J B McAdam Portrait

J B McAdam Portrait

Foresters all over Australia were deeply shocked to hear of the untimely death of Jim (James) Bannister McAdam, the Director of the Papua New Guinea Forest Service, on the 27th of February 1959. He was 49 years of age.

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James Bannister McAdam (” JB”) (1910-1959), forester and soldier, was born on 6 February 1910 at Preesall-with-Hackinsall, Lancashire, England, son of John George McAdam, Railway Cashier, and his wife Elizabeth Ann, née Bannister. The family emigrated to Queensland. James was sent to State Schools and then to Toowoomba Grammar School from 1924 to 1928. In 1929, he obtained an Open Scholarship to Queensland University. (He was in the first 25 top students in his senior matriculation state exam6). In 1929 he joined the Queensland Forest Service as a Forestry Cadet.

He proceeded to the University of Queensland, Brisbane, and the Australian Forestry School, Canberra (Dip. For.). Athletic and of robust build, he excelled at sport, particularly Rugby Union football. He was awarded the Schlich medal as the outstanding student in his final year for the quality of his academic and practical work in 1933.

AFS 1932 YEAR. William Baulman (NSW), George Boyd (NSW), Edward Kenneth Cox (Tas), John Mervyn Fielding (Q), James Freeman (VIC), John Maxwell Gilbert (Tas), Hans Larns Gloe (WA), Cecil Haley (Q), Benjamin Bernard Harris, (NSW), James Bannister McAdam (Q)7 - awarded Schlich Medal, David William Shoobridge (Tas}, Jack Thomas (SA). Source ANU-AFS Archives.

5 Source McAdam, James Bannister (Jim) (1910–1959) by L. T. Carron Published in Australian Dictionary of Biography Volume 15, (MUP) 2000 and IFA Newsletter, vol 2, no 3, June 1959. 6 Personal communication Eric Hammermaster 29th July 2022. 7 Personal communication Betty Fyfe (nee McAdam) 27/7/2022. 5

Australian Forestry School 201. Photo credit Dick Passauer.

From 1934 he joined the Queensland Forestry Department. On 19 January 1938 he married Eileen Alexandra Ewing, a schoolteacher, at St Paul's Anglican Church, Maryborough. In January 1938, he accepted a permanent position in the Lands Department of the Mandated Territory of New Guinea as a Forestry Officer, becoming the Chief Forestry Officer in 1939. Linda Cavanaugh Manning8 reported that there was no actual Department of Forests in either New Guinea or Papua before World War 2.

8 Linda Cavanaugh Manning personal communication 9th April 2019.