The Australian Women's Register

Hazel Craig was born in 1914 and educated at Bankstown Public School and St George High School. After studying shorthand and typing, she joined the Commonwealth Public Service in 1934, moving to Canberra to work in the Prime Minister’s Department. In 1937 she was appointed to the personal staff of Prime Minister Joseph Lyons and remained to serve successors Robert Menzies, Arthur Fadden, John Curtin, Ben Chifley and then Robert Menzies again. In 1951 she became private secretary to Menzies and remained in that position for 25 years, accompanying Sir Robert Menzies and Dame Pattie Menzies on official overseas visits to Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle in England and to the White House in Washington DC. Even on board ship, Hazel Craig set up office in a spare cabin and continued her duties dealing with incoming and outgoing cables, radio messages, official briefings, letters of thanks, itineraries, as well as receiving and issuing invitations for social occasions on board ship.

On Menzies’s retirement in 1966 when he became Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, she continued as his private secretary. She retired in 1976 having completed 25 years of service in that position, and when Menzies died in 1978 returned to assist Dame Pattie in responding to condolences and to make arrangements for Dame Pattie’s visit to England to attend memorial services in Westminster Abbey and in Rye. She lived in Canberra until her death in 2013.

She was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire in 1954, an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1959 and a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1964.