Kim Beazley Sr.

Kim Edward Beazley, the youngest of seven children, was born on 30 September 1917 in Northam, Western Australia. He was the son of Alfred Beazley, a storeman and packer, and his wife Mary Wright. Beazley grew up in Fremantle. He attended the academically selective Perth Modern School (1933–1935), where he topped the state in history and English. He went on to Claremont Teachers College, and first worked as a teacher at the Richmond State School in East Fremantle, and then Arthur River, Midland Junction, and Claremont. Beazley later studied politics at the University of Western Australia (UWA), and tutored at Claremont Teachers College and at UWA. He was later to gain an MA from the Australian National University. ==Career==

Beazley was active in the Labor Party, and the elegance of his writings and the eloquence of his speeches marked him out as a rising star. He served as vice president of the State School Teachers' Union and as a member of the State Executive of the Party. In Parliament On the death in office of Prime Minister John Curtin in 1945, the 27-year-old Beazley was preselected for, and won, Curtin's Federal Parliament seat of Fremantle. He was the youngest member of the federal parliament when elected, and was known as "the student prince". He spent 32 years in Parliament, holding his seat until he retired in 1977. A committed Christian (he was brought up and baptised in the Churches of Christ), and member of Moral Re-Armament (MRA), Beazley was prominent on the right wing of the Labor Party during the ideological battles of the 1950s and 1960s. He claimed a central role in the events leading to the Labor Party's fateful 1954 split and harboured lifelong regret that he failed to help avert the split when he felt it had been in his power to do so. In 1971, Beazley took Galarrwuy Yunupingu and Wulanybuma Wununggumurra (the latter a signatory to the Yirrkala bark petitions), to the Moral Re-Armament conference in Caux, Switzerland, Switzerland. He continued to champion the cause of MRA until his death. Beazley was the education minister in the Whitlam government from 1972 to 1975. Though afflicted with severe illness for part of his tenure, he carried out important reforms in the education field, such as abolishing university fees and introducing needs-based funding for all schools through the Schools Commission. He became the Father of the House. After the defeat of the Whitlam government in 1975, Beazley was elected to the Labor front bench, but resigned in March 1976 when it was revealed that Gough Whitlam and Bill Hartley, with the ALP national secretary, David Combe, had been seeking money from the Iraqi Ba'ath Party to pay for the party's election campaign. He retired from politics in 1977. Party roles In 1951, Beazley wrote the preamble to the national platform and constitution of the Labor Party, at their conference in Adelaide. He served on the ALP national executive as well as the state executive in Western Australia, and was senior vice-president of the party from 1969 until 1971. == Death and legacy ==

At the time of Beazley's death he was the last parliamentary survivor of the Chifley government, as well as the earliest surviving member of the Commonwealth Parliament. He died in Perth on 12 October 2007, and was accorded a state funeral on 20 October. ==Personal life==

Beazley married Betty Judge, a fellow teacher, union official, and an athlete (she was Australian women's 880 yards champion), on 7 February 1948, at Claremont. They had two sons, including Rhodes Scholar, Deputy Prime Minister and Governor of Western Australia Kim Christian Beazley, and one daughter. ==See also==