carr. He was endorsed by the Labor Party at the last moment, as a replacement for Douglas H. Bardolph, who had displeased the party's power brokers. He retained the seat until 1941. He succeeded J. Jelley as Chief Secretary (leader of the government party in the Legislative Council) in 1930, and retained it until the demise of the Hill government in 1933. From 1930 to 1933 he was Minister for Immigration, Irrigation, Repatriation and Agriculture. He made headlines in 1931 when he admitted that he, like most politicians, achieved power with promises that could not, or should not, be delivered. He was expelled from the ALP in 1931 for supporting the

Premiers' Plan The Premiers' Plan was a deflationary economic policy agreed by a meeting of the Premiers of the Australian states in June 1931 to combat the Great Depression in Australia that sparked the 1931 Labor split. Background The Great Depress ...

, then re-admitted in 1945.

Family

Whitford married Edith Thyra Dixon (ca.1878 – 20 March 1950), also of Moonta, on 1 October 1910. They had two sons: Gene Whitford and Owen Whitford. He had a sister Mary Lavinia "Polly" Whitford (ca.1856 – 18 April 1900), who married (mining) Captain Richard Cowling (ca.1854 – 27 September 1921) in 1877. Other siblings were Richard Prior (ca. March 1854 – 10 September 1927), of Yelta, Mrs. C. J. Holmes, of Norwood and Whyalla; and Alma (ca.1870 – 17 September 1913), who married Benjamin Jolly, of Moonta Mines

Other interests

He was a fair musician, well known as a public speaker and popular for his humorous recitations. access-dateHe was fond of drinking in company, and was once fined £5 for frequenting a hotel bar after hours. He once (unsuccessfully) sued a prohibitionist parson who criticized him as being manipulated by the alcohol industry. He was at the time a representative for a Scotch whisky company. He was a keen follower of the sport or pastime of

coursing Coursing by humans is the pursuit of game or other animals by dogs—chiefly greyhounds and other sighthounds—catching their prey by speed, running by sight, but not by scent. Coursing was a common hunting technique, practised by the nobility, ...

. He was an owner of "My Mate", winner of the (Australian) Waterloo Cup.

Artwork

He was several times caricatured by

Copper Triangle Copper Coast is a region of South Australia situated in Northern Yorke Peninsula and comprising the towns of Wallaroo, Kadina, Moonta, Paskeville and Port Hughes. The area approximately bounded by Wallaroo, Kadina and Moonta is also known ...

artist Oswald Pryor.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Whitford, Stanley R. 1878 births 1959 deaths Australian trade unionists Members of the South Australian House of Assembly Members of the South Australian Legislative Council Politicians from Adelaide Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of South Australia Independent members of the Parliament of South Australia People from Moonta, South Australia