Denis Joseph Murphy (6 August 1936 – 21 June 1984), was an Australian Labor Party politician, historian and biographer. Murphy was born in Nambour, Queensland. He was the youngest of nine children and went to an all boys Catholic school, St Joseph's Nudgee College. After graduating, Murphy went on to study high school PE teaching and later became an educator at Redcliffe State High School. As Murphy worked he went back to university and completed his master's degree in Queensland's state enterprises in 1965 at the University of Queensland. In 1966 he left his job as a PE teacher and took on a full-time position as a lecturer at the University of Queensland. He taught there as an academic historian and wrote primarily on the history of the Australian Labor Party.