From surgeon to student: a residential history of 86 Queen Street

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flatting, philosophy, politics

This post was researched and written by University of Otago history student Bree Wooller in 2017.

86 Queen Street 2016. Photographed by Bree Wooller.

North Dunedin has not always been occupied by students. For most of its history it has been just another suburb. Now, the houses are crumbling, and we risk losing the heritage and character that has become iconic to the area.

The gold rush of the 1860s made Dunedin the richest and most highly populated province in New Zealand.[1] This influx of wealth influenced the building of large, elegant, houses along the town belt. In 1880, David Henderson built a house at 86 Queen Street. In its early years 86 Queen was considered a charming, first-class, modern residence.[2] The early occupants were wealthy; regular adverts posted in the local papers look for domestic help, and furniture auctions reveal the occupants lavish lifestyle.[3] Walnut pianos, marble vases, and oil paintings were common furnishings in 86 Queen Street at the time.[4]

Professor Salmond had a brief occupancy till his death in 1917. Photographed by Morris, 1914. Image courtesy of Hocken Collections, P2018-013-005.

John Laing, a ‘foreign agent,’ owned the house from 1909 to 1924. He lived there with his wife Kathleen, son John Carroll, and daughter Katherine.[5] John Carroll Laing was killed in action in Italy, 1943.[6] Professor William Salmond, known for his position on the chair of mental and moral philosophy at Otago University, appears to have resided at the house for a brief amount of time up until his death in 1917.[7] Kathleen Laing’s brother, Dr Francis Hotop, a surgeon at Dunedin Hospital lived with the family for a period around 1922.[8] Their father, Lewis Hotop, a pharmacist and three-time Mayor of Queenstown, was also living at the residence until his death in 1922.[9]

House Interior 2016. Contrast of modern repairs and older features in balusters and stained window panes. Photographed by Bree Wooller, July 2016.

A new upstairs room was added in 1913, electricity was connected during the renovations.[10] In 1926, a garage was added at the front of the house.[11]

90 years ago, Dunedin was feeling the effects of the Great Depression.[12] Large houses along the town belt became too hard to maintain during this economic downturn, most were split into multiple dwellings. In the late 1930s, 86 Queen Street was split into a top and bottom flat.[13]

The house was rented in this period by a fast-changing array of occupants. Tenants included Miss Anna Glover, a spinster, who lived in the top flat 1940 to 1946, and an engineer named David Jack, who lived in the bottom flat from 1939-41.[14] The flat was owned by a retired salesman, Thomas McGoldrick, from 1944 till his death in 1969.[15] In 1958, the iconic yellow roughcasting replaced the houses traditional wooden exterior, making it resemble its present-day appearance.

Between 1969 and 1979, 86 Queen Street was owned and occupied by Richard Mulgan and his wife Margaret.[16] Mulgan was a professor of political studies at Otago University, known for his role on the New Zealand Royal Commission of 1985, which recommended the adoption of an MMP political system. Mulgan converted 86 Queen back to a single house, and remodelled the kitchen in 1976. From 1979, the flat was owned and occupied by Duncan Roper and his wife Mirrel.[17] Duncan was a tutor at the university while residing in the house.

50 years ago, the university roll was on a steady climb, and the number of students wanting to flat was on the rise.[18] In 1956, 17% of the student population lived in flats, and this rose to 39% of students in 1972.[19]

Student Occupation at 86 Queen Street. Photographed by Bree Wooller, October 2016.

The beginning of student occupation at 86 Queen Street is ambiguous. Names and dates in an upstairs room suggest students were living in the flat from 2001, if not earlier. 86 Queen Street became known as “The Yeast Infection” in 2008.

In 2017, we face the continued issue of degrading student flats. Maintenance and care is needed to preserve old houses such as 86 Queen Street. Without this, many historic flats will be demolished. Along with them, aspects of student culture, and landmarks of the first settler’s Dunedin will be lost forever.

Notes

[1] Erik Olssen, A History of Otago (Dunedin, N.Z. : McIndoe,1984), 69.

[2] Park, Reynolds and Co, “Charming City Residence and Choice Piece of Ground” Evening Star (Issue: 11528), 20^th April 1901.

[3] Gow, “Wanted, Respectful General Servant”, Evening Star (Issue 11411), 1 December 1900.; Mrs Laing “Wanted, Young Lady”, Evening Star (Issue: 14150), 30^th October 1913.; Mrs George Mackie, “Wanted, Young Girl” Otago Daily Times (Issue: 19225), 16^th July 1924.

