Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Wright, Thomas
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
- Tom Wright
- TW Wright
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
1902 - 1981
History
Thomas (Tom) Wright was born in Scotland and emigrated to Australia about 1913 and was apprenticed in the sheet metal working trade at the age of fourteen. Wright joined the Sheet Metal Workers' Union in 1921 and in 1924 was appointed to the New South Wales Branch Executive of the Sheet Metal Workers' Union. He was the NSW Branch Secretary from 1936-1972, and was Federal President of the Union from 1940-1972. Wright pioneered amalgamations of the SMWU with the Jewellers' & Stove Makers' Unions in the 1930s and 1940s and contributed to the formation of the Amalgamated Metal Workers' Union. At the time of his retirement in 1972 he was the NSW State President and National Vice-President of the Amalgamated Metal Workers' Union.
Wright was a promoter of the ACTU in 1926-1927 and was the Sheet Metal Workers' Unions' delegate from 1938 to 1972, serving on the ACTU Executive for many years and on its Shipbuilding Sub-Committee from 1946-1963. He was actively involved on the Executive of the NSW Labor Council from the 1920s until his retirement in 1972. He was a member of the NSW Labor Council delegation which travelled to China and the Soviet Union in 1927. In 1943, Wright helped found the Metal Trades Federation on which he was a Sheet Metal Workers' Union delegate. He visited the Soviet Union again in 1952 and 1969, China in 1952, and in 1963 visited Cuba after the Batista regime was defeated.
Tom Wright and his wife, Mary, played a substantial part in the long campaign to achieve equal pay for women and were active in campaigns on Aboriginal rights.
Places
New South Wales; China; Soviet Union; Cuba
Legal status
Functions, occupations and activities
metalworker; political activist; trade unionist; trade union official
Mandates/sources of authority
Internal structures/genealogy
General context
Relationships area
Related entity
Identifier of the related entity
Category of the relationship
Dates of the relationship
Description of relationship
Related entity
Identifier of the related entity
Category of the relationship
Dates of the relationship
Description of relationship
Access points area
Subject access points
Place access points
Occupations
Control area
Authority record identifier
Institution identifier
Rules and/or conventions used
Status
Level of detail
Dates of creation, revision and deletion
Entered from deposit description on 23 April 2012
Language(s)
Script(s)
Sources
Frank Bollins. “Veteran Trade Union Leader Dies”, Metal Worker, February 1981
Monash Library, http://www.lib.monash.edu.au/exhibitions/communism/com105.html (accessed on 23 April 2012)