James Rickard (c. 1850 – 25 January 1909) was an Australian Congregationalist minister, remembered as the founder of the Council of Churches in the state of Victoria, Australia.
[1] He studied for the Methodist ministry in the early 1870s[2] and served in the Fingal circuit in Tasmania in 1873,[3] transferred to Toolamba, Victoria in 1875.
He began his Congregational ministry at the Glebe, New South Wales, church in August 1875.
He was largely responsible for the creation and early success of the Victorian Council of Churches, serving as secretary from its inception to 1906, when he relinquished that position due to illness, and was elected president.
Rickard married twice: His eldest daughter Ethel Jane Rickard married Thomas Stephen Hart, MA., lecturer at Ballarat School of Mines, on 14 December 1898,[11] Other daughters were Harriet "Hattie", Irene, Elizabeth, Mabel "Maisie".