[4] Park, Reynolds and Co, “Superior Household Furniture”, Evening Star (Issue: 11528), 20^th April 1901.

[5] Laing, “Birth Notices”, Otago Witness (Issue 3060), 6^th November 1912; Wise’s New Zealand Post Office Directory, 1909-1924.

[6] Northern Cemetery, block 191, plot 86, 85. New Zealand, Cemetery Records, 1800-2007. Ancestry.com.

[7] “Auctions – Estate of the Late Professor Salmond” Evening Star (Issue 16422), 12^th May 1917.; Wise’s New Zealand Post Office Directory, 1917.

[8] Dr F. R. Hotop, “Professional Advertisement – Commenced Practice”, Otago Daily Times (Issue 18518), 31^st March 1922.  

[9] Hotop “Death Notice”, Otago Daily Times, (Issue 18673), 30^th September 1922.

[10] Electricity Records, 3^rd July 1913. Register No. 3329. Dunedin City Council Archives.

[11] Building Plans, 1926. No. 8788. Dunedin City Council Archives.

[12] Olssen, 90.

[13] Electricity Records, 24^th June 1940. Register No. 32313. Dunedin City Council Archives.

[14] Wise’s New Zealand Post Office Directory, 1940, 1942, 1943, 1946.; Electricity Records Register No. 32313.

[15] Anderson Bay Cemetery, block 259, plot 27. New Zealand, Cemetery Records, 1800-2007. Ancestry.com; Electricity Records Register No. 32313; Wise’s New Zealand Post Office Directory, 1947, 1950-1, 1953-4, 1955.

[16] Dunedin, Otago, 1978. New Zealand Electoral Rolls, 1853–1981. Auckland, New Zealand: BAB microfilming. Microfiche publication, 4032 fiche. Ancestry.com.

[17] Dunedin, Otago, 1981. New Zealand Electoral Rolls, 1853–1981.

[18] Debby Foster “No Mixing By Students” in Tower Turmoil: Characters and Controversies at the University of Otago, ed. Time Keepers. (Dunedin: Department of History, University of Otago, 2005) 129

[19] Sam Elworthy, Ritual Song of Defiance: A Social History of Students at the University of Otago, (Dunedin: OUSA, 1990), 199.

Bibliography

Auckland Museum Online Cenotaph. J C Laing. Record: C28301, Service Number: 600485.

Building Plans, No. 8788. Dunedin City Council Archives.

Evening Star. Dunedin, New Zealand, 1 December 1900 – 12 May 1917.

Electricity Records, 3^rd July 1913. Register No. 3329. Dunedin City Council Archives.

Electricity Records, 24^th June 1940. Register No. 32313. Dunedin City Council Archives.

Elworthy, Sam. Ritual Song of Defiance: A Social History of Students at the University of Otago. Dunedin: OUSA. 1990.

Foster, Debby. “No Mixing By Students.” In Tower Turmoil: Characters and Controversies at the University of Otago, edited by Time Keepers. Dunedin: Department of History, University of Otago. 2005.

McLeod, Catherine. “Halls of residence in the 1960s: curfews, couples and controversy.” In Tower Turmoil: Characters and Controversies at the University of Otago, edited by Time Keepers. Dunedin: Department of History, University of Otago. 2005.

New Zealand Electoral Rolls, 1853–1981. Auckland, New Zealand: BAB microfilming. Microfiche publication, 4032 fiche. Ancestry.com.

New Zealand, Cemetery Records, 1800-2007. Ancestry.com.

Olssen, Erik. A History of Otago. Dunedin: McIndoe, 1984.

Otago Daily Times. Dunedin, New Zealand, 31 March 1922 – 16 July 1924.

Otago Witness, Dunedin, New Zealand, 17 March 1898.- 6 November 1912.

Professor W. Salmond, by Morris Phot, 1914. Hocken Collections (c/nF189/1)

Wise’s New Zealand Post Office Directory, 1898-1955. New Zealand, City & Area Directories, 1866-1955. Microfilm publication, 921 fiche. Anne Bromell Collection. Ancestry.com.

