Sir Nicholas Michael Shehadie, AC, OBE (16 November 1926 – 11 February 2018) was a Lord Mayor of Sydney (1973–1975) and national representative rugby union captain, who made thirty career test appearances for Australia between 1947 and 1958.
Nicholas Michael Shehadie (Arabic: السير نيكولاس مايكل شحادة) was born to a Lebanese Greek Orthodox family in the beachside Sydney suburb of Coogee.
The young Shehadie embraced Sydney's sporting lifestyle and joined the Coogee Surf Club where many of the surfers were avid rugby players, Keith and Colin Windon among them.
[4] Shehadie worked in the 1950s selling fire doors and securities systems for Wormald Industries and later became a sales manager with an asphalt company.
When his footballing days ended he commenced a business supplying and fixing vinyl tiles used in hotel bars and in computer room installations requiring anti-static floors.
The business was successful, being first to market with a product in high demand by the growing information technology departments of corporate Australia.
When city council boundaries were changed in 1967, his ward moved into the South Sydney precinct and he and his fellow councillors were dismissed overnight.
He was in office during the Green Bans when the New South Wales Builders' Labourers Federation led a campaign to protect the built and natural environment of Sydney's Woolloomooloo area from excessive development.
In 1973 Shehadie stood for Liberal Party preselection for the seat of Parramatta with the support of future prime minister John Howard, losing by one vote to Philip Ruddock.
Shehadie served as patron to The Infants' Home Child and Family Services during his wife's Marie Bashir tenure as Governor (2001-2014).
[13] Shehadie had been a member of the Sydney Cricket Ground for 29 years when in 1978 he was invited by the New South Wales Minister for Sport, Ken Booth, to become a Trustee.
His time on the trust saw the installation of lights at the Cricket Ground and the building of the Sydney Football Stadium where a stand was named in his honour.
Michael earned a living as a chemist and shopkeeper, and having been ordained in Russia took over as the pastoral head of the Antioch Church upon the death of Nicholas senior in 1934.
His funeral was attended by one of the largest groupings of national dignitaries in recent New South Wales history which included: Governors-General Sir Peter Cosgrove, Dame Quentin Bryce and Michael Jeffery;[17] New South Wales Governors Dame Marie Bashir and David Hurley;[17] former Prime Ministers Bob Hawke, Paul Keating and John Howard;[18] current and former Premiers of New South Wales Barrie Unsworth, Nick Greiner, John Fahey, Morris Iemma, Kristina Keneally, Barry O'Farrell, Mike Baird and Gladys Berejiklian;[17] Lord Mayor Clover Moore;[17] Police Commissioners Andrew Scipione and Mick Fuller;[17] Wallabies players and coaches Nick Farr-Jones, Michael Cheika, Alan Jones, Mark Ella and Glen Ella, and Olympian Dawn Fraser.