Dunn, Hedley Allen

DUNN, Hedley Allen (1865–1942) was born in Adelaide, the fifth son of the Hon. John Dunn (1830–1892) jnr, MLC, a partner in the large South Australian flour-milling firm, John Dunn and Co. founded by his grandfather, also John Dunn (1802-1894) snr, and Elizabeth Williams. His mother’s father, John Williams (?-1878) was a well-known builder in North Adelaide. After starting his scholastic training at Prince Alfred College, Adelaide, he completed the last three years with his elder brother Frederick, at a Methodist boys’ school, The Leys, near Cambridge before making an extensive tour of the principal cities in England, Wales and Scotland, and Europe where he studied ‘everything of architectural and artistic interest’. After returning to Adelaide in 1881 via the United States, he undertook articles with an Adelaide architect. After an Architectural Students Association was formed in 1884, he was one of three students to pass the first examination held by the Association in 1885. After gaining further experience in Melbourne with ELLERKER & Kilburn, and in Brisbane, possibly with FDG STANLEY or R GAILEY, he returned to South Australia, where in 1886 he commenced practice, later briefly entering partnership with Edward Davies (1852–1927) as Davies & Dunn. By early 1889 Dunn had returned to Brisbane from where in May he represented OAKDEN, ADDISON & KEMP, in Auckland, New Zealand, preparing plans for a sanatorium at the Hot Springs, Waivera. Back in Brisbane by February 1890, Dunn established his own practice, while also acting as the local agent for John Dunn & Co.’s Eclipse Flour. Among the few buildings he designed as economic conditions deteriorated, were two houses in 1890 in Enoggera Tce, Red Hill, which were assumed to be the work of GHM ADDISON, who spent his later years living in one. In 1891 he was elected an Associate of the Queensland Institute of Architects. As an amateur painter, he became an Associate of the Queensland Art Society in 1894 and exhibited watercolour landscapes with the Society in 1895-96. In 1893 he married Annie Elizabeth Powis Jordan, daughter of Henry Jordan (1818-1890), dentist, parliamentarian and influential public servant. After the birth of their first child, he returned to Adelaide, still representing John Dunn and Co. while practising also as an architect. By 1907-08 By then he was working for the South Australian Public Works Department when he twice applied unsuccessfully for a position with the Queensland Public Works Department, claiming that he wished to move back to Brisbane “for private reasons”. Dunn died in Adelaide on 4 June 1942. His elder son, CL DUNN, was employed in the Queensland Public Works Department from 1914 until he retired in 1961.