Anderson, Francis

Francis Anderson was born on 3 September 1858 in Glasgow, Scotland, the only son of Francis Anderson, a manufacturer, and Elizabeth Anna Lockart (nee Ellison).

After a normal Scottish school education, Anderson became a pupil-teacher at the age of 14. At 18, he entered the University of Glasgow where he had a distinguished career, winning prizes for classics and philosophy, and being awarded the prize as the outstanding graduate of his year.

Anderson was awarded the Clark Philosophical Fellowship and spent two years as assistant to the philosophy professor Edward Caird. During this period, Anderson studied Theology with the intention of entering the Presbyterian ministry but was never ordained. He left Glasgow in 1886 for a two-year engagement as assistant to Reverend Charles Strong at his Australian church in Melbourne.

In 1888, instead of returning to Scotland as he had originally planned, Anderson applied for, and was appointed to, the new post of lecturer in philosophy at the University of Sydney. When the University Senate established a chair in philosophy in 1890 Anderson successfully applied for the position, becoming the first Challis Professor of Logic and Mental Philosophy. Although he published very little over the course of his academic career, Anderson was widely praised as one of the great University teachers. GV Portus, Director of Tutorial Classes from 1918 to 1934, wrote that Anderson's "was the first and only lecture room that I found in my undergraduate days at Sydney where questions were asked and discussion was encouraged".

Anderson's passion for teaching led him to address the 1901 Annual Conference of the New South Wales Public School Teachers Association, in a talk which made severe criticisms of the public school system in NSW. This address was greeted with acclamation and aided by several newspaper articles, led directly to the establishment, in 1902, of a Royal Commission to investigate the NSW School System. Consequently, the old pupil-teacher system, similar to that under which Anderson had suffered in Scotland, was abandoned and a proper training regime instituted, in conjunction with the University of Sydney, through the establishment of the Sydney Teachers College in 1906. Similarly, he agitated successfully for the establishment of Chairs of Education (1910), Economics (1912), and Psychology (1920) at the University of Sydney.

Anderson's non-teaching activities were numerous. He was president of the mental science section of the Australian Association for the Advancement of Science in 1897. Through his work on behalf of the Kindergarten Union of NSW he met his wife, Maybanke Susannah Wolstenholme (nee Selfe), whom he married at Balmain in 1899. Maybanke was independently active on behalf of educational causes, and she encouraged and helped him in his activities in this sphere. Anderson was a fellow of the Senate from 1914 to 1916 and from 1919 to 1921 and held the position of Dean of the Faculty of Arts from 1914 to 1915 and again from 1920 to 1921. As a proponent of adult education, he became chairman of the joint committee for tutorial classes of the University Extension Board from 1916.

Anderson resigned his chair at the end of 1921 and was made Emeritus Professor by the University, but his extra-curricular activities continued. In 1922 he founded the Australasian Association of Psychology and Philosophy, and acted as first editor of its journal during the period 1923 to 1926. He served as President of the local branch of the League of Nations Union for a long period and was Chairman of the Council of Social Service of NSW until his death.

In 1926 Anderson and Maybanke visited Britain and Europe, where Maybanke, fifteen years his senior, died on 15 April 1927 while the couple were staying in Paris. It was during this trip that Anderson was given an honorary LL.D by the University of Glasgow, at a graduation ceremony on 22 June 1927. After his return to Sydney, Anderson married Josephine Wright on 28 January 1928 at the Goulburn Cathedral, and then made another trip to Europe. Anderson was knighted in 1936 and died at his home in Woollahra on 24 June 1941.