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Grace Myrtle Grant (1898–1969)

by Chris Cunneen

This article was published:

Grace Myrtle (Myrtle) Grant, later Blair (1898-1969) feminist, equal pay activist and trade union organiser

Birth: 1898 at Tungamah, Goulburn Valley, Victoria, daughter of Malcolm Grant (1843-1929), farmer, born at Straith, Inverness, Scotland, and native-born Rose Anna, née Davidson (1843-1929). Marriage: 1922 at Prahran, Victoria, to Donald Attrill Blair (1894-1973), a gardener, born at East Ashwood, Kent, England. They had no children. Death: 25 January 1969 in hospital at Charters Towers, Queensland. Religion: Methodist. 

  • During World War I Myrtle was associated with the Victorian Socialist Party. She was also active in the Militant Propagandists and the Australian Labor Party.
  • In December 1915 she was honorary organising secretary of the Women’s Industrial and Social Union, founded in 1909 by C. M. McGrath, Miss Mulcahy and others. Its object, primarily, was to gain equal pay for women for equal work, but also “to gain for the workers the whole of the products of their labour”.
  • Her sister Mary John Grant was an active feminist and Labor worker. Two brothers Malcolm and Norman Grant and brother-in-law Ernest Hanks, linked with the No Conscription Fellowship, were prosecuted under Defence Act for failing to enlist.
  • In 1936 Myrtle and her husband Donald Blair moved to Charters Towers, Queensland.
  • Cause of death: acute cardiac infarction and rheumatoid arthritis.

Sources
Woman Voter (Melbourne), 9 December 1915, p 3: https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/171813828

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Citation details

Chris Cunneen, 'Grant, Grace Myrtle (1898–1969)', People Australia, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://peopleaustralia.anu.edu.au/biography/grant-grace-myrtle-34070/text42720, accessed 11 October 2024.

© Copyright People Australia, 2012

Life Summary [details]

Alternative Names
  • Blair, Grace Myrtle
Birth

1898
Tungamah, Victoria, Australia

Death

25 January, 1969 (aged ~ 71)
Charters Towers, Queensland, Australia

Cause of Death

heart disease

Cultural Heritage

Includes subject's nationality; their parents' nationality; the countries in which they spent a significant part of their childhood, and their self-identity.

Religious Influence

Includes the religion in which subjects were raised, have chosen themselves, attendance at religious schools and/or religious funeral rites; Atheism and Agnosticism have been included.

Occupation
Political Activism