1. Sir William Ian Potter, known as Ian Potter, was an Australian stockbroker, businessman and philanthropist.
11 Facts About Ian Potter
1. 2.
Potter was the third child of James W Potter and Maria Louisa Townsend McWhinnie, who was born in Glasgow in June 1869.
3.
Ian Potter studied economics at the University of Sydney, where he excelled and graduated at the top of his year.
4.
In 1933, Ian Potter began an eighteen-month period as a Treasury economist in Canberra providing him with an intimate knowledge of government finance.
5.
Ian Potter made many contacts in politics and the federal bureaucracy.
6.
Ian Potter continued his business interests during the war while training for, and serving in, the Naval Auxiliary Patrol.
7.
Ian Potter was commissioned as a Staff Skipper with substantive rank of Sub Lieutenant on 8 May 1944, and stationed at HMAS Lonsdale, Port Melbourne, until his discharge on 31 May 1946.
8.
Ian Potter was elected a fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 1978.
9.
The Ian Potter Foundation was established by Potter in 1964, inspired by the Myer Foundation, as he was friends with Ken Myer, eldest son of Sidney Myer.
10.
Ian Potter divorced his first wife in 1941 and on 2 July 1942 he married Gwenyth Winifred Izzard, an amateur actress, at the Cairns Memorial Presbyterian Church in East Melbourne.
11.
Ian Potter divorced his second wife on the grounds of desertion.