The childcare revolution

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1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2010s, childcare, women

The crèche in its original premises in the old All Saints Church Hall. The notes on the back of this photo are difficult to decipher. The voluntary helpers are identified as Vivienne Moss (although that name is crossed out) and Jenny Heath. The child facing the camera at the centre is Rebecca, with Rachael nearest the camera. Please get in touch if you can confirm any names! Photo courtesy of the Otago University Childcare Association.

There is one organisation affiliated to the university which, although unknown to some students and staff, has had a big impact on the institution since it began nearly 50 years ago: the Otago University Childcare Association (OUCA). During the university’s first century there were few women academics, even fewer married women academics and scarcely any with young children. Microbiologists Margaret and John Loutit arrived at Otago from Australia in 1956; Margaret obtained part-time work as a botany demonstrator and then microbiology lecturer while working on a PhD. As a working mother she encountered considerable criticism. Her salary was mostly absorbed in paying for private childcare, but her hard work was rewarded with the completion of her PhD in 1966; she then became a full-time academic and eventually a professor. For many others, motherhood spelled the end of any academic career, while most students abandoned degrees when they gave birth. In the 1960s and 1970s, when many New Zealanders married young and, whether married or not, also had children young, that meant a lot of ‘academic wastage’.

Improving childcare provision helped the next generation of women. Several younger staff wives instigated the university’s first crèche, designed to provide part-time childcare for students. Since the university was unwilling to provide childcare, the founders set it up as a community venture; the vicar of All Saints Anglican Church offered the use of the old church hall. They invited women students to a meeting late in 1968 and ‘it was evident from the animated discussion that a nursery would fulfil a need’. The University Nursery Association – later renamed the Childcare Association – was a parent cooperative, with Jean Dodd as first president; she was a lecturer’s wife who previously set up a playcentre in Leith Valley. The nursery/crèche (both names were used at various times) opened in 1969 with kindergarten teacher Barbara Horn and Karitane nurse Ann Leary as its first supervisors; parents provided assistance according to a roster.

Outdoor play and learning in the 1990s. Photo courtesy of the Otago University Childcare Association

The new affordable and convenient crèche, together with new access to contraception, made a big difference to women, comments one student of that era, Rosemarie Smith: ‘gaining control over fertility and creating childcare revolutionised women’s access to education – and also to employment in the university’. She ‘graduated in 1971 with a BA and a baby thanks to that crèche’, and worked on the general staff for a couple of years. There was some resistance to the crèche. Most people in positions of authority in the university – generally men – saw no need for it, but there was also resistance from women uneasy about working mothers. There was, however, a demand for childcare and the association grew quickly, from 39 paying members in 1969 to 83 in 1971. That year it moved into the Cumberland Suite (an old house) of the University Union and in 1973 into a house at 525 Great King Street. That was provided by the university as temporary accommodation, since it intended to demolish the building to make way for a carpark. Instead it became a long-term home for the association, which expanded into two adjoining houses in the 1980s.

Childcare became more respectable as increasing numbers of middle-class married women joined the workforce. OUCA helped overcome some resistance in its early years by insisting it was a part-time service, but from 1980 it offered full day care. The service was increasingly used by staff, although students retained priority. In 1994 there were 138 families using university childcare; 71 were staff and 55 were students. It remained affiliated to, rather than owned by, the university, although the university provided its buildings – including splendid new Castle Street premises in 2014 – and small grants from the university and students’ association covered a small portion of its expenses. Unsurprisingly, given its clientele, OUCA attracted highly capable people to its management committee. Among the parents who served were some who subsequently held senior posts in the university, including future vice-chancellor Harlene Hayne; she was succeeded as president by historian Barbara Brookes, who suggests it ‘was perhaps the most important committee in the university in terms of the connections we made’. Brookes, her husband (also an academic) and children all made, through childcare, ‘deep friendships that nourish us today’.

Behind the facades of several villas in Castle Street, across the road from Selwyn College, Te Pā opened in 2014 as new premises for the Otago University Childcare Association. It incorporated four childcare centres, including a new bilingual centre, Te Pārekereke o Te Kī. The association also continued to run a centre at the College of Education. Graham Warman photographs, courtesy of University of Otago Marketing and Communications.

