{{Short description|Australian politician}} {{otherpeople}} {{Use dmy dates|date=August 2021}} {{Use Australian English|date=August 2021}} {{Infobox officeholder |honorific_prefix = '''The Hon''' |name = James Tyson |honorific_suffix = |image = James Tyson State Library of Qld.png |caption = Tyson in 1890 |office1 = Member of the Queensland Legislative Council |term_start1 = 23 May 1893 |term_end1 = 4 December 1898 |birth_date = {{Birth date|1819|4|8|df=y}} |birth_place = Cowpastures, New South Wales, Australia |death_date = {{death date and age|1898|12|4|1819|4|8|df=y}} |death_place = Darling Downs, Queensland, Australia |resting_place = Toowoomba Cemetery |party = |other_party = |known_for = Australia's first self-made millionaire |occupation = Pastoralist |relations = |alma_mater = }}
'''James Tyson''' (8 April 1819 – 4 December 1898) was an Australian pastoralist. He is regarded as Australia's first self-made millionaire. His name became a byword for reticence, wealth and astute dealing.
==Early life== James Tyson was born about 1820 in the Camden district (then called Cowpastures) of New South Wales, the son of William Tyson and Isabella Marie (née Coulsen). There is disagreement over the date of his birth.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article117410575 |title=Week-End Magazine |newspaper=The Farmer and Settler |location=NSW |date=19 November 1954 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=17 |publisher=National Library of Australia |archive-date=17 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191217193027/http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article117410575 |url-status=live }}</ref> Some sources say 11 April 1823<ref name=obit>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article3683786 |title=The Late Hon. James Tyson |newspaper=The Brisbane Courier |date=6 December 1898 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=7 |publisher=National Library of Australia |archive-date=17 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191217193015/http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article3683786 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=death/><ref>{{Dictionary of Australian Biography|First=james|Last=Tyson|shortlink=0-dict-biogT-V.html#tyson1}}</ref> while others say 8 April 1819.<ref>Denholm, Z. [https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/tyson-james-985 Tyson, James (1819–1898)] , ''Australian Dictionary of Biography'', Volume 6, Melbourne University Press, 1976, pp 319–320.</ref><ref name=edays/> At his death in 1898, he was described as being either 75 years of age<ref>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article62376770 |title=James Tyson, Deceased |newspaper=Gippsland Times |location=Vic. |date=8 December 1898 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=3 Edition: Morning |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref> or 81 years of age,<ref name=funeral/><ref name=funeralbc>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article3683858 |title=The Late Hon. James Tyson |newspaper=The Brisbane Courier |date=7 December 1898 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=5 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref> suggesting an even wider range of possible birth dates.
His mother, Isabella, was a convict, sentenced to transportation for theft. His father, William, and his eldest brother, also William, came with her. Receiving a grant from Governor Lachlan Macquarie in the Narellan area, the Tysons set themselves up as small farmers, later moving with their growing family to East Bargo. As a youth James commenced work for neighbours such as Major Thomas Mitchell, and John Buckland who contracted him to take cattle to the north-eastern border area of the colony of Victoria. Then, with his brothers, he took up squatting licences in western New South Wales. Eventually they settled on land at the junction of the Lachlan and Murrumbidgee Rivers, in the reed-beds which had defeated John Oxley's exploration in 1837.
==Business life== The legendary Tyson fortune was founded on success in butchering on the Bendigo goldfields.
It was extended by canny buying, knowledge of cattle and of stockroutes, pastoral lending and the judicious selection of enormous leaseholds to provide a chain of supply which stretched from North Queensland to Gippsland and which fed beef to Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.
His first property, Royal Bank Station, near Deniliquin was purchased in 1855, followed by Juanbong (along the Murrumbidgee River), then the Heyfield station at Gippsland.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138885635 |title=James Tyson |newspaper=Western Grazier |volume=XIX |issue=1828 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=14 December 1898 |access-date=20 December 2020 |page=2 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref> Moving into Queensland, he took up Felton station in the Darling Downs area. Going west he also picked up Tinnenburra cattle station which carried 20,000 head of cattle.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article218939724 |title=Tinnenburra |newspaper=Balonne Beacon |volume=XVI |issue=31 |location=Queensland, Australia |date=29 July 1922 |access-date=20 December 2020 |page=1 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
In 1866, he purchased a group of pastoral runs: Wooroorooka, Rottenrow, Gordonsheet and Teckulman, all on the Warrego River and its tributary, Cuttaburra Creek.<ref>{{cite news|date=30 May 1868|title=The necessaries of life|page=11|newspaper=The Queenslander|location=Queensland, Australia|url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article20318841|access-date=14 May 2020|via=Trove|archive-date=24 January 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220124022811/https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/20318841|url-status=live}}</ref>
His other stations included Bangate, Goondublui, Tupra and Mooroonowa in New South Wales; and Glenormiston, Swanvale, Meteor Downs and Albinia Downs, Babbiloora, Carnarvon, Tully, Wyobie, Felton, and Mount Russell in Queensland.
==Link with Flora Shaw== Enid Moberly Bell (1947:124–126) recounts a chance meeting between Tyson and Flora Shaw on a long train journey: although vastly different in background, they had "a fundamental agreement on values – indifference to wealth, delight in adventure, satisfaction in work accomplished ..." – see E.M.Bell (1947) ''Flora Shaw: Lady Lugard, D.B.E.'' Constable.
