Henry Ryan (politician)


Henry Joseph Ryan was a member of the Queensland Legislative Assembly.

Biography

Ryan was born at Ballarat, Victoria, the son of Thomas Ryan and his wife Margaret. He was educated at the Christian Brothers College in Ballarat and on arrival in North Queensland took up mining. After his political career he was a businessman in Brisbane.
On 4 May 1898 he married Kate Butler in Gympie and together had one son. Ryan died in Brisbane in January 1943 and was buried in the Toowong Cemetery.

Public career

Ryan was heavily involved in the trade union movement and was associated with Ted Theodore amongst others in the Australian Workers' Association of Queensland. He was a delegate at the 1913 Rockhampton conference when the AWA was absorbed into the Australian Workers' Union.
He entered state politics at the 1915 Queensland state election when he won the seat of Cook for the Labor Party. Ryan defeated the sitting member for Cook, Henry Douglas of the Queensland Liberal Party, after previously standing unsuccessfully against him at the 1912 state election.
Ryan represented Cook for fourteen years before being defeated by James Kenny of the Country and Progressive National Party in 1929.