Admitting women

Tags

1870s, teaching, women

At the centre of this charming 1890s photograph of the Wanganui Girls’ College staff is the principal, Isobel Fraser, pouring the tea. She began studying at the University of Otago in 1879 and graduated BA and MA. Image courtesy of the Ian Matheson City Archives, Palmerston North, Public Photograph Collection Scs 52.

 

Learmonth Dalrymple, who led the campaign for the admission of women to the University of Otago. Image courtesy of Toitū Otago Settlers Museum, F761 (permission of Toitū Otago Settlers Museum must be obtained before any re-use of this image).

No women featured among the founding students (whose story appeared in last month’s post), but their absence did not last long. In August 1871, in response to a petition from 149 women, the university council agreed unanimously to admit women to all classes. This was welcome news to Learmonth Dalrymple, who had worked for years to improve educational opportunities for New Zealand women and girls. Dalrymple arrived in Otago with her family in 1853, carrying ‘an abiding resentment against the conventional and limited education for Scottish girls which she had suffered in the 1830s and 1840s’. In a quiet but determined fashion she led a long campaign against considerable opposition to have the provincial government establish the first public high school for girls in the southern hemisphere. With the Otago Girls’ High School opened in 1871, she and her supporters turned their attention to the fledgling university. They had good support on the council, especially from John Richardson, the chancellor. The council was not willing, however, to go as far as offering degrees to women; as Richardson explained, they would instead be admitted ‘to competition for Certificates which will be equivalent to degrees’. Such restrictions were in line with those in the few other universities in the British empire which admitted women. The most notorious examples were Oxford, which did not grant degrees to women until 1920, and Cambridge, which followed suit in 1948. In practice, Otago’s ban on degrees for women had no impact. By the time the first woman completed the necessary requirements all degrees were awarded through the University of New Zealand, which had no such ban. That university tacitly admitted the eligibility of women in 1874, when it accepted Auckland woman Kate Edger’s application for a scholarship; historian Jim Gardner notes that an institution desperate for enrolments could not afford to ‘turn away degree students in skirts’. Edger became New Zealand’s first woman graduate in 1877.

Mary Montgomery began studying at the University of Otago in 1877. She left to become headmistress of New Plymouth Girls’ High School in 1887. She continued her teaching career in other North Island schools following her marriage to Charles Baker-Gabb, and later completed her BA through Victoria College (Wellington). Image courtesy of New Plymouth Girls’ High School.

Although no women enrolled at Otago in 1871, at least four, and possibly several more, applied for admission in 1872. That was an impressive tally for a roll of just 70 students; it compared favourably with British universities, where a few women attended classes, though not yet on an equal basis with men. The most enlightened – University College, London – counted six women among its 1100 students in 1872. One of the first women at Otago was Anna Barton, who appeared on the list of students successfully completing part of the chemistry course in 1872. Probably attending with her was her mother, Jane Crichton Barton; founding student Alexander Williamson recalled attending classics classes with the Bartons and both women featured on the lists of successful chemistry students in 1873. The Bartons were women with sufficient determination, time and money to commit to a higher education. Jane, the daughter of a Scottish clergyman, was married to prominent Dunedin lawyer George Barton, who later became a judge. Their son Edward attended the university alongside their daughter Anna; he became a leading engineer in Australia, while her later life remains obscure. Another likely brother and sister pair among the early students were John and Miss M. Langmuir; she was probably Margaret, the daughter of Caversham market gardener and nurseryman John Langmuir (senior). Both Langmuirs passed the chemistry exams in 1873, while an unspecified Langmuir also succeeded in English and senior Latin in 1872.

Caroline Freeman, Otago’s first woman graduate. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, S13-186a.

Like their male counterparts, most of the early women students did not complete degrees. The first to do so, Caroline Freeman, first appeared in the lists of exam passes in 1875, when she topped the class in psychology and logic and also obtained a first-class pass in junior German. She did not, however, graduate BA until 1885. That was because she continued to work full-time, teaching during the day and attending university classes in the evening. It was not an uncommon pattern, but Freeman demonstrated more determination than most, for several years walking the 11 km home to Green Island after a full day’s work followed by lectures. She later moved into Dunedin and supported herself through tutoring and as a teacher at the girls’ high school. She had no higher schooling herself, following the same path as the many early students who had become pupil teachers as soon as they finished elementary schooling. After graduating Caroline Freeman established private schools for girls in Dunedin and Christchurch.

