Charles B. Anderson


Charles Buxton Anderson M. Inst. C.E., M.I.E. was a South Australian engineer and public servant, whose last appointment was Commissioner for Railways of the South Australian Railways, 1930 to 1946.

History

Anderson was born in North Adelaide to John Anderson and Mary Elizabeth Anderson, née Akhurst, who married in 1872.
He attended Glenelg Collegiate School, leaving at age 13, but while working for John Harrison Packard studied surveying at the School of Mines, proving an apt pupil. and in 1898 entered the public service as a junior draftsman, in the Chief Engineer's Department. Adelaide. In 1899 he was promoted to Surveyor and in 1900 was appointed Resident Engineer at Petersburg, followed by similar positions at Port Wakefield before returning to the Adelaide engineering staff.
In January 1910, he was appointed resident engineer at Petersburg, responsible for the northern division of the railways, then in 1921 he was appointed resident engineer for the midland line.
Then came the major reorganisation brought on by the new Chief Commissioner W. A. Webb. On 5 April 1923, he was appointed Divisional Superintendent at Adelaide, and in June 1924 Commissioner Webb sent him and B. H. Gillman to Britain and America to study the latest trends in railway management, and on his return was appointed Special Engineer under R. H. Chapman Chief Engineer for Railways.
He was promoted to Acting Chief Engineer for Railways during Chapman's absence in 1926, and that same year was admitted to the Institute of Civil Engineers, London, on the strength of his work for the South Australian Railways. He filled the post of superintendent at Adelaide during the absence abroad of S. H. Watson in 1927.
He succeeded Webb as Commissioner in 1930. Management of the railways during his term as commissioner was generally successful, particularly so during the war, when efficient transport was vital.
On his retirement he was presented with a model locomotive, of a type being built at the Islington Railway Workshops, and locomotive No 527 of the South Australian Railways 520 class was named the C. B. Anderson.
He was succeeded by R. H. Chapman.
He died at his residence in First Avenue, East Adelaide, aged 74.

Other activities

He received the ISO in 1937 and was made CMG in the Birthday Honours of 1944.
A locally built locomotive, completed in December 1946, was named "C. B. Anderson" in his honor.

Family

Anderson married Eva Gordon Scott on 22 January 1902; they had five daughters: