James Allan Woodburn died at the age of 91 on 25th February, 1960.
Born in Scotland, Mr. Woodburn was apprentice to Messrs. Johnstone and Rankine, civil and mining engineers of Glasgow, between 1884 and 1889, and remained as junior assistant for a few months before his appointment as assistant mining engineer with Robert Addie and Sons, coal and iron masters at Coatbridge. Two years later, in 1891, he assumed the position of mining engineer and colliery manager for Robert Addie and Sons Collieries, Ltd., Glasgow, having charge of plans and surveys of all their collieries and equipping and sinking new shafts. In 1895 Mr. Woodburn joined Lydenburg (Tvl.) Gold Exploration Co., Ltd., as manager, and in 1898 became manager of Spitzkop Farm Gold Co., Ltd. The next five years he spent in Southern Rhodesia managing Rezende Mines, Ltd., but returned to the Transvaal in 1905 to take up the post of manager, Van Dyk mine, transferring in 1908 to Messina (Tvl.) Development Co., Ltd., where he remained until 1915.
He then set up as consulting mining engineer on his own account in Johannesburg and was engaged in private practice for many years. He returned to the United Kingdom for the period 1947-49 but lived mostly in South Africa until 1955, when he settled in Sussex.
Mr. Woodburn was the author of several papers published in the journal of the South African Institute, and of ‘The working of a wide gold quartz reef in soft ground at Rezende, Rhodesia’ (vol. 12, 1902-3) in the Transactions of the Institution.
He was elected a Member of the Institution in 1902 and was also a member of the Institution of Mining Engineers. He occupied the Presidential chair of the South African Institute of Mining and Metallurgy in 1928-29, and was a member of the South African Institute of Mining Engineers and of the South African Institute of Engineers.
Vol. 70, Trans IMM 1960-61, p.220
