August 2009 - The Police Association Victoria

20
Police Association History
The Police Journal
A chronicle of Association
news & views for over 90 years
This month we continue the
story of our own Journal.
For more than 90 years, The
Police Association Journal
has chronicled the actions
and achievements of its
members for which today’s
members owe so much.
What we have today should
not be taken for granted.
Today our objectives are the
same – to achieve continual
improvements to police
salaries and conditions.
‘Sobriety is the quality most to be desired in a policeman.
… being a teetotaller with or without pledge is a great protection
to the man who cannot always trust himself, especially from
those people who through mistaken kindness so often offer a
policeman drink while on duty …’
Homilies such as this were
published frequently in early
issues of The Police Journal,
along with doggerel exhorting
members to pay their dues and
poems honouring the memory of
fallen colleagues. Intermingled
with meeting minutes and items
of official correspondence, such
items of general interest were an
integral part of the original journal
style: a format which continued
relatively unchanged for decades.
Printed and published initially by
Wilke, Mitchell & Co., of King Street,
Melbourne, the journal of sixteen
pages included paid advertising,
photographs and illustrations.
Constable Frederick Charles
Murphy, the inaugural editor of the
journal, resigned from the position,
and that of Association secretary,
on 3 January 1919. His resignation
followed a dispute with fellow
members regarding an honorarium
of one hundred and fifty pounds,
that was paid to his wife, purportedly
to compensate her for the time he
spent on Association duties.
Murphy did not have the use of
a typewriter or clerical support to
assist with the production of the
first two issues of the journal, so
in order to alleviate his workload
the Executive appointed a ‘Journal
Committee’ comprised of Murphy
and District Delegates G. Byres of
Russell Street and R.P. Jones of Ascot
Vale. Formed initially to shoulder
some of Murphy’s workload, the
idea of a journal committee proved
so successful that it became a
permanent arrangement over
succeeding decades.
Following Murphy’s unexpected
resignation, an acting editor filled
the position for two months, until
Constable William E. Adamson
of Russell Street was appointed
secretary and editor from 1919
to 1923.
Throughout this period some
members of the Association argued
that they would be better served if
the positions of secretary and editor
were filled by a person who was
not a member of the Force. Their
reasoning was that a civilian would
not be constrained in his actions or
views by the vagaries of the police
discipline system that governed
serving police.
The first civilian secretary and
editor was former school teacher,
Albert James Gill. Chosen from a
strong field of 40 applicants, Gill
served from August 1923 till April
1929, when he was replaced by
Victor Gustav Price, who transferred
to the Association after working on
the staff at State Parliament House
for 21 years.
Price was secretary and editor
during the tumultuous period
when Chief Commissioner Thomas
Blamey destroyed the original
Victorian Police Association
and replaced it with a puppet
organisation of his own making;
subtlety renamed the Victoria Police
Association.
The last journal edited by Price
was Volume XIV, No.1, published on
30 June 1931. There then followed
a hiatus of two months, when
no journal was published, until
September 1931, when the ‘new’
Association published Vol. 1, No.
1, of The Victoria Police Association.
Initially distributed gratis to all
members of the Force, the ‘new’
journal reflected its origins. It did
August 2009 The Police Association Journal
www.tpav.org.au