People Australia

Alice Isabelle Holloway, née Dwyer (1901-1961) community activist

Birth: 1901 at Helensburgh, Wollongong, New South Wales, daughter of native-born parents Henry Glendevour [or Glenderson] Carl Dwyer (Glen) (1876-1907), labourer, and Margaret, née Baxter (1878-1969). Marriage: 1921 at Hurstville, Sydney, to native-born Cecil Herbert Bramwell Holloway (1899-1969), butcher, war veteran, later railway porter and Communist. They had six children. Death: 14 May 1961 at Randwick, Sydney. 

• Moved in her childhood with her parents to Yarloop, Western Australia, where her father died when she was six. Her mother returned to NSW with three children.
• Foundation roll keeper of Australian Railway Union’s Women's Auxiliary in March 1934; soon elected president. In April 1935 became secretary.
• In 1938 represented railway women at May Day celebrations in Moscow, relishing “the comradeship, the tremendous enthusiasm” of the Soviet Union. While overseas she visited Spain at the behest of the London Spanish Relief Committee, causing ARU auxiliaries to donate funds to anti-fascist cause.
• Upon returning to Australia she commenced a lecture tour addressing, among others, the Movement against War and Fascism, Russian Cultural Relations Group, Modern Women's Club and ARU Women's auxiliary on the situation in Spain.
• Described by Lloyd Ross as 'a fighter in the cause of the underdog'.

Sources
Railroad, September 1986.