Learning to lecture

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1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, classics, economics, education, English, French, geology, Higher Education Development Centre, history, medicine, philosophy, physics, psychology, teaching, technology

WR Morris lecturing in the ‘old anatomy lecture theatre’ – now the Gowland Lecture Theatre – in the Lindo Ferguson Building, 1949. Anatomical drawings and skeletons were popular visual aids from the medical school’s earliest classes onwards. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, University of Otago Medical School Alumnus Association archives, MS-1537/441, S17-550c.

The University of Otago’s founders followed Scottish precedent in their choice of curriculum and also in teaching methods: rather than the Oxbridge-style tutorial, teaching was based on the professorial lecture. That had the advantage of being economical and many subjects got by with just one staff member for the first few decades. The professor did all the teaching, except in the sciences, which were first to acquire assistants, necessary because of the laboratory classes which supplemented lectures. Humanities subjects had no tutorials until the 1940s, though in some cases the classes were small enough that professors became well acquainted with their students. As mentioned in a recent post about the history department, history professor John Elder told a young lecturer whose students showed marked progress after he introduced seminar discussions: ‘These young men like to hear themselves talk but you’re paid to lecture and you’ll therefore lecture. So long as I’m head of this department, there’ll be no discussions’.

Elder was not the only professor suspicious of tutorials. They eventually sneaked into arts subjects as the rehabilitation department funded tutorials for returned servicemen and women in the wake of World War II; they became standard additions to the lecture programme soon after that. Sometimes the impetus for this innovation came from students and sometimes from staff. In 1948 Frank Mitchell, the education professor, reported that ‘this year the Honours students on their own initiative organised tutorials for students taking Education I. I hope that it will soon be possible to conduct regular tutorials for all stages’. In the same year departing philosophy professor David Raphael noted that tutorials were ‘not just a desirable luxury’ in that subject, but ‘essential for adequate training. Philosophy is a way of doing things with one’s mind, not a set of facts to be learned, and consequently the student must be in a position to practise the accomplishment in question’. Tutorials required a bigger investment in staff, but the growing student roll justified that.

Academics of course varied greatly in their teaching styles. Founding classics professor George Sale, notorious for his disdain of students’ abilities, preferred the stick to the carrot. John Murdoch, in reminiscences of his own teaching career, wrote of meeting some of Sale’s honours students after a lecture in 1907: ‘They had just received their corrected Latin proses, and the most successful had gained a mark of “minus 300”. Sale deducted marks, 10, 50, 100 or more for a mistake, according to his estimate of its seriousness’. Murdoch had little respect for the methods of the early 20^th century professors: ‘Otago University as I knew it was in effect a glorified coaching school’. Although the academic staff were ‘capable and well-qualified’, suggested Murdoch, their teaching was determined by a system whereby courses were ‘set by regulations applying to all four [University of New Zealand] colleges, and the success of their efforts was gauged by examiners in England’. Such conditions made ‘inspirational teaching almost hopeless if not quite impossible’, at least in English, ‘a notoriously difficult subject to teach’. Future high school principal Muriel May, an Otago student of the 1910s and 1920s, recalled that Thomas Gilray, the English professor, ‘taught by dictating at a relentless pace to his benches of scribbling students in the Lower Oliver classroom …. at the prearranged dates we regurgitated. There were no seminars, no discussions, originality was not fostered nor were personal opinions encouraged’. There were always, of course, some inspiring teachers. May also recalled that George Thompson’s French lectures ‘were invariably stimulating and enjoyable. (Latin students made comparable claims for the classes of Professor Adams.)’ Lecturer Agnes Blackie was in love with physics, which she found ‘brimful of interest’. ‘I can’t imagine a better subject for a lecturer’, she wrote in her reminiscences. ‘Lectures can be illustrated with fascinating demonstrations which bring the subject to life for the students and are fun for the lecturer to operate’.

From the 1950s, with greater local control of the curriculum and the widespread use of tutorials in addition to the traditional lectures, labs, clinical teaching and field trips, academic staff had greater flexibility in teaching. Their adoption of new technologies varied. Visual aids did not have to be high-tech: the beautiful anatomical drawings of John Scott, who was a skilled artist as well as first dean of the medical school, were used at Otago for many decades. Others used glass slides and a ‘magic lantern’ projector to show images. John Mackie recounted its use by Noel Benson in 1929 first-year geology lectures; it was ‘a contraption on a tripod which stood behind the lecture bench. Believe it or not, this projector incorporated an arc-lamp which spluttered, fizzed and made other dangerous noises, although as a source of light it was quite spectacular’. The notoriously absent-minded professor occasionally tripped over its wires ‘and the whole contrivance would crash to the floor’; that happened also on the day he rushed to extinguish the light after discovering students had replaced his first slide with a full-frontal nude. Slides remained a popular teaching tool, though shown through a more compact slide projector from the mid-20^th century, with the slides themselves shifting from glass to film negative to digital format.

