death_date birth_place title nationality party birth_date term_start image article_title term_end name occupation
11 march 1912 westbury , wiltshire , england senator for victoria english australian protectionist party 5 december 1830 29 march 1901 williamzeal.jpg william zeal
 31 december 1906 sir william zeal engineer
william zeal

sir william austin zeal -lrb- 5 december 1830 -- 11 march 1912 -rrb- was an australian railway engineer and politician , senator for victoria in the parliament of australia .
zeal was born at westbury , wiltshire , england , the son of thomas zeal , a wine merchant , and ann , `` nee '' greenland .
educated privately , zeal obtained his diploma as a surveyor and engineer , and came to melbourne in 1852 .
employed as an engineer in charge of railway construction by private contractors , zeal also served in the government service for some years .
he was elected a member of the victorian legislative assembly for the electoral district of castlemaine in 1864 , but , having joined forces with sir william mitchell in a station in the riverina , resigned his seat in 1866 .
drought conditions caused zeal to resume his practice as an engineer in 1869 , and in the following year he was again elected for castlemaine , but pressure of business caused him to resign again .
in 1882 he entered the victorian legislative council as a representative of the north central province , and in april 1892 he became postmaster-general in the shiels ministry .
he resigned in november and was elected president of the legislative council .
zeal was re-elected to this position in 1894 , 1897 and 1900 and was one of the representatives of victoria at the 1897 federal convention that worked towards federation of the six australian colonies .
at the first federal election in 1901 zeal was elected to the australian senate as a protectionist party representative for victoria .
he declined to stand in 1906 due to age concerns -lrb- he was then in his seventy-sixth year -rrb- .
zeal was a director of several leading melbourne financial companies and he retained his interest in these until his death , following an operation , in 1912 .
created k.c.m.g. in 1895 , zeal never married .
