People Australia

William Thomas Palmer (Bill or ‘Taffy’) Smale (1924-2017) railway worker, miner and trade union official

Birth: 6 January 1924 at Newport, Monmouthshire, South Wales, United Kingdom, son of Thomas James Smale (1898-1947), blacksmith and railway roof repairer, and Eliza, née Belcher, later Holloway (1897-1969). Marriage: 4 December 1943 at St Mary’s Catholic Church, Stow Hill, Newport, Monmouthshire, United Kingdom, to Mary Therese O’Connell (b.1925), clerk at dry dock. They had one daughter. Death: 13 February 2017 at Berkeley Vale, New South Wales. 

• His father served in the South Wales Borderers during World War I.
• Bill began working as an engine-cleaner in the British railways on 14 May 1941. Became a locomotive engine fireman in December 1941. From May 1943 until May 1946 served during World War II in the Royal Air Force as a bomber navigator. Rose to rank of flight-sergeant. Resumed work in the British Railways in 1946 and resigned in September 1950.
• Came to Australia aboard the Mooltan in March 1952, lived at Karingal hostel, began work as a miner at the Nebo colliery, and built his own home at Dapto, New South Wales. His wife and family arrived after him.
• Associated with the Communist Party of Australia from 1958, he was critical of the influence of Denis Freney in 1970.
• Worked at Nebo mine, NSW South Coast, where he was successively scrutineer, vice-president and president of the miners' lodge, then vice-president and president of Southern District of the Australasian Coal and Shale Employees’ [Miners'] Federation.
• Elected general secretary of the national executive of the Miners' Federation in 1973; re-elected in 1974, 1977 & 1980. Retired in 1982.
• Moved to Brighton-le-Sands, Sydney in the 1970s.

Sources
Pete Thomas, Miners in the 1970s: a narrative history of the Miners’ Federation (Sydney [1983].