1Wildlife conservation in Australia owes much to the ideas of a controversial mathematics professor whose attention-grabbing actions made him at once famous and widely vilified. John Wamsley overcame childhood disadvantage and trauma to create first a private sanctuary called Warrawong, then Earth Sanctuaries Limited, the world's first publicly listed company devoted solely to wildlife conservation. His company fell from a great height, but its influence has been enormous. This is the story of that enterprise and the man who founded it.