Alfred Bennett

Who is Alfred Bennett?

Alfred Edward Bennett was an Australian broadcasting executive.

Born at Balwyn, Victoria, to schoolmaster George Jesse Bennett and Harriet Ann, née Bentley, he attended Balwyn State School and Hawthorn College before becoming secretary of the Freezing Company Ltd. at Murtoa. On 11 June 1912 he married Ruby Adelaide Fraunfelder at St James Old Cathedral in Melbourne, moving to Shepparton the following year to become secretary of Goulburn Valley Industries Co. Ltd. After spending several years managing at meatworks in Carnarvon, Western Australia, he moved to Sydney in 1922 to become an accountant and in 1926 was appointed manager of the Theosophical Society's radio station 2GB. In 1929 Bennett and George Arundale founded the Who's for Australia? League and served as president until 1931, when his brother Gordon Bennett succeeded him. An open admirer of Benito Mussolini, Bennett ran for the Australian House of Representatives in the 1931 federal election as a United Australia Party candidate for the seat of Lang, but was unsuccessful.

Bennett travelled to the United States twice in the 1930s and continued his broadcasting activities.