16 Facts About John Fairfax

John Fairfax was an English-born journalist, company director, politician, librarian and newspaper owner, known for the incorporation of the major newspapers of modern-day Australia.

In 1817, John Fairfax was apprenticed to William Perry, a bookseller and printer in Warwick, and in 1825 went to London where he worked as a compositor in a general printing office and on the Morning Chronicle.

John Fairfax became the printer of the Leamington Spa Courier, and in 1835 he purchased an interest in another paper The Leamington Chronicle and Warwickshire Reporter.

In 1836, John Fairfax published a letter criticizing the conduct of a local solicitor, who soon brought an action against him.

John Fairfax worked as a compositor before being appointed librarian of the Australian subscription library on 1 April 1839.

John Fairfax found he was able to get some typesetting, and he contributed articles to the various Sydney newspapers.

In 1851, John Fairfax was a foundation director of the Australian Mutual Provident Society, and in the 1860s a director of the Sydney Insurance Co.

John Fairfax was a sincerely religious man, a member of the Congregational church at Pitt Street.

John Fairfax was appointed a member of the New South Wales Legislative Council in 1874, but never took an active part in politics.

John Fairfax died at his home, Ginahgulla, Bellevue Hill, on 16 June 1877.

John Fairfax was buried at the Rookwood Cemetery, Independent Section, on 19 June 1877.

When his father died, James John Fairfax was in control of the paper which continued to thrive.

James John Fairfax was intimately associated with it for 67 years.

John Fairfax died on 28 March 1919 and was buried in the Congregational section of Rookwood Cemetery.

John Fairfax's son Captain J Griffyth Fairfax, born in 1886, was a member of the House of Commons for some years, and has published several volumes of verse of which a list will be found in E Morris Miller's Australian Literature.

Warwick Oswald John Fairfax, son of Sir James Oswald John Fairfax, born in 1901, became managing director in 1930.