Ada Mary Fitchett, an Otago student in 1879, went to Melbourne in 1883 to teach at a the new Methodist Ladies’ College, founded by her uncle. She was lady superintendent of MLC from 1896 to 1921. Photograph courtesy of State Library of Victoria, Katherine Shaw Cole collection, H2014.11386.

Although it took over a decade for Otago to produce its first woman graduate, others quickly followed and by 1900 there were 58. As Dorothy Page notes in a study of these women, from 1886 ‘a steady and increasing trickle moved on from the girls’ high school to the university’, with at least 36 of the graduates former pupils of that school. Others came from the girls’ high schools in Southland (opened in 1879) and Waitaki (opened 1887), while a couple hailed from girls’ schools in Timaru and Whanganui. Many of the graduates went on to teaching careers themselves, providing role models and encouragement to future generations of potential women graduates.

There are few student records for the first decade – the names in the list below come from newspaper reports of exam passes. If you know of any other women who studied at Otago during the 1870s, please get in touch!

 

 

 

 

 

University of Otago women students of the 1870s – an incomplete list

• Alexander, Helen
• Barton, Anna
• Barton, Jane Crichton (nee Campbell)
• Begg, Miss
• Brown, Mary Maxwell
• Fitchett, Ada Mary
• Fraser, Isabel
• Freeman, Caroline
• Gillies, Isabella
• Graham(e), Mary G.
• Haig, Catherine
• Langmuir, Miss M.
• Mollison, Jessie
• Montgomery, Mary

 

Since this is the last blog post for 2016, I’d like to acknowledge everybody who has supported the project this year, whether by assisting my research, supplying photographs, promoting the blog, or just reading the posts – many thanks! All feedback is much appreciated. And I’m still trying to identify many of the mystery photographs – if you haven’t done so yet, please take a look and see if you can help! I’ll be back in February with more stories from the University of Otago’s fascinating past …

Three more colleges

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1900s, 1910s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, Knox, Salmond, St Margaret's, theology, women

The first stage of Knox College under construction, c.1908. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, Universal Post Card Co., G. Campbell series, Box-308-006, S16-548b.

The Anglicans – a minority group in colonial Otago – were the first to establish a residential college at the university, as I outlined in a recent post. The much larger Presbyterian community was slower to get started, but once it did, it went one better, opening a college for men in 1909 (Knox) and another for women in 1911 (St Margaret’s). As the university grew, the Presbyterians also added a third college – Salmond – in 1971. As had been the case with Selwyn, it was the needs of theology students that helped get these colleges started, though they were open to other students from the beginning.

The campaign to open a Presbyterian residential college was started and led by popular Presbyterian minister Andrew Cameron. Cameron, one of Otago’s early graduates, was on the university council (he later served as chancellor) and convened the church’s committee on theological training. The church had started training its own ministers locally in the 1870s. Classes took place at the theology professor’s home in Leith Street (where St Margaret’s now stands), but between the professor’s large family, the library and a growing student body the space quickly grew cramped. Cameron was keen to establish a college which would provide a better space for theology training, together with residential accommodation for its students and those of the university. He identified a good site in Opoho – the land already belonged to the Presbyterian Church – and in 1902 set about a major fundraising campaign. The campaign started well with a large donation from one of New Zealand’s wealthiest men, John Ross, of the large importing and manufacturing firm Ross and Glendining. Other donations trickled in, and in 1908 the foundation stone of a grand and imposing building was laid. The first 40 residents moved into Knox College – named after the Scottish theological reformer – in 1909. Nineteen of them were students at the theological hall and the remainder were university students (9 of those completing the undergraduate university degree necessary before they could start theological training). With new wings and alterations, by 1914 the college had expanded to house 94 residents.

The Knox farce was a regular feature of capping concerts for many years. The cast of the 1946 farce, ‘Cameo and Mabelette’, included Ratu Kamisese Mara, future Prime Minister of Fiji (the tall figure, standing at centre). Image courtesy of Michael Shackleton.

The original St Margaret’s College in 1911. The building had previously housed the Presbyterian theology professor. Image from the Otago Witness, 19 April 1911, courtesy of the Hocken Collections, S10-133a.

