Simon Fraser (Australian politician)

Sir Simon Fraser (21 August 1832 - 30 July 1919), Australian politician, was a member of the Australian Senate and the grandfather of Malcolm Fraser, Prime Minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983.

Fraser was born in Pictou in Nova Scotia, Canada, the son of a Scottish timber miller and farmer. When he was 21 he emigrated to the goldfields of Victoria in search of his fortune. After a time prospecting in Bendigo he became a contractor, soon moving into railways and becoming by the 1870s a wealthy man. One of the more notable contract was the supply of ballast to the new D & M Railway, a privately owned rail from Moama to Deniliquin in Southern New South Wales. Fraser instead of supplying blue metal, he supplied quartz from the slag heaps of Bendigo. It met the specifications of the contract, but was not what was expected by the owners of the railway. He later bought extensive estates in the Western District of Victoria and became a leader of the wealthy wool-growing class known as the squatters.

Fraser was elected to the Victorian Legislative Assembly for the seat of Rodney in 1876 where he served until 1883. He was elected to the Victorian Legislative Council, the traditional preserve of the squatters, for South Yarra Province in 1886, and remained a member until 1901. He was a Minister without Portfolio from 1890 to 1892. He was a Victorian delegate to the Imperial Conference in Ottawa in 1894, and a member of the Constitutional Convention which drafted the Australian Constitution.

In 1901, following the federation of the Australian colonies, Fraser was elected as one of the first six members from Victoria of the Australian Senate, where he sat until his retirement in 1913. He was elected as a supporter of Edmund Barton's Protectionist Party, but he was not a supporter of Barton's more liberal successor, Alfred Deakin, and sat as an independent conservative until 1909, when he became a member of Deakin's Commonwealth Liberal Party, although still belonging to its conservative wing. He was given a knighthood, becoming Sir Simon Fraser, in 1918.

Fraser married Margaret Bolger in 1862 and had two daughters. Following her death he married Anne Collins in 1885 and had three sons with her. One of these, Neville Fraser, inherited Simon Fraser's property at Balpool in the Riverina district of New South Wales, where his son Malcolm Fraser grew up.

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* [http://www.brightoncemetery.com/HistoricInterments/150Names/frasers.htm Sir Simon Fraser (1832-1919)] Gravesite at Brighton General Cemetery (Vic) where it is believed Malcolm Fraser will be interred on his death.