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President, 23 September 1943 to 19 March 1951
Australian Labor Party

A champion of workers’ rights, Gordon Brown (1885-1967) was sometimes unorthodox, occasionally irreverent and, according to colleague Senator Lionel Murphy, ‘one of the most colourful men ever to come into the Senate’.¹ Born in Chesterfield, Derbyshire, UK, in 1885, Brown was the son of a Methodist lay minister, whose teachings influenced his lifelong dedication to helping the underprivileged.²

After attending Clay Cross Grammar School, south of Chesterfield, on a scholarship, Brown worked as an apprentice to a steam engine manufacturer and then as a coalminer in England’s north. Deciding to see how the ‘bottom dogs’ lived, he visited workhouses across the country and was deeply affected by the poor conditions and widespread poverty.³ In 1908 he travelled to Canada, where he joined the Canadian Socialist Party and in 1911 stood unsuccessfully for the Canadian House of Commons.

Disillusioned with the party and Canada’s weak labour movement, Brown returned to England briefly before embarking for Australia in 1912.⁴ On arrival in Sydney he soon became involved with the Australasian Socialist Party, organising protests and rallies, and facing arrest for speaking without a permit. Moving to Brisbane on 1913, Brown married Beatrice Agnes Hinchsliff (1914), with whom he had three children. Concerned that working men enlisting to fight in World War I were ‘mugs’, Brown worked for the Anti-Conscription Campaign Committee, before taking on jobs as an insurance and furniture salesman.⁵

Joining the ALP in 1918, Brown became a union organiser and served as vice-president of the Shop Assistants’ Union and the Trades and Labour Council of Queensland (1925-27).⁶ Elected as a senator for Queensland in 1931, Brown’s early speeches focused on economic protection, nationalisation of industry, and social welfare. He served as Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate (1935-38) and Chair of Committees (1941-43) before he was elected President in 1943.

Although he was twice suspended from the Senate before his election as President, Brown was firm but fair in the chair, guiding proceedings with good humour.⁷ He ruled that senators should not quote from newspapers, books or periodicals when asking questions. However, he allowed latitude around the rule of relevance, ruling that if a senator appeared to be speaking irrelevantly to the question, the senator should be given the opportunity to show how the remarks related to the subject.⁸

Ill-health forced Brown to resign from the presidency in 1951 but he remained in the Senate for another 14 years. In 1953, he published his satirically-titled autobiography, My Descent from Soapbox to Senate. He retired in 1965 and died 18 months later, survived by his wife and children.

Henry Aloysius Hanke
Sydney-born painter and teacher Henry Hanke (1901-1989) studied at the JS Watkins School before establishing himself as a landscape painter and portraitist. In 1922, he became an exhibiting member of the Royal Art Society of NSW and was a regular contributor to group exhibitions, including the Sulman and Archibald Prize exhibitions. Hanke faced difficult financial circumstances for many years prior to winning the Archibald Prize in 1934. He would later remark that he had entered a self-portrait because he could not afford a model. Following his Archibald success he became much in demand as a portraitist. In 1936, he won the inaugural Sulman Prize with his painting La Gitana. In 1942 Hanke enlisted in the Army and became a war artist, depicting scenes from his time in New Guinea. A Director of the Royal Art Society art school, he was popular in art circles, with artists Graeme Inson and Ivy Shore among his friends. His work is represented in national, state and regional galleries.⁹

Gordon Brown
by Henry Aloysius Hanke
1944
Oil on canvas
89 x 68.7 cm
Historic Memorials Collection, Parliament House Art Collection

References
1. N Henty, ‘Death of the Honorable Gordon Brown’, Senate, Debates, 21 February 1967, pp. 15–16; L Murphy, ‘Death of the Honorable Gordon Brown’, Senate, Debates, 21 February 1967, pp. 16–17.
2. Unless otherwise noted, information sourced from B Stevenson, ‘Brown, Gordon (1885–1967)’, The Biographical Dictionary of the Australian Senate Online Edition, Department of the Senate, Parliament of Australia, published first in hardcopy 2010; Parliamentary Library, ‘Brown, the Hon. Gordon’, Parliamentary Handbook Online; N Brown, ‘Brown, Gordon (1885–1967)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1993. Websites accessed 7 June 2021.
3. Stevenson, op. cit.; Murphy, op. cit.
4. Murphy, ibid.; Henty, op. cit.; Stevenson, op. cit.; N Brown, op. cit.
5. Ibid.
6. Stevenson, op. cit.
7. Murphy, op. cit.; Henty, op. cit.; Stevenson, op. cit.
8. G Brown, ‘Question’, Senate, Debates, 11 May 1950, p. 2419; G Brown, ‘Report of Select Committee’, Senate, Debates, 5 October 1950, p. 333.
9. ‘Hanke, Henry Aloysius’, A McCulloch, S McCulloch and E McCulloch Childs, eds, The New McCulloch’s Encyclopedia of Australian Art, Aus Art Editions in association with The Miegunyah Press, 2006, p. 496; ‘Henry Hanke interviewed by Denise Hickey’ (sound recording), 20 August 1971; ‘Artists’ Models’, The West Australian, 25 February 1938, p. 18; ; ‘Relief worker wins blue riband of art’, The Labor Daily, 19 January 1935, p. 1; ‘Artist’s struggle’, The Sydney Morning Herald, 21 January 1935, p. 9; ‘NX191070 Lieutenant H. A. Hanke, Official War Artist attached to Headquarters Military History’, Australian War Memorial. Websites accessed 29 April 2021.