Elder Collection

DAVID FREDERICK ELDER

1916-2005

David Elder on his last trip to Adelaide in 2005

David Frederick Elder was born in Heidleberg, Melbourne on 8th August, 1916, and started school in 1922 at Spring Road, Malvern. The family later moved to the beachside suburb of Carrum and then settled in East Kew where he attended East Kew Central School and went on to the prestigious Melbourne High School.

He left school during the Depression and found work in the millinery trade. But it was his love of books that forged his career. From childhood he had loved reading and preferred that any presents he received were books. It was just before his 19th birthday that David started working in sales at Lothian Press.

David married Hilda Chandler, the daughter of a successful hardware businessman, in April 1939 and they would be happily married for 60 years, until Hilda’s death in 1999.

Prior to the Second World War, David joined the 6th Field Ambulance of the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps as a militiaman and later enlisted for active service in the Army, transferring to 8th Division Headquarters. He went to Singapore and, following that city’s fall to the Japanese, he spent the rest of the War in the infamous Changi Prison.

In Patsy Adam-Smith’s book Prisoners Of War, there is a five page section entitled, ‘A Bookman In Changi’. It is all about the experience from David’s point of view and gives a real example of the survival spirit shown by the Aussie prisoners.

After the War he returned for a while to Lothian’s but, in 1946, he became a publisher’s representative for Oxford University Press. He remained there until his retirement in 1981, by which time he was Deputy Manager in Australia.

It was in his retirement that David was able to devote his time to his long time passion for history. Whilst his main attraction was the life and times of Colonel William Light, he also held a fascination for the Napoleonic Wars and history in general. He contributed a number of entries for the Australian Dictionary of Biography.

David was meticulous with his research and generous with his knowledge – always willing to share with others.

He provided Geoffrey Dutton with a great deal of information for the first edition of Founder Of A City in 1960 and he was recognised as co-author of the second edition in 1991. He wrote the Introduction and Notes to the 1984 Wakefield Press publication of William Light’s Brief Journal and Australian Diaries and in 1987 authored the text for Art of William Light, produced by the City of Adelaide to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the foundation of South Australia.

David Elder died on 11th October, 2005, at the age of 89. In accordance with the arrangements he had made, his research papers and around 200 associated published books were donated to Flinders University, to be available for use by anyone interested in the life of Colonel William Light and the founding of the City of Adelaide.

In the first of the 70 loose leaf binders which form the basis of the David Elder William Light Collection, David Elder explains in great detail How and Why he became so interested in William Light and also The Purpose of this Collection.