Harold Wyndham

Sir Harold Wyndham CBE (27 June 1903 – 22 April 1988) was Director-General of Education in New South Wales between 1952 and 1968. He chaired the committee whose report (referred to as "The Wyndham Report") led to the Education Act 1961 which completely re-organised secondary education in NSW.

Wyndham was a great-grandson of Wadham Wyndham. His grandfather Alexander Wyndham (d.1915) arrived in Australia in the 1850s with a sizeable inheritance but within 20 years the fortune had been spent, lent or otherwise lost.

Harold Stanley Wyndham was born in Forbes, New South Wales on 27 June 1903, first child to Agnes Effie (née Finigan) and Stanley Charles Wyndham. His mother Effie died in June 1908, a short time after the arrival of her third child, Norman. The children were cared for by their aunt Rachel, Effie's younger sister, whom Stanley later married. Rachel urged that the family be moved to Sydney to ensure the children could receive a more rounded education. Rachel and Stanley had a son Robert. Harold's sister Kathleen founded Wadham Preparatory School and his brother Norman became a noted Sydney-based surgeon.

Harold married Beatrice Margaret (Margaret) Grieve in 1936 and moved to the Sydney suburb of Roseville in 1937 where the couple raised three sons, Philip, John and David, all of whom attended the academically selective North Sydney Boys High School. Wyndham died of a heart attack in Roseville on 22 April 1988, leaving his wife Margaret, three sons and five grandchildren.

Wyndham attended Fort Street High School and graduated in Arts at the University of Sydney in 1924. In 1925 he was awarded a Diploma in Education, winning the Peter Board Prize. He served for 8 years as a teacher in Primary schools and as a member of staff of Sydney Teachers College.

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