James W. Hendry is an American inventor. He was born in Scotland in 1920 but moved with his family to the United States in 1923.

Hendry and his brother developed and patented the first successful screw-type injection system for plastic injection molding machines in 1946, and in 1947 he joined the Jackson and Church Company as Vice President, Plastic Machinery. While there, he developed the first machine capable of molding rigid polyvinyl chloride, making possible the manufacture of plastic pipe fillings and starting a new industry for plastics. He was named Vice President of Manufacturing and Engineering for Tuber-Turn Plastics, a joint venture of Jackson and Church and National Cylinder Gas Company in 1954. He joined Borg-Warner Machinery in 1959 as Vice President and General Manager and remained there until 1972.

Mr. Hendry joined Ex-Cell-O Corporation in 1972 as Product Manager for plastics machinery at the Micromatic Division. He was named Director of Research at Ex-Cell-O Plastics Research Center at Walted Lake, Michigan in 1976 and was appointed Vice President and General Manager of the Plastic Components Division in 1977 and President in 1979.

An acknowledged expert in the plastics field, Hendry holds 93 patents covering plastics processing machinery and is among the most recognized leaders in the development of structural form molding technology. He was also one of the pioneer inventors of internal and external gas assisted molding. He is a member of the Society of Plastics Engineers and has served on the Machinery Group Executive Committee of the SPE.