Other than the master’s family and the domestic staff, all of the Knox residents were men: the idea that male and female students might live in the same college was well outside the norms of the era. But women coming to study at the university or teachers’ college in Dunedin also needed somewhere to live, especially as landladies often preferred male to female boarders (because men often spent more time out of the house, and also required fewer laundry facilities). In 1909 a Women Student’s Hostel Committee was formed by church people interested in establishing a women’s college. After various political complications, they managed to secure the lease of the building vacated by the theological college when Knox opened. It was a rundown building but the site, right next to the university, was ideal. After a few hurried repairs, early in 1911 the first residents moved into St Margaret’s College, which was named after a highly devout medieval Queen of Scotland. By the end of the year the new college had 15 residents, made up of 12 training college and 3 university students. It was a small beginning, but the college council had big plans; unfortunately it did not have any money. After several years of fundraising, in 1914 construction commenced on a new brick building, and at the end of 1917 it was complete, with room for 70 residents. Life in St Margaret’s was strictly controlled, but the women established a happy community at a time when they were not welcomed by all parts of the university. Almost a third of Otago students were women in the 1910s (even more in the war years), and as St Margaret’s historian Susannah Grant points out, the college ‘stood on the hill as a visible symbol of women’s increasing participation in higher education’. It also served as a focal point and meeting place for all women students.

St Margaret’s College residents and staff in 1924. Image courtesy of Hocken Collections, St Margaret’s College records, AG-157-N2, S10-532a.

Knox and St Margaret’s grew through the decades, especially during the 1960s, when both added new wings. By the end of that decade Knox provided a home for 155 residents and St Margaret’s for 170. There was no shortage of demand for student accommodation, with the university roll doubling between 1960 and 1970. That was one of the motives behind a 1960s scheme to build another women’s residential college in the grounds of Knox College. The initial spur for the new project was, however, the needs of women training for church vocations. Since 1903 women training as Presbyterian deaconesses had lived together as a small community, but some of their leaders felt they would benefit from living alongside other students, just as men training for the ministry did at Knox College. After all, the women already shared some classes with men at the theological hall. In 1963 the Presbyterian Church approved the scheme for a new residence, which would cater for women training as deaconesses as well as other women students of all denominations and all faculties. The idea that Presbyterian women should be granted the same privileges as men gained further impetus the following year, when the church approved the ordination of women as clergy. Nobody yet considered the more radical possibility that men and women might actually live together in one college.

A fundraising appeal got underway in 1965; generous government subsidies for the building of student accommodation meant the church only needed to raise part of the expense. There were considerable delays, with the government deferring its contribution due to financial difficulties and tightening controls on the building industry, but construction finally started late in 1969. In 1971 the first intake of 140 women moved in; three were students for the Presbyterian ministry, with the rest at the university or teachers’ college. Salmond Hall (known as Salmond College from 2006) was named for a prominent local Presbyterian family, in particular Mary Salmond, a former principal of the deaconess college, and her brother James Salmond, a minister and leader of Christian education. The first warden, Keren Fulton, combined experience and good Presbyterian credentials; she had run the YWCA hostel, Kinnaird House, and was a Presbyterian deacon.

The newly-built Salmond Hall, c.1971. Image courtesy of Hocken Collections, Salmond Anderson Architects records, MS-3821/2000, S16-548a.

Salmond quickly developed a life of its own. Though it shared a few facilities, such as tennis courts, with its older neighbour up the hill, and they held a few combined social events, Salmond and Knox maintained distinct identities and cultures. They were, however, governed by the same council. Once Salmond was up and running that council turned its attention to the needs of another growing group of students for the ministry: those who were married, often with children. In 1976 it opened a new complex of flats in the Knox grounds, named Somerville Court in honour of Knox master and university chancellor Jack Somerville. They included flats designed for families alongside others which catered for the growing demand for flats from groups of single students. As private flat provision grew, there was less call for these flats, so they were absorbed into Knox College. Together with other additions and alterations, this expanded Knox to cater for 215 residents; St Margaret’s now accommodates 224 residents and Salmond 238.

An aerial view of Knox College in 2008. The Somerville Court flats are to the left of the main building, and the Presbyterian theological hall (now the Knox Centre for Ministry and Leadership) and library at the rear. Image courtesy of University of Otago Marketing and Communications.