In 1940 the dean of arts and sciences, Robert Bell, reported that several departments took advantage of a new scheme for borrowing ‘sound-films’, finding them ‘an extremely valuable and effective addition’ to teaching methods. Not every academic liked new technology; John Howells, who retired from the economics department in the 1990s, commented ‘my major advancement in the technology area stopped with the biro pen’. The emergence of the Audio Visual Learning Centre (AVLC) in 1973 ‘was regarded with suspicion by some staff members who had visions of classes being handed over to various mechanical gadgets’, reported the staff newsletter in 1977. By then, the ‘prejudice’ was ‘disappearing’, with 30 departments already using the AVLC. Its use ranged from ‘tape/slide/workbook programmes’ for anatomy courses to a ‘film providing “evidence” for a simulated Supreme Court trial’ for law students. The impetus for the centre came from the medical school, which was concerned about how it would manage its larger intake of students; it provided space for AVLC academic director David Teather and his team, with a production centre in the Adams building and a study centre with library of audio visual resources in the Scott building.

By the time this photo was taken in 1983, medical school lectures had become much more relaxed and technology enabled the use of film and other audiovisual aids. Please get in touch if you can help identify the lecturer or class! Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, University of Otago Photographic Unit archives, MS-4368/086, S17-550b.

Academics using the AVLC ‘face some adjustment of their teaching methods and their attitudes’, noted the staff newsletter in 1975. There was already wider consideration of teaching and learning methods in the university, which new technology helped accelerate. In 1971 the lecturers’ association ran a well-attended seminar on teaching methods and suggested the university set up a research centre on higher education. In 1973 Otago appointed Terry Crooks as a lecturer in the education department, with half of his time devoted to research and advice on university teaching. He, the lecturers’ association and AVLC ran occasional sessions on teaching methods; for instance, a 1976 session looked at the use of film in university teaching, with staff discussing Otago-made films they had used in anthropology, physical education and medicine. Psychology lecturer Louis Leland ‘introduced a film which demonstrated the training of laboratory rats’. He made ‘a similar film each year with rats trained by the current year’s students and uses this to demonstrate to the following year’s students that training rats is within their capability’. In 1976 senate established a higher education research and advisory centre (HERAC) committee. HERAC and the AVLC often worked together and in 1978 they merged under a new acronym, this time destined to last: HEDC, or the Higher Education Development Centre.

Although HEDC had few staff in its early years, it performed a significant role; ‘there was growing awareness of the need for stimulating teaching’ reported the director, David Teather, in 1983. A recent two-day seminar on ‘helping students succeed’ had attracted 140 staff and ‘there was now hardly a department which did not make regular use of the resources at HEDC’ for producing teaching aids. That was just as well, since students ‘now came from school expecting to make use of technology in their work’. Computers became a significant part of that technology, and in 1986 Graham Webb joined the HEDC team; his ‘major responsibility’ was ‘to advise staff members on the educational uses of computers on campus’. Otago’s computing services centre also developed a team with expertise in computer-aided learning and in the 1990s HEDC’s audio-visual production section joined them as part of information technology services. HEDC continued to research and disseminate information on tertiary teaching, provide advice and run courses, notably for new academic staff; from 1996 staff could obtain a formal qualification – a postgraduate diploma in tertiary teaching – taught by the centre. The centre also supported Otago staff from other departments working on teaching-related research and new innovations. To help ‘enhance’ learning and teaching, the university offered special grants for research and innovation in teaching.

HEDC assisted with course evaluations, which gave students an opportunity to provide feedback on their teachers and courses. Staff could use them to identify weaknesses in their teaching which required work, or as evidence of their skills when seeking promotion. In an era of growing emphasis on quality assurance, they helped ‘measure’ courses in departments which were up for review. With a growing body of research from staff and postgraduate students on many aspects of higher education, plus a range of courses and support services for academics wanting to make their teaching more effective, Otago had travelled a long way from the days of Sale scoring papers at ‘minus 200’ and Gilray ‘dictating at a relentless pace’.