==Death== Slow of speech, though astute and perceptive, "Jimmy" Tyson habitually dressed like a tradesman or boundary rider, and when he visited his various properties, he did so anonymously, preferring the swagmen's camp and the company of sundowners to the comfort of the manager's homestead.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article106523509 |title=Fifty Years of Racing |newspaper=The Daily Herald (Adelaide) |volume=9 |issue=2672 |location=South Australia |date=12 October 1918 |accessdate=7 August 2017 |page=7 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
He died in Darling Downs.on 4 December 1898. He had been ailing for two weeks but refused to see a doctor. His funeral service was held at St James's Church at Toowoomba and he was buried in Toowoomba Cemetery.<ref name=death>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article3683655 |title=Death of the Hon. James Tyson |newspaper=The Brisbane Courier |date=5 December 1898 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=4 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref name=funeral>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article62376769 |title=Funeral at Toowoomba |newspaper=Gippsland Times |location=Vic. |date=8 December 1898 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=3 Edition: Morning |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref name=funeralbc/><ref>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article71325960 |title=In Town and Country|newspaper=Australian Town and Country Journal |location=NSW |date=1 April 1899 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=32 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref name=funeraldetails>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article76628647 |title=The Late Hon. James Tyson |newspaper=Warwick Argus |location=Qld. |date=10 December 1898 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=5 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
At the time of his death his estate was the largest in Australia to that time. However he died unmarried, childless and intestate. His estate was sold off, realising about £2.36 million, which was divided among his closest relatives. In 1901, his remains were exhumed and re-buried in a family vault at St Peter's Anglican Church in Campbelltown, New South Wales;<ref name=edays>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article92498732 |title=Early Days on Australian Cattle Stations |newspaper=The Chronicle |location=Adelaide |date=14 April 1938 |accessdate=7 July 2013 |page=57 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article102167032 |title=The Late Mr. Tyson |newspaper=The Campbelltown Herald |location=NSW |date=4 December 1901 |accessdate=2 February 2015 |page=2 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
==Legacy== *Banjo Paterson (in T.Y.S.O.N.), Breaker Morant and Will Ogilvie all wrote about him. *The papers of James Tyson are held by Deniliquin & District Historical Society, National Library of Australia, Queensland State Archives and the State Library of Queensland are of historical significance as the surviving records of the creator of one of Australia's greatest pastoral empires and this country's first millionaire, described as ‘a legend in his own lifetime’, and celebrated on his death by a poem by Banjo Paterson, 'T.Y.S.O.N.'<ref>{{Cite web|date=2017-02-15|title=UNESCO listing for JOL collection {{!}} State Library Of Queensland|url=https://www.slq.qld.gov.au/blog/unesco-listing-jol-collection|access-date=2021-03-22|website=www.slq.qld.gov.au|language=en|archive-date=23 March 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210323173835/https://www.slq.qld.gov.au/blog/unesco-listing-jol-collection|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=James Tyson Papers {{!}} Australian Memory of the World|url=https://www.amw.org.au/register/listings/james-tyson-papers|access-date=2021-03-22|website=www.amw.org.au|archive-date=29 March 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210329204310/https://www.amw.org.au/register/listings/james-tyson-papers|url-status=live}}</ref> In 2010 James Tyson was inducted into the Queensland Business Leaders Hall of Fame. A digital story was produced to mark the occasion where Tyson Doneley talks about the life of The Hon. James Tyson MLC and his pastoral interests throughout the 19th century. Doneley reads out the Banjo Patterson poem that mentions Tyson and talks about the considerable wealth he accumulated during his lifetime (estimated to be 9 billion AUD in today's terms).<ref>{{Cite web |date=2010 |title=The Hon. James Tyson MLC Digital Story, 2010 |url=http://onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au/permalink/f/1upgmng/slq_digitool521312 |website=State Library of Queensland OneSearch catalogue}}</ref>
== Awards == In 2010, the Hon James Tyson MLC was inducted into the Queensland Business Leaders Hall of Fame, as Australia's first cattle king.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://leaders.slq.qld.gov.au/inductees/the-hon-james-tyson-mlc-1819-1898/|title=The Hon James Tyson MLC|access-date=7 August 2017|archive-date=7 August 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170807112441/http://leaders.slq.qld.gov.au/inductees/the-hon-james-tyson-mlc-1819-1898/|url-status=live}}</ref>
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== * {{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article49455163 |title=Jimmy Tyoson, Millionaire Grazier |newspaper=The Northern Standard |location=Darwin, NT |date=25 April 1939 |accessdate=2 February 2015 |page=7 |publisher=National Library of Australia}} — 1939 newspaper biography * {{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article76546286 |title=James Tyson |newspaper=The Charleville Times |location=Brisbane |date=24 October 1947 |accessdate=2 February 2015 |page=36 |publisher=National Library of Australia}} — 1947 newspaper biography * {{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article117410575 |title=Week-End Magazine |newspaper=The Farmer & Settler |location=Sydney |date=19 November 1954 |accessdate=2 February 2015 |page=17 |publisher=National Library of Australia}} — 1954 newspaper biography *[https://www.amw.org.au/register/listings/james-tyson-papers UNESCO Memory of the World Register - James Tyson Papers] *[https://www.slq.qld.gov.au/blog/unesco-listing-jol-collection UNESCO listing for JOL collection], John Oxley Library Blog *[http://onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au/permalink/f/1oppkg1/slq_alma21148813270002061 OM69-11 James Tyson Papers ca. 1834-1965], State Library of Queensland *[http://onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au/permalink/f/1oppkg1/slq_alma21148674640002061 OM81-16 James Tyson Letter 1878], State Library of Queensland *[https://vimeo.com/14912137 The Hon. James Tyson MLC Digital Story, 2010], State Library of Queensland
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Tyson, James}} Category:1819 births Category:1898 deaths Category:Members of the Queensland Legislative Council Category:Burials at Drayton and Toowoomba Cemetery Category:19th-century Australian politicians Category:19th-century Australian businesspeople