1. William McKell had previously been Premier of New South Wales from 1941 to 1947, as leader of the Labor Party.
40 Facts About William McKell
1. 2.
William McKell left school at thirteen, training as a boilermaker at Mort's Dock.
3.
William McKell soon became involved with the union movement, and after a brief period on the railways began working full-time as a union secretary.
4.
William McKell sided with the anti-conscriptionists during the Labor Party split of 1916, and at the 1917 state election defeated James McGowen, a former Labor premier who had been expelled from the party.
5.
In 1920, aged 29, William McKell was Minister of Justice under John Storey.
6.
William McKell served as a minister under John Dooley and Jack Lang.
7.
William McKell replaced Jack Lang as leader of the opposition in 1939, and became premier following Labor's victory at the 1941 state election.
8.
William McKell was re-elected with an increased majority at the 1944 election, making him the first Labor premier to win successive elections in New South Wales.
9.
William McKell had planned to retire from public life in 1946, but was instead convinced by Ben Chifley to become Governor-General.
10.
William McKell's appointment was initially controversial due to its openly political nature; Sir Robert Menzies called it "shocking and humiliating".
11.
Bill William McKell was born in Pambula, New South Wales, the eldest of four children.
12.
William McKell's father, Robert Pollock McKell, was a butcher who moved the family to Surry Hills in Sydney in 1898.
13.
The family moved to Redfern, with William McKell's mother working to support the family.
14.
William McKell was educated at Bourke Street Public School in Surry Hills.
15.
In 1906, William McKell became an apprentice boilermaker at Mort's Dock at Balmain in Sydney.
16.
William McKell joined the Federated Society of Boilermakers and Iron and Steel Ship-Builders and organized fellow apprentices to fight for improved conditions.
17.
William McKell became full-time Assistant Secretary of the Boilermakers' Society in 1914.
18.
William McKell was active in the Labor Party, which he joined in 1908.
19.
William McKell was prominent in the Industrial Section, which took control of the Party in 1916.
20.
When Labor split over conscription in that year, William McKell was an anti-conscriptionist.
21.
In 1919, William McKell bought a house in Redfern that was to be his long-term home.
22.
Except for the period of proportional representation, when he was a member for Botany, William McKell represented the seat of Redfern until he resigned to become Governor-General in 1947.
23.
William McKell became Minister of Justice after Labor won the 1920 election and retained the position until the Government was defeated in 1922.
24.
When Labor regained office under John Thomas Lang's Leadership in 1925, William McKell returned to the Justice portfolio.
25.
When Lang won the 1930 election, William McKell became a Minister but was relegated to the minor portfolio of Local Government.
26.
In June 1931, William McKell again became Justice Minister, where he remained until Lang's dismissal by Governor Game in May 1932.
27.
William McKell contrasted this with United Australia Party Premier Alexander Mair's attitude that all social and other reform had to be postponed because of the war.
28.
William McKell set up a War Effort Co-ordination Committee chaired by himself.
29.
William McKell was the first NSW Labor Premier to win a second consecutive term.
30.
The William McKell Government achieved an impressive record in the social, industrial, planning, and environmental areas, including Kosciusko National Park and the Snowy Mountains Scheme.
31.
On 13 February 1946, William McKell announced that he was retiring from politics before the next election.
32.
William McKell kept a dignified silence on the matter of his appointment, rather than conducting a public defence of it.
33.
William McKell carried out the usual round of his formal duties with dignity, behaved with unfailing respect towards the King himself, and succeeded in winning over all but the most inflexible.
34.
When Menzies succeeded Chifley as Prime Minister in December 1949, his relations with William McKell were initially civil rather than friendly, but later on, the two men formed a cordial working relationship.
35.
William McKell took the view that an election was necessary, and that it was for the electorate, not for himself, to determine whether the Senate or Menzies was right.
36.
William McKell saw it as his duty to act on the advice of his Prime Minister.
37.
Sections of the Labor Party condemned William McKell for granting the double dissolution, claiming he had 'ambushed' his old Party.
38.
On 13 November 1951, William McKell accepted a knighthood from George VI, who personally invested him at Buckingham Palace while William McKell was on an official visit to the United Kingdom.
39.
William McKell was the only Australian Governor-General to be knighted during his term, until Quentin Bryce was appointed a Dame of the Order of Australia in March 2014.
40.
William McKell died in the Sydney suburb of Waverley in January 1985 aged 93.