Jack O'Brien Dash (23 February 1907 – 8 June 1989) was a British communist and trade union leader, famous for his role in London dock strikes.
His father Thomas was a scene shifter at the theatre where he met Dash's mother, Rose Gertrude John, who appeared on stage there.
Dash, who was interested in poetry and would quote Samuel Butler or Robert Browning in his speeches, was often invited to address prestigious bodies: he spoke at 40 student meetings, and opposed the motion 'This House would outlaw unofficial strikes' at the Oxford Union debating society.
While he enjoyed undoubted success in improving conditions for workers - between 1959 and 1972 the wages of dockers trebled - between approximately 1960 and 1970, when the shipping industry adopted the newly invented container system of cargo transportation, London's docks were unable to accommodate the much larger vessels needed by containerization, and the shipping industry moved to deep-water ports such as Tilbury and Felixstowe.
His autobiography Good Morning Brothers!, published in 1969, was a testimony to his work as a militant trade unionist and his lifelong membership of the Communist Party.