User:MCE89/Mary Gilmore

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Mary Gilmore was born Mary Jean Cameron on 16 August 1865 near Goulburn, New South Wales. She was the first child of the Scottish-born farmer Donald Cameron and his Australian-born wife Mary-Ann (née Beattie), whose family had migrated from Ireland in 1842.^[4] During her childhood her father frequently moved the family across New South Wales and spent time working as a builder, carpenter, innkeeper, and farmer.^[4] At the age of seven Gilmore began attending a small school near Wagga Wagga, and at nine she began attending Wagga Wagga Public School. After the family moved to Houlaghan's Creek in 1877, she began serving as an informal pupil-teacher at small rural schools at the age of 12.^{[4] [2]} She became an official probationary pupil-teacher at the Superior Public School in Wagga Wagga at the age of 16.^[4]

In 1884 Gilmore resigned from her teaching position, before commencing at Beaconsfield Provisional School in Beaconsfield in May 1886.^[4] The following year, she moved to Illabo Public School.^[4] After passing a teachers' examination, she became a temporary assistant teacher near Broken Hill at Silverton Public School.^[4] While working in the Silverton, a working-class mining town, she developed an interest in the labour movement.^[5] In January 1890, she began teaching at Neutral Bay Public School.^[4]

Around 1890 Gilmore met the writer Henry Lawson; they became close, and she later wrote that they had considered marriage.^[4] She became increasingly involved in radical politics and supported major strikes by the maritime and shearers' unions.^{[4] [5]} She was the first female member of the Australian Workers' Union and served on its executive.^[2] Her politics were influenced by her friendships with William Lane, John Farrell, and A. G. Stephens.^[5] In May 1891 she began working at the Stanmore Superior Public School.^[4]

Gilmore supported the utopian socialist author and journalist William Lane in establishing the New Australia settlement in Paraguay. She resigned from her teaching position in 1895 and sailed to Paraguay to join Lane at the settlement.^[4] There, she married a shearer named William Alexander Gilmore on 25 May 1897.^[4] Her only child, a son named William Dysart Cameron Gilmore, was born on 21 August 1898 near the Cosme settlement.^[4] They left the settlement in November 1899 and moved to Rio Gallegos the following year. There, Gilmore began delivering English lessons.^[4] They left Paraguay and arrived in England in April 1902, then returned to Australia in July of that year.^[4]

After returning to Australia, Gilmore and her husband travelled to his family's property near Casterton, Victoria.^[4] She began contributing to The Bulletin and exchanged letters with its editor Alfred George Stephens.^[4] The family moved to Casterton in 1907.^[4] In 1908 Gilmore began contributing to the Australian Worker ; she ultimately edited its women's page until 1931.^[4] She campaigned for the Australian Labor Party in 1906 and 1910.^[4]

In 1910 Gilmore published her first volume of poetry, Marri'd, and other Verses .^{[4] [5]} In 1912 Gilmore moved to Sydney with her son while her husband moved to Queensland; they remained close, but rarely saw one another over the years that followed.^[4]

In 1918 Gilmore published a second volume of poetry, The Passionate Heart , about what she saw as the horror and futility of the First World War. She donated the royalties to blind servicemen.^[4] She published a collection of essays titled Hound of the Road in 1922.^[4] Suffering from heart problems and high blood pressure, she was hospitalised in 1920 and spent various periods in Goulburn over the next four years.^[4]

Gilmore published her third poetry collection, The Tilted Cart , in 1925.^[4] Her fourth, The Wild Swan , was published in 1930.^[4] The collection laments the destruction of Aboriginal culture and the natural landscape by European colonisation.^[4] Her next collection, The Rue Tree , was published in 1931 and explored religious themes.^[4] Her collection Under the Wilgas was published in 1932.^[4] She published two prose memoirs—Old Days, Old Ways: A Book of Recollections and More Recollections —in 1934 and 1935.^[4] In these memoirs she described life on the Australian frontier.^[2]

In 1937 Gilmore was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.^{[4] [5]} She published a new poetry collection titled Battlefields in 1939.^[4] Her patriotic wartime poetry, particularly the poem "No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest", attracted her a significant audience.^[2] In 1952 Gilmore began writing a regular column for the Communist newspaper Tribune .^[4] In her later years she lived in a small apartment in the King's Cross neighbourhood of Sydney.^[5] Her final volume of poetry, Fourteen Men , was published in 1954.^[4]

By her later years Gilmore was a celebrated public figure; she regularly appeared in the media and became the namesake of various prizes and institutions.^[4] She died on 3 December 1962 and was given a state funeral at St Stephen's Presbyterian Church.^[4]

Sharyn Pearce describes Gilmore's writing as "didactic, even messianic", writing that she became an "object of veneration" for the Australian working class.^[2]

Gilmore was the subject of portraits by William Dobell and Joshua Smith and a bronze bust by Rayner Hoff, which are now held by the Art Gallery of New South Wales.^[4] A collection of Gilmore's writing titled Mary Gilmore: A Tribute was published in 1965, edited by Dymphna Cusack, T. Inglis Moore, and Barrie Ovenden.^[5] Her collected letters, edited by W. H. Wilde and T. Inglis Moore, were published under the title Letters of Mary Gilmore in 1980.^[5] A biography of Gilmore by W. H. Wilde titled Courage A Grace was published in 1988.^[5] Since 1993, Gilmore has featured on the Australian ten-dollar note.^[5]