a celebration of culture and life in Higgins
On this page....Henry Bournes Higgins (b. 30 June 1851, d. 13 January 1929)Join the rising chorus to make 30 June "Higgins Day" - a public holiday for Higgins residents to stop, reflect and celebrate the birth of the great H.B. Higgins. A politician and judge, H.B. Higgins, came to Australia from Ireland with his family in 1870, and is remembered as a great friend of the labour movement, the Irish-Australian community and liberal and progressive causes generally.
In 1901, when federation under the new constitution came into effect, H.B. was elected to the first House of Representatives for the working-class electorate of Northern Melbourne. He stood as a Protectionist, but the Labor Party did not oppose him, regarding him as a supporter of the labour movement. In fact, in 1904 he was offered the post of Attorney-General in the first federal Labor government. He is the only person to have held office in a Federal Labor government without being a member of the Labor Party. In 1906 he became Justice of the High Court of Australia (some say this was to get him out of politics because he was such a trouble maker!). In 1907 he was also appointed President of the newly created Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration, created to arbitrate disputes between trades unions and employers, something H.B. had long advocated. He continued to support the labour movement, although he was strongly opposed to militant unions who abused the strike weapon and ignored his rulings. In 1908 H.B. delivered a judgment which became famous in Australian history, known as the "Harvester Judgement". The case involved one of Australia's largest employers, Hugh McKay, a manufacturer of agricultural machinery. H.B. ruled that Mackay was obliged to pay his employees a wage that guaranteed them a standard of living which was reasonable for "a human being in a civilised community," regardless of his capacity to pay. This gave rise to the legal requirement for a basic wage, which dominated Australian economic life for the next 80 years.*
*source - edited extract from Wikipaedia. Google Henry Bournes Higgins for lots more info about the great man. NOW AVAILABLE - HENRY HIGGINS TSHIRTS. Only $25. Email editor@higgins.org.au for details.
As a
birthday treat, why not download your very own cutout Henry
Higgins dressup doll. Henry Higgins Birthday ParadeJune 30 was Henry Higgins birthday, and Higgins residents came out in the dozens to celebrate and join in the inaugural Henry Higgins Birthday Parade. We talked with one of the revellers.... What do you think of the parade
today?Yeah pretty good. Been to a few of this sort of thing and it has a great vibe by any standards. I’ll definitely be comin' back again. What other parades have you been to? Kaleen was not bad a few months back but not as professional as this one. I thought there could have been more food stalls. What were the highlights? Oh Christ. So hard to choose. Did you see the giant Henry Higgins birthday float? It nearly killed a dog. It was amazing. And the commemorative Higgins donuts were good. I hesitated at $3.50 but they were worth it. Amazing likeness too.  Did you take the public holiday? Yeah my boss wasn’t real happy about it. Said he’d never heard of it but he was convinced when I showed him the website and he saw what an important cultural event it is. In fact, he's gonna take the day off too next year just so he can come to the parade. We are very impressed by your outfit. Well some of the local fellas are anyway. The hairdresser too. What inspired you? Well I thought it was gonna be more of a gay mardi gras. Woops. Hugh Jackman - a Huge Fan of Henry Higgins A
recent story in a popular women's magazine has revealed that Hugh
Jackman once played Henry Higgins live on stage. Our sources confirm that HughJ was initially thrilled to be able to play the great man, but later was gutted when he found out it was not a play about the 'Harvester Judgement' but in fact the story of My Fair Lady. Rumour has it that he is now preparing to rectify the situation, some 25 years later, in a play to be staged in the next season of the Sydney Theatre Company, directed by Cate Blanchett. Nice Work team. Return to top Return to Home page |
As
an MLA in Victoria in the 1890's H.B. spoke
out on issues such as greater protection for workers, government
investment in industry, and votes for women. He was part of the
convention that wrote the Australian Constitution, personally ensuring
that it contained a guarantee of religious freedom, and also a
provision giving the Commonwealth the power to arbitrate industrial
disputes. He was also an anti-war activist. 
Missy
Higgins, the singer formerly known as Rachel Smith... 
Jonathon
Higgins, the butler from Magnum PI... 
The
Higgins Boat - the boat credited with winning World War 2 - was named
after the great man. The Higgins Boat could travel on water AND land.
So could Henry apparently. 
Henry
Higgins, from George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion (and My Fair Lady), was
originally intended to be a great socialist like his namesake; a man
who stood up for equality and education for all. The misogynistic
snobby character has been attributed to typographical errors and a bad
case of Chinese whispers. 
The
Higgins Mouse - a long-tailed jumping mouse and the ONLY mouse endemic
to Tasmania. The man who first identified it was so enamored by Higgins
after visiting his aunt one summer holidays he named the mouse after
our suburb. 
And
…..it is rumoured that Glenn Shorrock's mother had her baby
induced so
that he be born on Henry's birthday, in the hope that he would grow up
to be just like the great man. 
