In January 1943, the Commonwealth Government established the Department of Post-War Reconstruction under the leadership of H C (Nugget) Coombs to plan and coordinate Australia's transition from a war economy with the goal of achieving and maintaining full employment.

One result was the first direct Commonwealth financial support to the university sector via the Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme (CRTS). Student numbers increased from 180 in 1945 to 246 in 1948, partly as a consequence of ex-service personnel enrolling under the CRTS.

In 1946, the University also received a Commonwealth grant of £33,000 under CRTS to build a temporary laboratory block, the Belshaw Block, which finally opened in 1949. The new building may have been, as University librarian Edith Tattersall said, “a bleak, ugly, two-story barn”, but it was still a God-send to the Faculty of Science

Despite this growth, the autonomy issue failed completely. Possible Commonwealth funding was drained by the creation of the Australian National University in 1946, an action vigorously promoted by HC Coombs.

In NSW, the Government transformed the Sydney Technical College into an Institute of Technology and then in 1949, with much fanfare, into the New South Wales University of Technology, now the University of New South Wales.

This was a bitter outcome from a New England perspective: “the University of Sydney is being financially starved”, Drummond said, and “its offspring, the New England University College, is even more starved”. Staff bitterness lingered for years.

In February 1947, Jim Belshaw as acting Warden had been replaced by Robert Madgwick. It had been a busy and productive time for Belshaw.

In addition to his duties as acting Warden, he had continued teaching. He had also found the time to marry.

“I wonder”, he had written in his diary in 1938, “whether I shall ever have a wife and children?” Now his new bride was Edna Drummond, David Drummond’s oldest daughter.

Edna’s sisters were a little surprised at the news because she had not always been complimentary about Doctor Belshaw. In fact, it’s not so surprising. Edna had established the College library so they worked together, while Belshaw and Drummond had worked closely on College and Northern Development matters.

In February 1945 their first son, James, was born.