1961
(503)
(RETIRED TRADE UNION OFFICIAL)
Born in Leicester 12th November 1893, the only girl in a family of six children.
Attended the Avenue Road Elementary School which she left at the age of 13 in order to enter the boot and shoe industry where she worked for 52 hours a week for a wage of 4/ 6d. Owing to the seasonal nature of the work in the industry in those times she had to leave and then spent a few months in the hosiery trade but she afterwards returned to the shoe industry which was to be her lifelong occupation.
She became interested in trade union work at a very early age and was appointed the youngest shop President in the Boot and Shoe Union.
The depression after the First World War caused her to take a wider interest in public affairs. She became a full time trade union official and served on the Local Employment Committee and was Chairman of the Women's Subcommittee for many years. In 1939 she was elected President of the Leicester Women's Branch of the Boot and Shoe Union (the only women's branch of the Union in the country to be served entirely by women officers) and became responsible for the working conditions in the industry of over 6,000 female employees in the city and county.
The war brought additional responsibilities. For her work in connection with the concentration of the boot and shoe industry to release factories and labour for the war effort Miss Goodwin was appointed a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 1942. As a member of the Air Raid Precautions Organisation she served as a driver throughout the war.
In 1943 she was appointed a Justice of the Peace. She was co-opted to serve on the Public Assistance Committee in January 1944; later in the same year she was elected a member of the Council, under the wartime provisions for filling vacancies, when she was appointed a member for Latimer Ward which she continued to represent as a Councillor until her election as Alderman in 1955.
From the outset of her local government career Miss Goodwin concerned herself with the well, being of her fellow citizens. Whilst still maintaining her interest in the Public Assistance Committee (later to be replaced by the Welfare Committee) she became a member of the Housing Committee from the date of her election to the Council. For 121 years she was Chairman of that Committee during which time approximately 12,000 dwellings were erected by the Corporation. She has also served on the Highways and the Town Planning and Reconstruction Committees of the City Council and on the Leicester No. 2 Hospital Management Committee.
In 1944/45 she was elected Chairman of the City Labour Party. As a member of the Productivity team for the British boot and shoe industry she toured America in 1950 and as a representative of her Trade Union she attended many international conferences. She retired from her post with the Trade Union in 1958.
Alderman Miss Goodwin was High Bailiff for the City in 1959/60 and on the 25th May 1961 she was elected Lord Mayor, in which office she was accompanied, as Lady Mayoress, by her very close friend, Mrs. Ada Rawlings, who for many years had worked with her in the boot and shoe industry and as a co-opted member on the Welfare Committee.
