People Australia

Samuel Antliff (Sam) Kenny (1875-1919) schoolmaster, music teacher and trade union official 

Birth: 1 April 1875 at Wallsend, Newcastle, New South Wales, son of the Reverend Bernard Frances Kenny (1833-1902), Primitive Methodist minister, born at Portadown Armagh, Northern Ireland, and Mary Elizabeth, née Lundie (1841-1926), born at Ardrie, Lanarkshire, Scotland. Marriage: 1 January 1902 at the bride’s parents’ residence, Harris Park, Parramatta, by his father, to native-born Edith Kate Akehurst (1875-1957). They had four daughters and one son. Death: 10 February 1919 in a private hospital at Cronulla, Sydney, usual residence Alfred Street, Granville, Sydney. Religion: buried with Methodist forms. 

• Employed on probation as a pupil teacher at Five Dock, Sydney, on 27 May 1892. Taught at various public schools in the Newcastle region from 1894 to 1897. From 1897 to 1898 attended Training School. He was music master at Fort Street Model School in 1899 to 1904.
• From 1904 to 1906 he was assistant teacher at Milltown, near Bathurst, and then at Burwood, Sydney. He was briefly choirmaster at the Macquarie Street Methodist Church, Parramatta.
• A music-lover and singer, from time to time he was in charge of musical arrangements at various Methodist churches. From 1907 to 1913 he was conductor of the Pitt Street Congregational Church choir.
• From 17 July 1907 Kenny was employed as lecturer and teacher of singing and voice production at the Training College for Teachers at Blackfriars, Sydney.
• He was honorary general secretary of the NSW Public School Teachers’ Association from about 1909. Joint honorary secretary of the Teachers’ Federation.
• A long-time resident of Granville, he was a founding member of the Granville Brotherhood in 1910, and was sometime conductor of the Granville Musical Union.
• Cause of death: pernicious anaemia (one year) and exhaustion.

Sources
Education Gazette, 1 March 1919.