Trevor Housley

Summary

Trevor Alfred Housley CBE (31 October 1910 – 10 October 1968) was a senior Australian public servant. He was Director-General of the Postmaster-General's Department from 1965 until his death in October 1968.

Trevor Housley
Director-General of the Postmaster-General's Department
In office
9 December 1965 – 10 October 1968
Personal details
Born
Trevor Alfred Housley

(1910-10-31)31 October 1910
Gympie, Queensland
Died10 October 1968(1968-10-10) (aged 57)
Kew, Melbourne, Victoria
Resting placeBoroondara Cemetery
NationalityAustralia Australian
SpouseSusan Maureen Reilly (m. 1935)
OccupationPublic servant

Life and career edit

Trevor Housley was born on 31 October 1910 in Gympie, Queensland.[1]

Housley served for four years as chief airways engineer in the Department of Civil Aviation,[2] until 1951 when he joined the Overseas Telecommunications Commission (OTC) as assistant general manager.[2] In 1956, he was appointed to OTC general manager.[1] In the general manager role, Housley led a delegation to the Commonwealth Telecommunications Conference in 1958 which recommended a worldwide telephone cable system be developed.[1] He returned to London in 1960 to convene a management committee responsible for plans to lay the British Commonwealth trans-Pacific cable between Australia and New Zealand.[3]

Housley was appointed Director-General of Posts and Telegraphs, heading the Postmaster-General's Department, in 1965.[2][4]

In 1967, he penned Communications in Modern Society, in which he argued that if public administrators could shift from paper communication to phone-calls, it would streamline the service and enable "quickly responsive sensitivity to public need".[5]

At Kew, Melbourne on 10 October 1968, while still in office as Director-General of the Postmaster-General's Department, Housley died of an intracranial haemorrhage.[1]

Awards and honours edit

1961, Housley was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire.[1]

In 2012, a street in the Canberra suburb of Casey was named Housley Street in Trevor Housley's honour.[6]

References edit

  1. ^ a b c d e Maltby, George F, "Housley, Trevor Alfred (1910–1968)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian National University, archived from the original on 21 November 2014
  2. ^ a b c "Postal chief named". The Canberra Times. 1 October 1965. p. 3.
  3. ^ "New Post For Director Of Telegraphs". The Canberra Times. 3 August 1960. p. 2.
  4. ^ CA 9: Postmaster-General's Department, Central Administration, National Archives of Australia, retrieved 21 November 2014
  5. ^ Housley, Trevor (June 1967). "Communications in Modern Society". Australian Journal of Public Administration. 26 (2): 108–112. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8500.1967.tb00136.x.
  6. ^ Housley Street, ACT Government Environment and Planning Directorate, archived from the original on 21 November 2014
Government offices
Preceded by Director General of the Postmaster-General's Department
1965 – 1968
Succeeded by