The Guardian 15 February, 2006
Joan Williams' 90th birthday:
A life to celebrate
The life and works of Joan Williams were celebrated at her 90th birthday party on January
22. Over 80 friends and comrades gathered at the Kungah Myal Centre close to her home in
the Perth suburb of Willagee. They represented a wide range of political and people's
organisations in which Joan has been a consistent activist.
Joan was a journalist when she joined the Communist Party in 1938. She reacted strongly to the
Nazi and fascist intervention against the elected government of Spain, and she saw that the Soviet
Union was the only country to give real assistance to the Spanish Government. Her belief and
commitment has burned through her lifetime and she has remained a member of the Party to this
day.
During the "illegal period" she worked on the Party newsletter, and then later on the Party's weekly
newspaper in Western Australia, the Workers' Star, first as a journalist and then as
editor.
Because of her forthright reporting of President Dunphy's decisions of the Arbitration Court in the
Workers' Star, Dunphy illegally expelled her from the Arbitration Court.
Over many years she played a key role in initiating women's organisations such as Women's
Liberation and Women's Electoral Lobby. A high point of the struggles was the campaign for a
better law on abortion, where Joan's speeches and poetry played their part in a democratic
victory.
Joan was deeply involved in the international "Ban the Bomb" campaign, as she was on all peace
issues, and the defence of the peace role of the Soviet Union. She was one of the first onto the
streets to protest against Australian involvement in the Vietnam War. Conscription was brought
close to home when the marble for military service included her younger son.
When US nuclear-powered and probably nuclear armed warships came into Fremantle harbour,
Joan was among the first to expose the danger with leaflets, posters and in demonstrations. With
the build-up to 10,000 on the wharf, Fremantle became a peace city and helped to elect Jo
Valentine as an anti-nuclear Senator.
Joan's training as a journalist, led her into creative writing, of stories from the struggles of the
people.
Drawing on her contacts and knowledge from work on the Workers' Star, she built a major
work, written from a Marxist viewpoint, of the radical history of WA up to 1942. The book, The
First Furrow, is now used in the curriculum of universities.
The autobiography Anger and Love has given readers a lively picture of how Communists
are created and act. It is a book to give confidence for the future. Joan's poetry is based on her
experiences, highlighting the protests and struggles, sparks that fired the feelings of many
people.
Patty Watts, in the Writers Fellowship News, told how Joan as President took the initiative to
raise funds and enable writers to visit country schools to help children write their stories, and
brought prominent Australian authors to a Writers Week that has been carried on. "A life of social
and political activism, a pioneer of women's liberation".
At the 90th birthday celebration Myrna, a fellow peace activist, was full of admiration in her praise:
"For your activity, dedication, to social justice, peace and equality".
Former university lecturer Dorothy Parker, apologising for not coming to the party, wrote of: "my
appreciation of your tremendous contribution to all the issues so dear to me, to peace, to socialism,
to the women's movement".
Jo Valentine admired Joan's work for peace in the 30 years she had worked with her and read her
poem Not in My Name that is being used by the women's campaigns in USA and Britain for
peace and withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.