Knox, St Margaret’s and Salmond are now formally affiliated to the University of Otago, but continue to be owned and managed by the Presbyterian Church. Despite their religious background, they have always been open to students of any faith (or none). I suspect, though, that some of the Presbyterian founders might be a little surprised to know that the college they established for young ladies in 1911 has had a Catholic priest (Peter Norris) as warden since 1989! They might also be surprised to discover that the colleges, like all at Otago, accommodate both men and women. Salmond did not remain a solely female domain for long, admitting a few men from 1975, while St Margaret’s admitted men for the first time in 1981. Knox admitted its first woman as a senior resident in 1982, meaning it narrowly escaped becoming the last single sex college at Otago; both Knox and Selwyn provided a home for undergraduate women from 1982.

St Margaret’s College, 2012. Image courtesy of University of Otago Marketing and Communications.

With over 600 residents each year, the Presbyterian colleges make a big contribution to the university (and in Salmond’s case, also to the Otago Polytechnic). Do you have any stories to share of their past? I’m especially interested in hearing memories of Salmond, since it doesn’t have the benefit of a published history, like Knox and St Margaret’s!

Salmond College in 2009. Image courtesy of University of Otago Marketing and Communications.

Scientific women

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1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, botany, chemistry, home science, marine science, microbiology, physics, psychology, women, zoology

Winifred Betts, Otago’s first specialist botany lecturer. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, Botany Department archives,  r.6461, S14-586a.

There’s been a fair bit of discussion recently about sexism in science. This has inspired me to write about some of the women academics who led the way for women in the sciences at Otago. Their path was not always easy, and for many decades the university was more willing to employ gifted women than to promote them, but they made important contributions to teaching and research and deserve better attention. Some have already appeared on this blog: marine biologist Betty Batham here; and Muriel Bell, Elizabeth Gregory and Marion Robinson all feature on this post about nutrition research. Today’s story, therefore, concentrates on some of Otago’s other women scientists.

Winifred (Winnie) Betts was Otago’s first botany lecturer, though it is telling that botany officially dated its beginning as an independent department from 1924, when her male successor, John Holloway, commenced as lecturer. Botany classes were taught from the university’s early years by the professor of natural science, later the professor of biology, but these men specialised in zoology rather than botany, and it was irksome having to teach both subjects to the growing student body. Recent zoology honours graduate Winifred Farnie was assistant lecturer in biology in 1917 and 1918, but in 1919, after some years of trying, biology professor William Benham managed to persuade the university council that it was time that botany had its own lecturer. Winnie Betts was just 25 years old when she commenced this new position at the beginning of 1920. Born in Moteuka, she was educated at Nelson College for Girls and the University of Otago, graduating BSc in 1916 and MSc in 1917. She then received a National Research Scholarship – one was awarded at each university each year. This provided her with an income of £100 a year along with lab expenses so she could carry out independent research. In 1919, at a lecture to an admittedly partisan audience in Nelson, distinguished botanist Leonard Cockayne described Betts as ‘the most brilliant woman scientist in New Zealand’. In December 1920 Winnie Betts married another brilliant Otago graduate, the mathematician Alexander Aitken. Aitken, whose studies were interrupted by war service (he was badly wounded at the Somme), was by then teaching at Otago Boys’ High School. This was an era when most women left paid employment when they married, so it is intriguing that Winnie Aitken continued working as botany lecturer for some years. That came to an end in December 1923, when the Aitkens moved to Scotland to further Alexander’s academic career (he eventually became professor of mathematics at the University of Edinburgh).

Several other women were appointed to the biological sciences between the wars; all had started out at Otago as outstanding students. Marion Fyfe became a zoology lecturer in 1921 and when Beryl Brewin joined her in 1936 women thereby accounted for two-thirds of the zoology academic staff! They remained to teach generations of Otago students: Fyfe retired in 1957 and ‘live wire’ Brewin in 1963. Both were by then senior lecturers and Fyfe, described as ‘the backbone’ of the zoology department, had acted as its head on some occasions. Ella Campbell became assistant lecturer in botany in 1937, leaving to become the first woman academic at Massey University in 1945. An expert on liverworts, she was made a Dame in 1997 for her contribution as ‘a pioneer in the field of university botanic research’. When Campbell left, Brenda Slade (later Brenda Shore) became assistant lecturer in botany; she had just finished a BSc in the department. She later took leave to complete a PhD at Cambridge in her specialist field of leaf development, then returned to Otago, eventually retiring as associate professor in 1982. Two other biology students of that generation returned to Otago after overseas study and research. One was the aforementioned Betty Batham, who returned with a Cambridge PhD in 1950 to become first director of the Portobello Marine Biology Station, newly taken over by the university. Another was Ann Wylie, recruited back to Otago’s botany department in 1961 to take responsibility for teaching in the rapidly-developing field of cytology and genetics. Like her colleague Brenda Shore, with whom she had first taught in the botany department in 1945 when lecturer John Holloway became ill, Wylie eventually rose to the status of associate professor, retiring in 1987. I have had the pleasure of interviewing Ann Wylie, who is still active and sharp-witted in her nineties. She recalls that women were well accepted in zoology and botany and she did not experience prejudice, though she also notes that women lecturers behaved as ‘honorary men’; it was they who had to adapt rather than the men. There was a strong sense of collegiality between women academics from various departments and they often socialised together.