A class underway in the late 1980s or early 1990s in the Castle Lecture Theatres. The overhead transparency was a popular teaching tool for many years, later largely overtaken by Powerpoint digital slides. Unfortunately, the resolution of this old negative isn’t good enough to read what’s on the screen – if you can identify the class, lecturer or year, please get in touch! Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, University of Otago Photographic Unit archives, MS-4185/060, S17-550a.

Building for the arts

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1960s, art history, classics, economics, education, English, geography, history, languages, music, philosophy, politics, religion, teacher education, theology

The new Arts Building, photographed around 1970 by Arthur Campbell. The open area at the northern end was later built in to create more teaching spaces. Image courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

“We hope to give the people of Dunedin an arts building they can be proud of,” commented vice-chancellor Arthur Beacham in 1964. Fifty years later, that building is listed for replacement as part of the university’s 15-year building development plan. A new arts building – indeed a whole new humanities precinct – is planned, with construction scheduled to commence late in 2019. It seems timely, then, to look back to the beginnings of the original Arts Building.

Beacham made his 1964 comment as he welcomed the news that the government had granted approval for the University of Otago to obtain sketch plans for a new building to house some of the Faculty of Arts. This was a period of strong central government control over university development. The national University Grants Committee juggled requests for new buildings from the various institutions and made recommendations, which were then approved and funded by the government.

Otago arts student numbers were growing steadily, having doubled to reach nearly 1000 over a decade; they were predicted – fairly accurately as it turned out – to double again by the early 1980s. “Students are being taught in every basement, attic and old house we can bring into use,” noted Beacham. The English department was based in Cameron House, a grand old house which would later make way for Unicol; it also shared space in Lower Studholme, a neighbouring house, with the geography and education departments. Education, one of the largest university departments, also used Marama Hall, while geography had space in Mellor House. Political science and history occupied St Anne’s, yet another old house, once part of Studholme Hall’s accommodation, which would be demolished to create the Unicol site. Classics and modern languages had their home in the old professorial houses, while music, economics and philosophy were in the houses at 403, 411 and 421 Castle Street. Some classes took place in the revealingly named “arts hut”.

A new library was under construction and would open in 1965. Plans were for this to house some of the arts departments – political science, English and geography – until the library expanded to fill the whole building. The new Arts Building would supply teaching space and offices for most of the remaining arts departments. Its site, which had been set aside for a proposed building by the university council as early as 1960, expanded the campus in a new direction.

The site of the new Arts Building is marked ‘Phase I’ in this plan from the 1964 Design Report. The Student Union building is under construction at front left, while in this photo work on the library is yet to commence. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, Angus Ross papers, MS-1050/014.

The new building was designed by J.O. Aimers of old Dunedin architectural firm Mason and Wales. His design report of 1964 noted that the long narrow building of six floors would allow for future developments nearby while providing well for “Staff Studies, Seminar Rooms and Research Rooms requiring good daylighting and aspect”. Larger lecture rooms would take up the ground floor space: “This avoids problems in vertical circulation.” Seminar rooms for smaller classes and tutorials were located at the centre portion of each floor, meaning staff offices were in “quiet cul-de-sacs which are desirable in a Faculty of Arts.” Those “cul-de-sacs” would not always be as quiet as the architect anticipated. Ninian Smart, a distinguished religious studies scholar who visited Otago in 1971, recalled “the former dean of arts, reprimanded by the registrar for playing cricket on the matted corridors of the new arts building” (please tell me if you know who that was!). The long corridors would prove a temptation to cricketers of later generations as well – I recall corridor cricket taking place in the history department early in the 21st century.

Building, noted the Otago Daily Times, was “dogged  by Government delays at each stage of planning,” but in 1966 the university received the good news that cabinet had approved a tender from Dunedin firm Mitchell Brothers Ltd for construction of the new building. The total cost, when equipped, would be around £550,000. Occupation was scheduled for 1969, but in September 1968 the builders made an “all-out effort” over two weeks to complete two of the larger ground floor lecture theatres so they could be used by the Dunedin Teachers College. The college’s buildings were destroyed by a large fire on 3 September 1968 and the university – then a separate institution – offered this, along with some other accommodation, as “rescue aid.”

