Please wait. Contacting image service... loading

Article text

DEATH OF MR. JAMES
MUNRO.
AN EX-PREMIER OF VICTORIA.
Melbourne, February 26.
Mr. James Munro, for many years a prominent
politician, and at one time Premier
of Victoria, died last night at his
daughter's residence, Malvern. Mr. Munro,
who was in his 77th year, had been
in bad health for some years. He was
born in Sutherlandshire, Scotland, in
1822. He began life as a printer, and was
in the establishment of Messrs. Thomas
Constable & Sons, the well-known publishers,
of Edinburgh, in his early manhood.
He emigrated to Australia at the
age of 36, landing in Melbourne in 1858.
After spending a few years in the printing
trade Mr. Munro founded the Victorian
Permanent Investment and Building
Society in 1865. He was a keen business
man, who interested himself in various
industrial and commercial ventures. He
was instrumental in starting the Victorian
wool mills, Victorian Permanent Fire Insurance
Company, and subsequently the
Federal Banking Company, of which he
acted as managing director for several
years.
Up to the land boom Mr. Munro was
looked upon as a wealthy man, but in
common with others the reaction, which
took place after the bursting of the boom,
affected him materially. He entered politics
in 1874 as a member of the Legislative
Assembly for North Melbourne,
and continued in the popular Chamber
with intervals till 1892. Mr. Munro was
always a staunch adherent to Liberal
principles. He was Minister of Education
in the Berry Ministry, and Pre-
in her in 1890 on the defeat of the Gillies,
Government. In 1892 Mr. Munro re-- j
signed the Premiership to Mr. Shiels, and
accepted the post of Agent-General in
London. At the conclusion of his term
of office he returned to Victoria, and for
a brief period again entered Parliament before
finally retiring into private life. Mr.
Munro was known as one of the staunchest
champions of the temperance cause in Victoria.
$