Early and Family Life
Edward Gough Whitlam was born on 11 July 1916 in Kew, a suburb of Melbourne. He was the older of two children (he has a younger sister, Freda) born to Martha (née Maddocks) and Fred Whitlam. His father was a federal public servant who later served as Commonwealth Crown Solicitor, and Whitlam senior's involvement in human rights issues was a powerful influence on his son. Since the boy's maternal grandfather was also named Edward, from early childhood he was called by his middle name.
In 1918, Fred Whitlam was promoted to Deputy Crown Solicitor and transferred to Sydney. The family lived first in the North Shore suburb of Mosman and then in Turramurra. At age six, Gough began his education at Chatswood Church of England Girls School (early primary schooling at a girls' school was not unusual for small boys at the time). After a year there, he attended Mowbray House School and Knox Grammar School, in the suburbs of Sydney.
Fred Whitlam was promoted again in 1927, this time to Assistant Crown Solicitor. The position was located in the new national capital of Canberra, and the Whitlam family moved there. Gough Whitlam remains the only Prime Minister to have spent his formative years in Canberra. At the time, conditions remained primitive in what was dubbed "the bush capital" and "the land of the blowflies". Gough, who had always attended a private school, was sent to the government-run Telopea Park School, since no other school was available. In 1932, Fred Whitlam transferred his son to Canberra Grammar School, where, at the 1932 Speech Day ceremony, Gough Whitlam was awarded a prize by the Governor-General, Sir Isaac Isaacs.
Whitlam enrolled at St. Paul's College at the University of Sydney at the age of 18. He earned his first wages by appearing, with several other "Paulines", in a cabaret scene in the film The Broken Melody—the students were chosen because St. Paul's required (and requires) formal wear at dinner, and they could therefore supply their own costumes. After receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree with second-class honours in Classics, Whitlam remained at St. Paul's to begin his law studies; he had originally contemplated an academic career, but his lacklustre marks made that unlikely.
Read more about this topic: Gough Whitlam
Famous quotes containing the words family life, early, family and/or life:
“Like plowing, housework makes the ground ready for the germination of family life. The kids will not invite a teacher home if beer cans litter the living room. The family isn’t likely to have breakfast together if somebody didn’t remember to buy eggs, milk, or muffins. Housework maintains an orderly setting in which family life can flourish.”
—Letty Cottin Pogrebin (20th century)
“I doubt that I would have taken so many leaps in my own writing or been as clear about my feminist and political commitments if I had not been anointed as early as I was. Some major form of recognition seems to have to mark a woman’s career for her to be able to go out on a limb without having her credentials questioned.”
—Ruth Behar (b. 1956)
“A ball player’s got to be kept hungry to become a big leaguer. That’s why no boy from a rich family ever made the big leagues.”
—Joe Dimaggio (b. 1914)
“Professors of literature, who for the most part are genteel but mediocre men, can make but a poor defense of their profession, and the professors of science, who are frequently men of great intelligence but of limited interests and education, feel a politely disguised contempt for it; and thus the study of one of the most pervasive and powerful influences on human life is traduced and neglected.”
—Yvor Winters (1900–1968)