The Minister of Education, Arthur Kinsella, formally opened the Arts Building on 5 March 1969. He noted that the building “was a particularly fine one. The planning had been done economically, and he felt it was good value for money.” These comments were presumably a reaction to the criticism of Prof Eric Herd, dean of the arts faculty, who informed him that the building was “already too small …. Surely it is less expensive in the long run to design a building which will last for 20 years instead of three.” In 1972 the government approved preliminary planning of another larger “arts-library block” – the future Hocken/Richardson Building – which would house several arts departments, allowing others to expand within the 1969 Arts Building.

People sometimes refer to the Arts Building as the Burns Building, as its larger teaching areas are known as the Burns lecture theatres. I was asked recently if these are named after Reverend Thomas Burns, the spiritual leader of the Otago colony and first chancellor of the university, or his nephew Robbie Burns, the poet. I haven’t managed to find the answer yet, but either – or both! – would be appropriate for a building which is now home to the Department of English and the Robert Burns Fellow as well as the Department of Theology and Religion. Others who call the Arts Building home at present are the Departments of Politics, Classics, Languages and Cultures, History and Art History, and the administrative staff of the Division of Humanities.

Like all parts of the university, the Arts Building has seen many interesting people come and go through its history. Though few of its current occupants seem to regret its planned future replacement, it does hold many memories. Do you have any to share?

The first four professors

Tags

1870s, 1880s, 1890s, 1900s, 1910s, chemistry, classics, English, geology, mathematics, philosophy, physics, psychology

The physically and intellectually imposing Professor George Sale, photographed around 1876. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, Rolleston album 2. Reference PA1-q-197-11-2.

You’d think it would be pretty tricky to recruit four good candidates to be the inaugural teaching staff of a tiny institution, located as far as it was possible to get from Europe, in a town which was the centre of a colony only a couple of decades old. But Otago managed to secure the services of four outstanding men as its first professors. All were young and presumably attracted to the idea of shaping a new university in a lively new colony; they must have had a considerable taste for adventure.

The oldest, George Sale (1831-1922), was just 39 years old when appointed Professor of Classics in 1870, while the youngest, Duncan Macgregor (1843-1906), was only 27 on his appointment as Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy. Joining them on the foundation staff were John Shand (1834-1914), Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, and James Gow Black (1835-1914), Professor of Natural Science.

Sale, a Cambridge graduate, had already spent some years in New Zealand. He migrated in 1860, partly for health reasons, but probably also to escape the conventions of the life of an English gentleman. He worked on a Canterbury sheep run, was first editor of the Christchurch Press, joined the Otago goldrush as a miner, and then returned to Canterbury to become Provincial Treasurer; he later held various official posts on the West Coast goldfields. The illness of his father, a master at Rugby School, prompted his return to England in 1869; there he was selected over 61 other applicants for the Otago chair of classics.

Sale’s three professorial colleagues were all Scots of humble backgrounds whose academic ability had served them well; all had more conventional CVs than the colourful Sale. Black came from a poor Perthshire crofting family and started teaching at 14 years of age; he eventually obtained three degrees from the University of Edinburgh, including in 1869 a doctorate, an unusual and elite qualification in those days. Shand hailed from Morayshire, where his father was a farm steward. Capable in many fields, he excelled particularly at mathematics and obtained a master’s degree from the University of Aberdeen. After that he taught in various Scottish academies and also in the military mathematics department of the Royal Academy in Gosport, England. Macgregor was a mason’s son and another Aberdeen graduate; like Black he came from Perthshire. After completing his MA at Aberdeen, where he excelled in mental and moral philosophy, he graduated in medicine from the University of Edinburgh in 1870.

Fortunately all four men had broad academic interests, because they had to teach a variety of subjects in Otago’s early years. Sale was responsible for teaching English as well as Latin and Greek until the appointment of the first Professor of English, John Mainwaring Brown, in 1880. Shand taught both mathematics and physics (then termed natural philosophy) until 1886, when he was appointed to a newly-created chair of natural philosophy and Frederick Gibbons became Professor of Mathematics. As Professor of Natural Science, Black was responsible for teaching both chemistry and geology until 1874, when Frederick Hutton, newly appointed Provincial Geologist, became lecturer in geology and zoology, allowing Black to concentrate on chemistry. Macgregor’s subject, mental and moral philosophy (sometimes known as mental science) incorporated both philosophy and psychology.

