The Dictionary of Australasian Biography/Benjamin, Hon. Sir Benjamin
Benjamin, Hon. Sir Benjamin, Kt., M.L.C., J. P., eldest son of the late Moses Benjamin, J.P., was born in London in 1834, and arrived in Victoria in 1843. He was elected to the Melbourne City Council in 1870, became alderman in 1881, and was mayor from 1887 to 1889. In the year 1888 he was a commissioner for the Melbourne Centennial Exhibition, and was knighted in 1889 in recognition of his services and hospitalities during the Exhibition year. He is President of the Melbourne Hebrew Congregation, a trustee of the Jewish Philanthropic Society and the Ladies' Hebrew Benevolent Society, and is the representative of the Melbourne province in the Legislative Council. He is a director of the Colonial Bank of Australasia, and of the Union Trustees' Executors and Agency Company, and is a justice of the peace for Victoria and New South Wales. In 1857 Sir Benjamin Benjamin married Fanny, daughter of Abraham Cohen, of Sydney.