- James Ralph Darling
Sir James Ralph Darling OBE (
18 June ,1899 -1 November ,1995 ) was theHeadmaster ofGeelong Grammar School , (1930-1961), andChairman of theAustralian Broadcasting Commission , (1961-1967).Early life
Darling was born in
Tonbridge ,England , the second child of an Englishman, Augustine Major Darling, and his Scottish wife, Jane Baird, née Nimmo. He was educated at the preparatory school in Tonbridge run by his father, then atRepton , a boarding school inDerbyshire . He served as a Second Lieutenant in theRoyal Field Artillery inFrance and occupiedGermany in 1918 and 1919 before reading history at Oriel College,Oxford . He taught from 1921 to 1924 atMerchant Taylors’ School inLiverpool , before joining the staff ofCharterhouse inSurrey .Headmaster
He was appointed as Headmaster of Geelong Church of England Grammar School in 1930 and the student population of the school grew from 370 to 1139 at the time of his retirement. He was a founding member of the
Headmasters' Conference of the Independent Schools of Australia and was its sixthChairman . During his time at Geelong he set upTimbertop and was a founder of theAustralian College of Education . Darling served from 1933 to 1971 on the Council of theUniversity of Melbourne and he was a member of the Universities Commission from 1941 to 1951.ABC Chairman
After his retirement as Headmaster he was for several years Chairman of the
Australian Broadcasting Commission . In retirement he wrote often for newspapers and published his own books. In 1988 he was named on a list of 200 great Australians (of whom only 22 were living, he being the only headmaster on the list). He died aged 96 in Melbourne.Honours
* Officer,
Order of the British Empire (1953)
*Knight Bachelor (1968)Publications
* The Education of a Civilized Man (Melb, 1962)
* Timbertop: An Innovation in Australian Education (Melb, 1967)
* Richly Rewarding (Melb, 1978)
* Reflections for the Age (Melb, 1991)References
* [http://www.humancondition.info/Articles/SirJamesDarlingObituary.html FHA - Sir James Ralph Darling, OBE Obituary]
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