Macgregor left the University of Otago to become national Inspector of Lunatic Asylums, Hospitals and Charitable Institutions in 1886. His Otago career of 15 years may seem long, but it paled next to those of his early colleagues. Sale retired in 1908, Black in 1911, and Shand was eventually forced to leave due to failing eyesight in 1913 after 42 years as an Otago professor. These four remarkable men not only shaped New Zealand’s first university, but also played an active part in the local community and were well-known citizens of Dunedin.

What did the students make of these men? Reminscences written by early students for the university’s jubilee help bring the professors to life. David Renfrew White, who later became Otago’s first Professor of Education, recalled that Macgregor was unconventional, had “no professorial airs or restraint,” and was much loved by his students. His lectures were very interesting and challenging: “there was no drudgery and wearisomeness about this class; the hour was all too short.” He once lit a cigar while supervising a written exam, and “one at least of the students thought that if he, too, were allowed to smoke he would do a better examination paper.”

Shand was “patient with the dullest student, and of a quiet, philosophic temperament. He looked with clear common-sense on men and things,” commented White. Violet Greig, another early student, remembered Shand’s “radiant smile and glorious white hair … I can see him now looking over his spectacles as he stands with that metre rule in his hand waiting for the students to assemble, and I can hear him now dictating our ‘expiriments for tu-marra’ …” The kindly Shand was a “born teacher,” commented Thomas Pearce: “who will ever forget his blackboard performances, his cancellations and eliminations and reductions from complexity to simplicity.”

Black was energetic and genial and “always doing kindnesses to someone” remembered Greig; he was a popular president of the university’s football association. His classes could be exciting and sometimes literally explosive. Greig could “still hear the thud of the rock sulphur on that table as the doctor held it high and threw it noisily down to impress upon his students that it was one form of sulphur.” Pearce  commented on his “ebullient nature” and original turn of phrase; “students flocked to his classes not to learn chemistry, but to feel the magic force of his originality.”

Sale was a highly respected scholar who was “a splendid guide” to anybody with an interest in classics, recalled 1890s student John Callan. Unfortunately many Otago students did not have an interest in, or gift for, Latin, which was a compulsory subject: “our knowledge of classics must have been a source of continual torture to the professor,” wrote John O’Shea. Callan commented that, if Sale struggled to teach adequate Latin to “the rest of us, he at least kept us in order, partly by his gift of crushing sarcasm, but more just by being what he was, a silent, massive man, full of unutterable possibilities.” He was a keen athlete, who preceded Black as president of that all-important football association.

1890s student John O’Shea sums it all up well. “I have heard it said by older students that when Sale, Shand, Black, and Macgregor taught the University the students felt that they were led by giants. I knew the first three in their later days, and I can believe the statement.”

 

50 years of psychology

Tags

1880s, 1960s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, mental science, philosophy, psychology, technology

The Department of Psychology neuroscience lab in the 1980s. From the University of Otago Handbook for Intending Students – Science & Surveying, 1989.

One of the university’s significant milestones this year is the 50th anniversary of one of its largest departments, psychology. In 1964 Stephen Griew arrived from Bristol to become Otago’s first Professor of Psychology and in the following year, assisted by two lecturers, began teaching papers which would enable students to major in psychology for a BSc or BA degree and go on to postgraduate study.

Psychology had been taught at Otago for many years prior to the foundation of the department, but it was part of the philosophy programme. The roots of the discipline are reflected in one of its early names, experimental philosophy. At Otago it formed part of the subject known as mental science, or mental and moral philosophy. In 1882 the course in mental science covered three areas: psychology, ethics and logic. The psychology lectures examined “Outlines of the physiology of the nervous system; Instinct; the senses and the intellect; Abstraction, with outlines of the Realistic Controversy; Perception, with outlines of the chief ancient and modern theories.” Though courses in psychology expanded over the years, they remained part of the philosophy programme and it wasn’t possible to study psychology at an advanced level without majoring in philosophy. Students completing a science degree could complete a psychology paper without also studying philosophy, but had to do more laboratory work than arts majors, and had no options for more advanced study.

