Jessie Street

Jessie Street
Born	Jessie Mary Grey Lillingston (1889-04-18)18 April 1889 Ranchi, Bihar, Bengal Presidency, British Raj (now in Jharkhand, India)
Died	2 July 1970(1970-07-02) (aged 81) Sydney, Australia
Monuments	Jessie Street Gardens, Jessie Street National Women's Library
Nationality	Australian
Alma mater	University of Sydney (BA, 1911)
Spouse	Sir Kenneth Whistler Street
Children	Sir Laurence Whistler Street
Relatives	Edward Ogilvie (grandfather) Sir Philip Whistler Street (father-in-law)
Family	Street

Jessie Mary Grey Street, née Lillingston, (18 April 1889 – 2 July 1970) was an Australian diplomat, suffragette and campaigner for Indigenous Australian rights, commonly referred to as Mrs Kenneth Street, but later dubbed "Red Jessie" by the media. As Australia's only female delegate to the founding of the United Nations in 1945, Jessie was Australia's first female delegate to the United Nations, where she ensured the inclusion of sex as a non-discrimination clause in the United Nations Charter. She was Lady Street from 1956, with the elevation of her husband Sir Kenneth Whistler Street.

Background

A sketch of Jessie, aged 21

Jessie Mary Grey Lillingston was born on 18 April 1889 at Ranchi, Bihar, India. Her father Charles Alfred Gordon Lillingston, JP (great-grandson of Sir George Grey, 1st Baronet) was a member of the Imperial Civil Service in India. Her mother Mabel Harriet Ogilvie was the daughter of Australian politician Edward David Stuart Ogilvie. She was involved with Dorette Margarethe MacCallum and others who were challenging the patriarchy at the University of Sydney where the men were trying to monopolise the sports facilities. In 1911 as a Bachelor of Arts.

In 1916, she married Kenneth Whistler Street, who was knighted in 1944. Her father-in-law Sir Philip Whistler Street served as Chief Justice of New South Wales, as did her husband Kenneth and their youngest son, Laurence, who was knighted in 1976. Their other children were Belinda, Philippa and Roger. She was known as Red Jessie due to her friendship with the Soviet Union during the cold war.

Career and activism

Street was a prominent figure in Australian and international political life for over 50 years, from the women's suffrage movement in England to the Aboriginal Australian rights. Street ran in the 1943 Australian federal election as a member of the Australian Labor Party against United Australia Party frontbencher Eric Harrison for the Sydney Eastern Suburbs seat of Wentworth, and nearly defeated him amid that year's massive Labor landslide. She led the field on the first count, and only the preferences of conservative independent Bill Wentworth allowed Harrison to survive. Her attempt was the closest a Labor candidate has ever come to winning the conservative stronghold of Wentworth.

At the San Francisco Conference in 1945, Street was Australia's only female delegate to the founding of the United Nations, where she played a key role alongside Eleanor Roosevelt in ensuring that sex was included with race and religion as a non-discrimination clause in the United Nations Charter.

In 1941 the future prime minister Ben Chifley received a united deputation from a number of women's organisations. They were encouraging him to create a tax on men who were not married. This suggestion was made in preference to a proposal to introduce a new tax on the total income of married couples. The delegation was by Vivienne Newson, Edna Lillian Nelson, Erna Keighley and Street.

In 1949, Street was made a charter member of the Australian Peace Council. The Jessie Street Centre, the Jessie Street Trust, the Jessie Street National Women's Library and Jessie Street Gardens exist in her honour.

Further reading

• Lenore Coltheart, "Jessie Street and the Soviet Union", in Political Tourists: Travellers from Australia to the Soviet Union in the 1920s–1940s. Eds. Sheila Fitzpatrick and Carolyn Rasmussen. Melbourne University Press, 2008. ISBN 0-522-85530-X
• Heather Radi, Jessie Street, Documents and Essays, Women's Redress Press, 1990. ISBN 1-875274-03-0
• Peter Sekuless, Jessie Street, a rewarding but unrewarded life, Prentice Hall, 1978. ISBN 0-7022-1227-X
• Jessie Street, ed Lenore Coltheart, Jessie Street, a Revised Autobiography, Federation Press, 2004. ISBN 1-86287-502-2
• Jessie Street, Truth or Repose, Australasian Book Society, 1966.
• Eric Russell, Woollahra – a History in Pictures, John Ferguson Pty Ltd., 1980. ISBN 0-909134-23-5

External links

• Red Jessie: Jessie Street – biography produced by the National Archives of Australia.
• Street, Jessie Mary Grey at The Encyclopedia of Women and Leadership in Twentieth-Century Australia
• Street, Jessie Mary Grey at The Australian Women's Register (archive)
• Jessie Street Papers | National Library of Australia National Library of Australia.
• Jessie Street | Australian Broadcasting Corporation ABC broadcast on Jessie Street.