Jefferson Stow

Jefferson Pickman Stow (4 September 1830 – 4 May 1908), was a newspaper editor and magistrate in South Australia.

Stow was born at Buntingford, Hertfordshire, England, the second son of the Rev. Thomas Quentin Stow and his wife Elizabeth, née Eppes. Jefferson Stow came to South Australia with his parents and brothers ( Randolph Isham Stow and Augustine Stow) in 1837. After engaging in farming pursuits, he went to the Victorian diggings in 1856, and to the Northern Territory in 1864. In the following year he formed one of a party of seven who sailed from Adam Bay in the Northern Territory to Champion Bay in Western Australia in a small ship's boat named the Forlorn Hope. An account of this expedition was published by Stow, who in 1876 was appointed editor of The South Australian Advertiser in succession to Mr. Harcus.

Stow was the author of "South Australia: its History, Productions and Natural Resources," compiled at the request of the South Australian government for circulation at the Calcutta International Exhibition (1883), and published that year. It is a well written and concise manual, and has had an extensive circulation in Australia, England and India. Stow was appointed a magistrate in 1884, and in 1886 Commissioner of Insolvency, and Special and Stipendiary Magistrate at Mount Gambier, South Australia and later at Port Pirie. Stow retired in 1904; he died on 4 May 1908 at North Adelaide, survived by his wife, two sons and five daughters.