Agnes Blackie, photographed around the 1960s, at the end of her long career as a physics lecturer. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, c/nE5302/11A, S16-521e.

The physical sciences weren’t so welcoming of women staff in this period. The school of mines and departments of geology, mathematics and chemistry remained resolutely male until later in the twentieth century. Indeed, the only woman academic in the physical sciences at Otago for many decades was Agnes Blackie in physics. She was appointed assistant lecturer in the department in 1919, eventually retiring as senior lecturer in 1958, though she continued teaching part-time for some years after that. The petite Blackie, who fell in love with physics as an Otago undergraduate, stood out in this largely male domain. Long-serving physics technician Stan Hughes, who started in the mid-1920s, recalled: ‘In the distance I saw this schoolgirl who later turned out to be Miss Agnes Blackie …. Agnes was very quiet with very thin features and my first impression was that a couple of mutton pies would do her the world of good’. In her early years, working with students sometimes older than herself (including returned servicemen), she had to endure considerable teasing, but was a gifted teacher who earned the affection and respect of generations of students, especially those who struggled with physics. She taught a range of students in addition to those specialising in physics, such as physiotherapy students learning about electricity and radiation, music students studying acoustics and home science students learning about household electricity and appliances, energy and calories, ventilation and humidity. Many a future doctor or dentist only made it through their compulsory physics course thanks to Blackie’s helpful teaching.

Not all of Otago’s pioneering women scientists were home-grown. Englishwomen Winifred Boys-Smith and Helen Rawson were the founding staff of the new home science school, whose courses commenced in 1911. Both had completed the natural science tripos at Cambridge but were unable to obtain degrees because they were women. Boys-Smith was Otago’s – and New Zealand’s – first female professor and Rawson succeeded her in the chair of home science. Otago chemistry professor James Black, by then in his seventies, had his doubts about these women’s scientific abilities. The first two home science degree students later recalled that when they progressed ‘from Professor Black’s Chemistry to take Applied Chemistry under Miss Rawson, they were informed in no indefinite words as to his grave doubts of Miss Rawson’s knowledge of things chemical. “A fine lassie, but is she sound on the soda-ammonia process? I’ll put it down on paper for her,” said the dear old man’. Rawson’s ‘brilliant career’ at Cambridge and London evidently counted for nothing to him. Home science did, to some extent, segregate capable women from the ‘pure’ science courses, but it also offered them opportunities. The degree students took advanced courses in chemistry, and many went on to become school teachers in the pure sciences as well as home economics. Some became highly-regarded researchers and academics, either overseas (Neige Todhunter is a good example) or in New Zealand (such as Elizabeth Gregory and Marion Robinson, mentioned above).

Helen Thomson (centre back) teaching a laboratory class on the chemistry of the household at the School of Home Science in 1936. Thomson was one of numerous women who made an academic career in science through the school. After completing undergraduate and master’s degrees there, she was appointed lecturer in 1931 and remained on staff for 30 years, taking leave for overseas research. She graduated with a PhD in textile chemistry from Leeds University in 1947. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, Consumer and Applied Science records, 97-081/4, S16-521a.

