John Medway Day (24 February 1838 – 8 July 1905), generally known as J. Medway Day, was an English-born Australian journalist, Baptist minister and activist.
He was born atBedford to carver Samuel Day and Elizabeth Stamford. He worked for a local solicitor before studying for theBaptist ministry in the early 1860s. He migrated toSouth Australia in 1866, becoming the minister atMount Gambier until 1869, when he moved toKapunda. In 1870–71 he was the chair of the South Australian Baptist Association, but in 1875 he left the ministry to become a journalist for theRegister. He was acting editor for the paper in 1883–84, attracting some controversy for his views on land nationalisation. He married Ellen Sandland on 12 August 1886; they had no children.[1]
From 1892 Day edited thePioneer, the paper of theSingle Tax League; then in 1893 edited his own short-lived weekly,The Voice. A strong reformist, he delivered many lectures on topics including land reform,women's suffrage,trade unionism and electoral politics. He ran unsuccessfully for theSouth Australian House of Assembly seat ofGumeracha in 1893, and later in the year a loose coalition had coalesced around him, the "Forward Movement", which included members from a wide variety of progressive causes.[1]
In January 1894 Day moved toSydney to edit theAustralian Worker, and thus was involved in the formation of theAustralian Workers' Union. He ran forLabor Party preselection for the1895 colonial election; losing endorsement forGrenfell toWilliam Holman, he instead contestedGundagai but was defeated (Holman also lost). He was widowed in 1894, and on 8 September 1897 married Marcella Mary Carr, also widowed. In 1904 he moved toHobart to edit theTasmanian Mail, but he died the following year having suffered anintestinal obstruction.[1]
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