Person
Newbigin, William Johnstone (1874 - 1927)
- Born
- 12 June 1874
Alnwick, Northumberland, England - Died
- 20 April 1927
Wahroonga, New South Wales, Australia - Occupation
- Mechanical engineer and Company director
Summary
William Newbigin, MIEAust, was Chief of the engineering staff of William Adams & Co. Ltd 1906-1920 and Managing Director from 1922. He was on the CSIR Executive from 1926 and played a leading role in the formation of the Institution of Engineers, Australia. He died in office and was replaced on the CSIR Executive Committee by Dr A.E.V. Richardson.
Details
Quote from his ADB entry (1988):
"Recognizing the weakness of a fragmented profession, further subdivided by State boundaries, he played an important part with R. W. H. Hawken and D. F. J. Harricks in the conferences which led to the foundation of the Institution of Engineers, Australia, and was a foundation council-member until his death. He served as vice-president in 1919-20 and as second president in 1921. In his presidential address he stressed the value of individual effort based on reason rather than on emotion. Moving to Sydney in 1922 as managing director of William Adams & Co., Newbigin was a council-member of the Sydney Chamber of Commerce and represented the Associated Chambers of Commerce of Australia on the main committee of the Australian Commonwealth Standards Association and supported standardization at an early stage. In 1926 he was appointed to the executive of the Commonwealth Council for Scientific and Industrial Research under (Sir) George Julius."
Chronology
- 1895 - 1897
- Career position - Foreman in charge of the test bed, C. A. Parsons & Co. Ltd., Newcastle-on-Tyne
- 1897
- Career position - Guarantee Engineer in charge of Power Plant supplied to the Funchal Electric Light Co., Madeira, C. A. Parsons & Co. Ltd
- 1898
- Career position - Breakdown Engineer, Leeds Office, C. A. Parsons & Co. Ltd
- c. 1899
- Career position - Guarantee Engineer in charge of plant supplied to the Victorian Government Railways for installation at the Spencer Street Power Station, C. A. Parsons & Co. Ltd.
- 1901 - 1905
- Career position - Resident Engineer in Australia, C. A. Parsons & Co. Ltd.
- 1904 - 1905
- Career position - Member of Council, Victorian Institute of Engineers
- 1905 - 1922
- Career position - Chief of Engineering Staff, Wm. Adams & Co. Ltd., Melbourne
- 1910 - 1912
- Career position - Member of Council, Victorian Institute of Electrical Engineers
- 1913
- Career position - President, Victorian Institute of Electrical Engineers
- 1914 - 1919
- Career position - Member, Federal Council, Electrical Association of Australia
- 1919
- Career event - Foundation Associate Member (AMIEAust), Institution of Engineers Australia
- 1919 - 1927
- Career position - Member of Council, Institution of Engineers, Australia
- 1920
- Career event - Member (MIEAust), Institution of Engineers Australia
- 1920 - 1921
- Career position - Vice President, Institution of Engineers, Australia
- 1921
- Career position - President, Institution of Engineers, Australia
- 1922 - 1927
- Career position - Managing Director, Wm. Adams & Co. Ltd., Sydney
Related entries
Colleague
Archival resources
Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science
- William Johnstone Newbigin - Records, 1922 - 1927, MS 041; Adolph Basser Library, Australian Academy of Science. Details
Published resources
Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation Exhibitions
- Smith, Ailie, Adolph Basser Library Manuscript Collection, eScholarship Research Centre, Melbourne, 2012, https://www.eoas.info/exhibitions/basser/basser_browse.html. Details
Books
- Currie, George; Graham, John, The Origins of CSIRO: Science and the Commonwealth Government, 1901-1926 (Melbourne: CSIRO, 1966), 203 pp, https://doi.org/10.1071/9780643105553. pages 148, 149 (photograph), 152. Details
Book Sections
- Corbett, Arthur, 'Newbigin, William Johnstone (1874-1927), mechanical engineer and company director' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 11: 1891 - 1939 Nes-Smi, Geoffrey Serle, ed. (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1988), pp. 6-7, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/newbigin-william-johnstone-7823. Details
Journal Articles
- 'Memoirs', Transactions of the Institution of Engineers, Australia, 8 (1927), 483-495, https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/informit.264881614830457. pp.491-493. Details
- 'First members of institution [Diamond Jubilee feature article]', Journal of the Institution of Engineers, Australia, 51 (20) (1979), 69. 'Registered member number 6'. Details
- Newbigin, William Johnstone, 'Some notes on the Parsons steam turbine (Paper & Discussion)', Proceedings of the Victorian Institute of Engineers vol. IV (1905), 163-191. https://hdl.handle.net/11343/24301. Details
- Newbigin, William Johnstone, 'Presidential address [1922]', Transactions of the Institution of Engineers, Australia, 2 (1923), lxvii-lxxx, https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/informit.633510632012552. Details
- Upstill, Garrett; Spurling, Thomas H.; and Healy, Terence J., 'CSIR and Australian industry, 1926-49', Historical Records of Australian Science, 32 (1) (2021), 52-66. https://doi.org/10.1071/HR20012. Details
- Woolnough, W. G., 'Presidential address', Journal and proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, 61 (1927), 1-53. Details
Resources
- Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q24026261. Details
- VIAF - Virtual International Authority File, OCLC, https://viaf.org/viaf/2664153895176602410008. Details
- 'Newbigin, William Johnstone (1874-1927)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-1465123. Details
See also
- Beale, Bob, Engineering a Legacy: Memories of the journey of CSIRO Chemical Engineering (Clayton, Victoria: CSIRO Minerals, 2005), 124 pp. pages 6. Details
Gavan McCarthy; Ken McInnes
Created: 20 October 1993, Last modified: 25 June 2025
- Foundation Supporter - Committee to Review Australian Studies in Tertiary Education