Magdalene Dick
ca. 1851 — 22 July 1922
Magdalene Dick (18‑35‑25)
Magdalene Dick was born in Brecon, Wales around 1851. She was the daughter of David Price, a plumber, glazier and painter and his wife, Mary William or Williams. Magdalene came to Australia as a young girl and the family settled in Ballarat where she later married William Heddel Dick, a journalist who wrote for major newspapers in Sydney, Hobart and Brisbane and who established a penny newspaper in Toowong. Magdalene was also a journalist and sister of Thomas Evan Price who was the social and drama critic of the Sydney Morning Herald.
After William’s death Magdalene became superintendent of the first group of female switchboard operators at the Brisbane telephone exchange.
Telephonists working at the, Brisbane Central telephone exchange, Brisbane, 1910 — State Library of Queensland.