A wealth of western history was lost when Dubbo's "grandest townsman" and inaugural mayor passed away at the age of 92.
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James Samuels - also dubbed in newspaper articles as the 'Father of Dubbo' - left a legacy which will never be erased from town.
Born in 1835 in Bristol, England, at 16-years-old he moved to Australia with his father, mother and siblings.
After experience on the gold diggings in Victoria, he arrived at Dubbo in 1854. He made a geological study of western NSW in 1868, and published a series of papers on the 'Water System of Interior' in Sir Henry Parkes' journal The Empire.
When Dubbo was declared a municipal council in 1872, Mr Samuels became the town's first mayor at the age of 37.
Presiding over a population of almost 500 people, Mr Samuels served in this role until 1875.
He was also president of the Mechanics' Institute, chairman of the Land Board, and chief warden of Holy Trinity Church of England.
According to the Dubbo Dispatch and Wellington Independent from 1927, he was also among the earliest members of the Dubbo School Board established in 1857, a year before the first public school building was erected on Macquarie Street in 1858.
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Mr Samuels was also one of the founders of the Agricultural Society, and through shows became a noted breeder of stud cattle and heavy horses. As a result of this Mr Samuels' breed of stock was known throughout the district for many years.
However most significantly, Mr Samuels is well remembered as playing a major role in the establishment of the Dubbo hospital, where he served as its first treasurer for almost 60 years until his death in 1927.
Mr Samuels was regarded as the founding father of the hospital, he attended the first planning meeting in 1866 and later donated two acres of land north-west of the original complex for the purpose of extending the existing infrastructure.
Mr Samuels maintained and lived on the land, with his family home situated on the western side of where the railway is today. When he died, he bequeathed the land to the hospital in his will.
His life was a long one, but a useful one, a life of unselfish service and kindly deeds
- Dubbo Dispatch and Wellington Independent, 1927
He married Mary Anne McMillan - daughter of one of the oldest pioneering families - in 1858 and they had eight children.
At the age of 92, Mr Samuels died on May 17, 1927 as a result of burns sustained from a warming fire.
Posthumously, the Dubbo Dispatch and Wellington Independent in 1927 remembered Mr Samuels as a "pioneer townsman, public-spirited citizen and kindly natured man".
"His life was a long one, but a useful one, a life of unselfish service and kindly deeds," the article read.
"Throughout the whole of that time [as hospital treasurer] he had worked hard in the interest of the institution, and was one of its great benefactors."
"The sick and poor of two generations had good reason to be thankful to the fate that gave them a James Samuels."
His funeral notice in the Sydney Morning Herald on May 21, 1927 said his funeral "was the largest seen in Dubbo for years" and the "cortege was half a mile long".
His pallbearers were members of the hospital committee.
"Practically every prominent person was present at the graveside," the notice ends.
According to an article in the Dubbo Liberal and Macquarie Advocate from June 3, 1930 Mr Samuels' work on behalf of the hospital was commemorated with the opening of the Samuels Ward.
Its believed the ward - the female ward at the north-west of the building - stood until 2004 when it was demolished for a car park behind the old 1868 hospital building.
In 2021 Dubbo Regional Council joined the push to have part of Dubbo hospital redevelopment named after Mr Samuels by writing to the NSW government.