Country life tonic for the times
When a 43-year-old railway clerk stepped from the steam train at majestic Maryborough railway station in January 1916, his future that Sunday was as uncertain as the town itself.
Failing health had pointed James Drew, a doyen of Melbourne cricket administrators and grandson of a prominent 19th century Melbourne building and railway construction contractor, towards the warmer central Victorian climes.
Maryborough was at the crossroads for economic survival. Its population had dipped 12 per cent to 5000 between 1911 and 1916 as better job prospects siphoned people out of country towns and for the first time, more Victorians were living in Melbourne than the bush.
Big mining had come to a standstill and young men were answering the call of King and Country on the battlefields of World War One.
Widower James Drew was later joined by his five children. The decision to make Maryborough home, despite a significant reduction in wage, began a 28-year journey of better health for both town and servant.
His reputation as secretary for eight years of the Victorian Sub-District Cricket Association preceded arrival in Maryborough and James was soon president of the local railways club – a position that exempted him from union membership - and vice-president of the Maryborough club.
Attendance at community meetings grew involvement in town affairs, often acting as an honorary journalist as he had during football and cricket administration days at Williamstown and as a delegate to the Victorian Football Association and senior cricket bodies.
He was on the Maryborough committee supporting the 1916 conscription referendum opposed by the union movement. It was the first of dozens of committees that would occupy him in decades ahead, walking from meeting to meeting each night chomping on a cigar.
The most important of these would be the progress association formed in 1917 with a vision of new prosperity in the “hub of Victoria” through industry and civic pride.
James Drew was minute secretary but with the death of J. N. Cleary months after formation, he became secretary and held the position for 15 years when the foundations for a 20th century Maryborough were laid.
He was part of the team that secured Patience and Nicholson and Maryborough Knitting Mills, championed establishment of the butter factory and other local industry, all the time putting Maryborough at the forefront of the decentralisation movement.
In negotiations with George Cuttle to bring the knitting mills to the town, James Drew saw employment opportunities for young women and explored wages for female staff.
His interest in education and training of young people extended to being a member of the then Maryborough Technical School council for more than a decade.
He engaged former residents, organising and promoting the first two Back-To Maryborough events to celebrate community achievements in lifting dark clouds that had hung over the town only a decade before.
In 1921, James Drew enthusiastically accepted employment as a journalist with the tri-weekly Maryborough Advertiser.
Highly regarded among senior journalists in Victoria including Maryborough native Alec Chisholm and leading sporting writers of the day, the son of Scottish immigrants assumed the night editor’s chair when the Advertiser became a daily following the demise of the Maryborough Standard. He held the position for all seven years the Addy came out Monday to Saturday.
The 1920s and 1930s were James Drew at his best in the service to Maryborough –a cricket administrator using his Melbourne networks to bring visiting teams to town and pushing for state selection of local high school teacher Bill Woodfull who would captain Australian in the infamous Bodyline series, assisting the newly-formed RSL and soldiers back from war, working to save the bowls club in Philips Gardens through an eventual merger with highland society and restructure of football when Maryborough was forced out of the Ballarat league in 1932.
James Drew had been Maryborough Football Association secretary when the Ballarat fracas boiled over and became president of a new Maryborough United in the Bendigo league with players including youngest son Reg who had lined up in three games for St Kilda.
Like contemporaries in the community, James Drew had vision that was matched by hard work and commitment. On retirement from the Maryborough Advertiser in 1942, he recalled "Maryborough has been good to me in many ways—especially in health. I came here on January 16, 1916 . . . I have made many associations and friends in this town, which I prize so much.
“(I) … have enjoyed every minute with plenty to keep my mind occupied, particularly in relation to the needs of younger members of the community. I admire and appreciate the fine community spirit that has prevailed at all times in the last quarter of a century.”
That same article recorded “Mr Drew must be credited with having had a very big hand in the establishment of something which Maryborough sadly needed at the time – industries for the employment of its people.”
When sportsman, journalist and community leader James Leggat Drew died aged 72 in January 1944, Australia was again at war. His part in the forging a culture for regional vibrancy through decentralisation would be overlooked as communities grappled with post-war challenges. But the positive influence of he and fellow travellers would continue in Maryborough.
Harold Nunn, editor of the Advertiser at the time, praised the service of his former colleague: “Maryborough is all the better for his life: he left it a better town than he found it. The job of those remaining is to ensure that the town continues to advance along the plane he helped to so firmly establish. Let us declare that we will not fail.”
First published in Maryborough District Advertiser 29 January 2016* Chris Earl is a great-grandson of James Drew