The introduction of the full degree programme for psychology in the 1960s reflected a growing demand for this field of study and about 90 students completed the first-year course – described in the calendar as “a synoptic introduction to the experimental study of behaviour” – in 1965. Otago was certainly not ahead of the times: Victoria, Canterbury and Auckland universities had all separated their philosophy and psychology departments in the 1950s. The department’s first PhD graduate, in 1968, was Michael Davison, who came to Otago from Bristol to study with Griew; he went on to a distinguished career at the University of Auckland. Another early PhD graduate was Geoff White, who had been one of those pioneering first-year students in 1965. After some years teaching at Victoria University of Wellington, he returned to Otago in 1985, becoming professor and head of department in 1988; his success in developing the research culture of the department resulted in his later appointment as the university’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research). His successor as DVC was another professor from the department, Harlene Hayne, who is now Otago’s Vice-Chancellor. The department takes pride in its ranking as New Zealand’s top academic unit for research, across all disciplines, achieved in the 2012 Performance-Based Research Fund assessment.

In 1986 the department set up a new first-year laboratory course using a new microcomputer network, developed using the staff’s DIY skills. This proved very popular and some of the experiments are still used in courses nearly thirty years later. By the mid-1990s there were over 1000 first-year students; fortunately there were also numerous PhD students who could serve as demonstrators. The rapidly growing department put a strain on resources, especially buildings. For many years it was scattered around various old houses and prefabs, and parts of the department are still there today. The Goddard Laboratories were purpose-built in 1989 to cater for the growing undergraduate classes. They are named after Professor Graham Goddard, the head of department who tragically drowned in a flash flood while tramping in 1987. In 2000 another new building meant the animal laboratories finally had adequate housing, rather than a leaky Nissen Hut. The William James Building, opened in 2012, provided a large purpose-built space with facilities for teaching, research and staff offices.

Do you have any memories to share from the early years of the Department of Psychology? Do you recall performing experiments using the 1980s computer network, or in the neuroscience lab (pictured above)?

Anyone for mental science?

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1910s, jubilee, Knox, mental science, philosophy, psychology, St Margaret's, war

Professor Dunlop and mental science students in 1919. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, Album 89, S13-215b.

In 1919, as part of its jubilee celebrations, the university commissioned Charles Armstrong to photograph its buildings and people. This image comes from the wonderful album which resulted, now among the treasures held at the Hocken Collections. It features Professor Francis Dunlop and the mental science students. I can’t help thinking there should be another person in the front row – did somebody develop stage fright and run away at the last moment, perhaps?

Mental science (sometimes known as mental and moral philosophy) was a significant part of the university’s offerings for many decades. It combined two fields of study we now think of as distinctly different: philosophy and psychology. In 1919 the mental science course for beginning students included psychology and either ethics or logic (deductive and inductive). The advanced class included logic (“mainly viewed as the methodology of scientific enquiry”), psychology, and ethics (“in its full extent, treated both theoretically and historically”). There was also an honours class in the history of philosophy. Eventually psychology emerged from the shadow of philosophy and the arts faculty to become an independent department within the science faculty in 1964.

Dunlop, himself an Otago graduate, was Professor of Mental Science from 1913 until his death in 1931. Like his predecessor in the chair he was a Presbyterian minister; he completed his doctorate in Germany under Rudolf Eucken, a proponent of Lebensphilosophie, a form of idealism. Dunlop was famous for his enormous book collection and his steam-powered car.

An interesting feature of the class photograph is that several of the men are wearing prominent Returned Soldiers’ Association badges. There was a big jump in Otago student numbers in 1919 as men returned to, or began, their studies after the war. One of the returned servicemen in the class (second row from back, on the far right) is Hubert Ryburn. Ryburn returned to his Otago studies after serving in France, eventually completing a master’s degree in mathematics. He then went to Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship, finished off his training in theology in New York and returned to New Zealand as a Presbyterian minister. In 1931, while minister of St Andrew’s Church, Dunedin, he married Jocelyn Dunlop, the daughter of his former mental science professor. From 1941 to 1963 Hubert Ryburn was Master of Knox College, where he was renowned for being “firm but fair”. After his retirement he moved to St Margaret’s College, where Jocelyn Ryburn was Warden until 1974. She was a stalwart of many organisations and served as president of one of New Zealand’s most influential bodies, the Plunket Society. Hubert Ryburn’s most significant contribution to the University of Otago came through the University Council, which he sat on from 1946. From 1955 to 1970 he was the highly capable Chancellor of his alma mater.

Do you recognise any other students in this photograph? If so, please get in touch!