Background
Sandford was born in Footscray, Victoria the eldest son of Scottish-born businessman Alexander Wallace Sandford.
Businessman director politician
Sandford was born in Footscray, Victoria the eldest son of Scottish-born businessman Alexander Wallace Sandford.
James was educated at Saint Peter"s College and Roseworthy Agricultural College, then the University of London.
They moved to Adelaide in 1980, where the dairy products business of A. West. Sandford & Company had moved its head office. He joined A. West. Sandford & Company in 1901. His father died in 1906 and James took over control of the company, which had diversified into an importer of agricultural machinery, in 1911.
He was by this time generally referred to as simply "Wallace Sandford".
In 1931 Wallace Sandford was appointed chairman of a three-man committee (with Professor J McKellar Stewart and the Director of Education, William J Adey) to enquiry into the cost of education. The panel recommended severe cost-cutting measures, which included the introduction of school fees, increases in the minimum sizes of country schools, amalgamation of high schools, and entrance examinations to high schools in order to halve enrolments.
Adey signed a minority report. His politics were influenced by loyalty to the British Empire and the laissez-faire belief that capitalists should be relatively free from interference by Government.
He was a director on the boards of the Adelaide Cement Company
Limited, Sun Insurance and the South Australian Gas Company. He acted as honorary consul in Adelaide for Sweden for 17 years. He was a keen golfer.
He was knighted in 1937.
They had a home at Avenel Gardens Medindie, then on East Terrace, Adelaide and a summer residence at Mount Lofty.
In 1938 Sir Wallace, as he had become, was elected as a Liberal member of the Legislative Council for the Central Number.2 district.