Vice-Chancellors

The Hon Sir David Gilbert Ferguson — Vice-Chancellor 1919-1921

(1861 - 1941)

BA Syd
Vice-Chancellor: 1919 - 1921
Fellow of Senate: 1913 - 1934

The Hon Sir David Gilbert Ferguson, judge, was born on 7 October 1861 at Muswellbrook, New South Wales. He was educated at the Scone national and Church of England schools and finally at Fort Street Model School, Sydney.

He worked as a clerk in the copyrights office and was then employed by Want & Johnson, solicitors, as a shorthand writer. In 1882 he entered St Andrew's College, University of Sydney (BA, 1886), and financed his studies by reporting for the Sydney Morning Herald and the Daily Telegraph and, while living in Brisbane for several months of the year, for Queensland Hansard. He settled in Sydney and was admitted to the Bar on 8 March 1890.

His involvement with the University of Sydney included: while practising, and a member of the Bar Council, Ferguson in 1901-11 was Challis lecturer in the law of procedure, evidence and pleading at the Sydney University Law School; 1902: a founding vice-president of the Sydney University Law Society (president in 1913); 1913-34 a member of the university senate; and vice-chancellor in 1919.

Highlights of his career included: 1912: judge of the Supreme Court of New South Wales; 1929: acting chief justice; and lhe eft the Bench on 6 October 1931; chairman of the Amelioration Committee during Worl War I; royal commissioner inquiring into the Wheat Acquisition Act in 1915, and into the cost of production and distribution of gas in 1918; 1932: chair of the Commonwealth royal commission on taxation, which sat for three years and whose findings were largely accepted by all Australian governments; 1934 he was knighted; 1936:chairman of the Returned Soldiers and Sailors' Employment Board.

Ferguson divided his time between his Sydney home and his much-loved garden at Bowral. He never completely retired, and early in 1941 was on a committee to study various aspects of law reform. He died in hospital at Woollahra, Sydney, on 2 November 1941.

Information taken from the Australian Dictionary of Biography