Family background
William John Alleyn was born at Glebe in 1869, son of William Alleyn and Bridget née McNamara. On 25 July 1894 he married Margaret Clare Riach at St James, Forest Lodge. There were five daughters, including Hilda Margaret Alleyn who married Harold Charles Earl Booler, and two sons of the marriage. His grandson, Desmond Booler, was also a Glebe council alderman. Alleyn died on 6 June 1937, aged 67 years. Margaret Alleyn died on 17 July 1943, aged 70 years.
Occupation & interests
William Alleyn was employed in the Railways and Tramways Department’s massive locomotive workshops at Eveleigh, a workplace steeped in craft traditions and craft union militancy. especially in 1917. He was dismissed from the railway service during the strike. From 1908 Eveleigh, with 3,000 employees, was manufacturing steam locomotives as well as servicing and repairing the NSW rail fleet.
Community activity
William Alleyn first stood for Glebe Council as a Labor candidate in 1917. Like the majority of Glebe Labor aldermen since 1925 Alleyne was Catholic, anti-Communist and socially conservative. He was a Justice of the Peace (1913).
Local government service
William Alleyn was an alderman on Glebe Council from 1929 to 1931. The corridors of Glebe Town Hall were crowded with Labour enthusiasts awaiting the outcome of pre-selection for the 1928 municipal elections which as described was being like ‘a horse race whose pedigree was all important, and he then traced in chronological order, the association of his forebears with the Labor movement’. Alleyn easily topped the vote count.
References
Hogan, Michael 2004, Local labor: a history of the Labor Party in Glebe, 1891-2003, Federation Press, Annandale, NSW, pp. 65-66
Alleyn, William John, Railway Personal History Card, State Archives NSW, NRS-12922-1-[11/16553]-[482], https://search.records.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/1ebnd1l/ADLIB_RNSW113566552
‘Glebe Council’, Sydney Morning Herald, 8 August 1928, 16, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/16485116
‘Mr William John Alleyn’, The Catholic Press, 17 June 1937, p. 29, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article106335607