James Robert Syme was the longest serving Warden of The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Radiologists (RACR.) He served in this position from 1970 to 1988. Dux of both Sandgate State School and Brisbane State High School, he was awarded an open scholarship to the University of Queensland in 1946, having been placed third in the state matriculation examinations. He graduated MBBS in December 1951. He entered radiology relatively late after gaining valuable experience as medical officer at Brisbane General Hospital, Princess Margaret Hospital for Children, Perth, Launceston General Hospital, the Alfred Hospital, Melbourne, between 1952 and 1956 and as pathology registrar from 1957 to 1958 at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. After a year as registrar in the Professorial Medical Unit he began training in radiology in 1960.

He eventually held Fellowships of the Royal College of Radiologists, Royal Australian College of Radiologists (RACR) and Royal Australasian College of Physicians and Diplomas in Diagnostic Radiology and Diagnostic Ultrasound.

Jim was the Thomas Baker Fellow of the RACR from 1964 to 1965 and travelled abroad. He returned to the Royal Melbourne Hospital in 1965 to become Deputy Director, with the status of Director , and Senior Associate, in the recently established University of Melbourne Department of Radiology. His research interest initially was in dissection of the aorta and coarctation, and in the years following he published and lectured on a wide range of topics.

He was co-opted to the Membership Board of the RACR in 1968, and appointed Warden in 1970. The affairs of the College were divided at that time so that the executive activities took place in Sydney and the academic side was based in Melbourne, vested in the Membership Board which comprisied four Victorians and a New Zealand branch representative under the chairmanship of the Warden, who reported to Council. Jim provided so much detail that it was not unknown for councillors sometimes to wager on the duration of his submission! The Board met at the home of Jim and his wife, Helen, in Glen Iris. Jim did all the paperwork until around 1980 when funds were provided by Council to obtain an office in East Melbourne and to employ a part-time secretary.

Jim was influenced greatly by the College Foundation Warden, Rutherford Kaye Scott, whose philosophy was that standards must be maintained at the highest level, at least comparable to the Royal Colleges, if the College was also to achieve the Designate Royal, as it did in 1972. From 1973 to 1987 Jim represented the College on the Combined Education Committee of Clinical Colleges and was Chairman/Secretary of the Committee from 1984 to 1985. He led the negotiations with the Royal College of Radiologists (London) in the establishment of the Rohan Williams Travelling Professorship, whereby, alternately, a distinguished lecturer visited Britain or Australia, and he was invited to serve in that capacity in 1979. When the College changed the constitution in 1981 and formed the Education Board, embodying representation from each branch, Jim, as Warden, was the Foundation Chairman.

Always of the view that nuclear medicine and ultrasound were integral to radiology, Jim represented the College on the Nuclear Medicine Special Working Party from 1982 to 1990 and was Convenor from 1988 to 1990. Although several College Fellows, particularly Dr Peter Verco, had fervently taken up ultrasound diagnosis in obstetrics and gynaecology and become active in forming the Australasian Society of Ultrasound in Medicine (ASUM), the College had been tardy in embracing the discipline. Realizing this, in 1982 Jim spent six months of his sabbatical leave in Sydney completing the training course of the Ultrasonics Institute and the Royal Women’s Hospital and obtained the Diploma of Diagnostic Ultrasound.

He maintained a close association with ASUM over many years and as Warden he promoted a steady increase in the ultrasound content of the College syllabus to a point where graduating Fellows today are recognised as specialists without obtaining the DDU. Jim was a Member of the Council of ASUM from 1984 to 1987 and a Member of the Board of Examiners for the DDU since 1987, chairing that Board from 1989 to 2000.

Having married a radiographer, Jim maintained a close association with the Australian Institute of Radiography, chairing the Conjoint Board from 1965 to 1970, and becoming an Honorary Member of the Institute in 1981.

He continued to work in private practice after retiring from the Hospital. He was proud of his Scottish and Prussian forebears, and he adored his family: Helen (nee Fitzgerald) whom he married in 1957, their two sons, David and Cameron, and two grandchildren.

His devotion to the Royal Australian and new Zealand College of Radiologists will long be remembered. With his meticulous attention to detail in all things and his rather striking appearance – dignified, with a concealed sense of humour, and rather gaunt as he stood tall in his Warden’s robes - he had a grand reputation in the College. He was awarded the Gold Medal of the College in 1984 and in 1989 became the College President.