[1] He was educated at Curling high school, became an apprentice in the electrical department of the Anglo-Newfoundland Development Company, operators of the pulp and paper mill in Grand Falls.
[1] When Bowater's constructed a pulp and paper mill in Corner Brook in the mid-1920s, Ballam moved there to be close to his former home in Curling.
[1] Ballam, elected president of Local 64 of the Pulp and Sulphite Workers Union in Corner Brook in 1935, had also attended the founding convention of the Newfoundland Federation of Labour in 1937.
In 1939, he relinquished his leadership role with Local 64 to become president of the new federation, a position he held until the following year when he left the Corner Brook mill to enter the insurance business.
Ballam decided to offer himself for one of the two delegate positions assigned to Humber district at the National Convention, that was set up by the British government on December 11, 1945, to determine the political fate of Newfoundland and Labrador.