May Holman: Western Australia's forgotten political star remembered in new biography 720 ABC Perth
By Emma Wynne
Mon 30 May 2016, 1:24pm
Photo: May Holman, pictured in the 1930s, was Australia's first female Labor MP. (Supplied: John Curtin Prime Ministerial Library)
She was young, vivacious, an accomplished singer and dancer, as well as consummate politician — so why isn't May Holman more well known?
Mary Alice (May) Holman was Australia's first female Labor politician, elected to the state seat of Forrest when she was just 31.
She is now the subject of new biography The Magnificent Life Of Miss May Holman, by Lekkie Hopkins, a senior lecturer in history at Edith Cowan University.
"May Holman was something completely different," Dr Hopkins told James Lush on 720 ABC Perth.
"She was 31, she was fresh, and she was glamorous.
"Before her entry into politics, she has been an entertainer, and this meant that she was a singer and a dancer and she was really an accomplished musician."
Holmans' a Labor Party dynasty Ms Holman was also born into Labor politics.
Her father, John Barkell Holman, was the secretary of the Timber Workers Union and singled out his eldest daughter for a career in politics from an early age.
"When she left school, although she had been a brilliant scholar at school, she went into Trades Hall to sit beside her father to learn all about industrial advocacy," Dr Hopkins said.
"He died in 1925, but for the 10 years preceding his death May had been his right hand."
Photo: May Holman in 1917. As young woman she worked with her father in the Labor movement. (Supplied: State Library of Western Australia)
When Mr Holman died he was the state MP for Forrest, a south-west electorate centred around the timber town of Dwellingup.
Ms Holman stood for the seat and won, creating a sensation on her first day in parliament.
"When she entered parliament she sailed in looking very glamorous and the public galleries were packed," Dr Hopkins said.
"Newspaper reports say that people abandoned decorum and stood on the edges of their chairs to get a better view."
Health and safety advocate But Ms Holman was more than a novelty — she was deeply committed to her the people in her electorate, Dr Hopkins said.
"She was really well positioned as a member of parliament because she had grown up as a little girl with a lot of these men as her father's friends. Everyone in parliament knew her," she said.
"One of the very important things that she did was introduce the Timber Workers Bill, which provided for changes in the industrial health and wellbeing of those workers.
"This was one of the first health and safety bills that had been seen anywhere in the world; it was actually copied by other countries."
Ms Holman was briefly married to Joseph Gardiner between 1914 and 1920, but their union was later annulled.
The couple never lived together.
Photo: May Holman at the a Women's Organisation of WA ball held in a cave at Yanchep, 1936. (Supplied: State Library of Western Australia)
She never had any children, but drove south every weekend to visit her electorate with one of her seven brothers or sisters in tow.
"She said one of the advantages of being a woman politician was that men, if they visited, had to go formally through the front door and sit in the parlour," Dr Hopkins explained.
"She, as a woman, could knock on the back door and sit at the kitchen table.
"People took her into their hearts."
Five electoral victories Ms Holman won election after election, remaining as the member for Forrest until 1939.
Then, on the eve of being re-elected for the fifth time, tragedy struck.
It was Friday March 17, 1939, and Ms Holman was driving down to Dwellingup.
"The car failed to take a bend and overturned," Dr Hopkins said.
"She was crushed beneath it.
"Her sister [a passenger in the car] was flung out, but May stayed alive until the following Monday.
Photo: The funeral for May Holman on March 22, 1939. Thousands turned out at Perth's Karrakatta cemetery to farewell her. (Supplied: State Library of Western Australia)
"She was re-elected.
"She was told on Monday afternoon and then two hours later she died."
Her brother Edward ran in a subsequent by-election and held the seat of Forrest until 1947.
Thousands crowded Karrakatta cemetery to say farewell to Ms Holman — but decades later, few people know her story.
Dr Hopkins said she is hoped that, 77 years later, the biography would reignite interest in her story.
"Women have been hidden from history, but we know very little about any politicians from that time really," she said. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-30/may-holman-was-forgotten-political- star/7459548?section=wa