John Quirk (18 May 1870 – 13 December 1938) was an Australian politician. Quirk was born at Balmain in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

to dairyman John Quirk and Margaret, ''née'' McClapperty. After attending St Joseph's School in

Rozelle Rozelle is a suburb in the inner west of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located 4 kilometres west of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the Inner West Council. Location Rozelle si ...

, he joined the Postmaster-General's department in 1886 and began a long-running position at the Balmain post-office. In 1889 he married Sarah Gaillie in Sydney, with whom he had five children. A founder of the Letter Carriers' Union (which became the Postal Workers' Union), he was also a founding member of the Rozelle Labor League in 1893. In 1917 he was elected to the

New South Wales Legislative Assembly The New South Wales Legislative Assembly is the lower of the two houses of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The upper house is the New South Wales Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament Ho ...

as the

Labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

member for

. With the introduction of

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...

he became a member for Balmain from 1920 to 1927, when he returned to Rozelle. Rozelle was abolished in 1930 and Quirk moved back to the seat of Balmain. He had married his second wife, Mary Deal, around 1917, and she succeeded him as the Labor MP after he died in 1938.

References

1870 births 1938 deaths Members of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly Politicians from Sydney Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of New South Wales {{Australia-Labor-NewSouthWales-MP-stub