DUNKLEY, LOUISA MARGARET (1866-1927), union leader and feminist, was born on 28 May 1866 at Richmond, Melbourne, daughter of William James Dunkley, boot-importer, and his wife Mary Ann, née Regan, both from London. After education at suburban Catholic girls' schools, Louisa Dunkley entered the Postmaster-General's Department in 1882 as a junior assistant. She studied telegraphy and in 1888 qualified as an operator, working in Melbourne metropolitan post and telegraph offices until 1890. She was then transferred to the Chief Telegraph Office and, after passing the necessary proficiency tests, was appointed as a telegraphist.

Miss Dunkley became interested in unionism in the early 1890s from her experience of the unfair conditions in pay and status of women workers in the Victorian public service. Encouraged by the first advances towards equal pay and status in 1895 by women telegraphists in the colony of New South Wales, Louisa Dunkley and a committee ...

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Source:

Australian Dictionary of Biography