James Henry Aldridge

rdf:langString James Henry Aldridge

rdf:langString James Henry "Jim" Aldridge (4 July 1849 – 11 November 1929) was a horse breeder and hotelier in South Australia. He founded the Richmond Park Stud in the Adelaide suburb of Richmond. J. H. Aldridge, as he was generally known, or "Jim" to his friends, was born at Kensington, South Australia, the son of George Aldridge (c. 1817 – 12 December 1879), who emigrated to South Australia in 1847. Before the advent of the Adelaide Town Hall there were three city venues for public functions: Neale's Rooms, White's Rooms and Aldridge's Rooms, all on King William Street. Aldridge's Rooms, which appears in newspaper advertisements between 1860 and 1863, was mentioned as a strong argument against the building of a Town Hall. It is probable that this venue became the Prince Alfred Hotel (alongside the Town Hall), which George Aldridge opened in 1869, and remained its proprietor. Aldridge was educated at St. Peter's College, and immediately after leaving school joined G. W. Goyder's party surveying the Northern Territory. On his return to the city, he joined the telegraph party working in the Roper River area. He then drove a herd of bullocks to the Northern Territory diggings, and sold them for a good profit. In 1879 he purchased from William Blackler the publican's licence to the Globe Hotel (the popular resort of sportsmen, and home of the Tattersalls Club, of which he remained a member) in Rundle Street and managed it for nine years. He left the "Globe" to become first licensee of the Grand Hotel, Broken Hill 1888–1893 in the midst of a mining boom. To escape the smelter's fumes he built a home and farm between Thorndale and the aerodrome. Then from 1898 to around 1907 he was the lessee of the newly rebuilt Gresham Hotel 1–9 King William Street, Adelaide.