Another English import was Betty Bernardelli, who arrived at Otago in 1948 and took charge of the psychology laboratory (then part of the philosophy department). She had qualifications from Oxford and Cambridge, and had been officer in charge of psychological testing in the vocational advice service of the Royal Air Force during the war. She came to New Zealand with her husband Harro Bernadelli, who became lecturer in the economics department; in 1961 they left Otago for posts at the University of Auckland. The appointment of Bernardelli, a married woman, represented progress; an earlier generation of women academics had been single on appointment and mostly resigned if they married (a notable Otago example was home science professor Helen Rawson, whose academic career ended on her marriage to geology professor Noel Benson in 1923). It would be many years, however, before most people welcomed the advent of married women on the academic staff. Margaret Loutit came from Australia to Otago in 1956, when her husband John Loutit was appointed lecturer in the microbiology department. Already armed with an MSc, she obtained part-time work as a botany demonstrator and then microbiology lecturer while working on a PhD. As the working mother of young children she experienced considerable criticism, often from other women (notably the wives of other academic staff). Her salary was mostly absorbed in paying for private childcare; there were no crèche facilities at that time. However, her hard work was rewarded with the completion of her PhD in 1966 and in the following year she became a full-time staff member. Margaret Loutit was a gifted teacher and productive researcher in soil and water microbiology; she also made important contributions to university administration. She was promoted to a personal chair in 1981. John Loutit had become a professor in 1970, so they had the then rare status of ‘professorial spouses’.

There were other scientific women who held academic posts in the medical school: noted researchers Marianne Bielschowsky and Barbara Heslop, for example. However, there isn’t room to do justice to their achievements here, so I’ll have to save those for another time …

Otago’s pioneering women scientists – some of whom ended their careers not so very long ago – achieved remarkable things in the face of considerable difficulties. In proving the capability of women in the academic world of science they made things a little easier for those who followed and I am delighted to be able to pay tribute to them here. Do you have any stories to share of women in science at Otago?

Lodgings and landladies

Tags

1870s, 1880s, 1890s, 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, accommodation, boarding houses, flatting, lodgings, women

Many homes near the campus took in a lodger or two, and larger buildings might become boarding houses. This detail of Forth Street from a 1925 photograph demonstrates the range of housing close to the university – many of these later became student flats. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, The Press (newspaper) negatives collection, reference 1/1-008298-G.

One of the most important characters in student life during the university’s first century was not a member of the university at all, but that notorious figure, the landlady. Original plans for the current Dunedin campus, occupied by the university from the late 1870s, included residential accommodation for both students and professors. However, due to lack of funds the intended ‘boarding establishment’ was dropped, along with some of the staff accommodation (four houses for professors did go ahead – these are now known as Scott/Shand House and Black/Sale House). Students from out of town had to find their own place to live. Independent flatting was unheard of in the university’s first 50 years, and even after the churches set up residential colleges (Selwyn in 1893, Knox in 1909 and St Margaret’s in 1911), private boarding appealed to many as a cheaper option. Local newspapers from the late-19^th and early-20^th centuries include numerous ads from students looking for board, plus a smaller number advertising rooms specifically for students.

We know sadly little about the women who provided this essential service. Some local families had one spare room they rented out to help the household coffers, but many landladies were widows or single women who offered several rooms to lodgers, this being their only source of income. If the premises were large enough – some housed around 10 people – this would be termed a boarding house. An 1884 street directory lists several boarding houses close to the campus: Mrs Henderson Morrison and Mrs Eliza Fisher had boarding houses in Albany Street, Mrs Isabella Maffen in Clarendon Street, Mrs Mary Coles in Dundas Street, Mrs Lucy Stuart in Union Street, and Mrs Margaret Maher in Leith Street; Charles Crapp, also in Leith Street, was one of the few male boarding house keepers. Of course, at that early date, when Otago had just 120 students, many of their boarders were working men and women. As the university grew, students became a larger part of the accommodation market and landladies advertised specifically for them. Caledon House was providing accommodation in Albany Street by the mid-1870s; it provided ‘every convenience’, including harmonium and bath, according to one 1881 advertisement. This and earlier ads made no mention of students, but by 1896 it was listed by then-landlady Mrs Johnston as ‘Private Board and Residence; convenient for students; every home comfort; terms moderate’.

The standard of boarding accommodation varied. In 1890 medical students Charles Hector and Bartholomew Wilford, both from Wellington, boarded with Mrs Taylor. In the manner of every generation of concerned parents, Charles’s father was unhappy to discover him ‘hard at work in a cold room – no fire’, when visiting town. Bart Wilford became ill with rheumatic fever shortly afterwards. He and Charles apparently shared a room, and Bart was moved to the sitting room with a nurse to care for him, while Charles was sent by his father, perhaps concerned for the spread of infection, to other lodgings. When Bart developed possible symptoms of typhoid, Hector’s father wrote to his wife: ‘I have told Charlie that he must not go back to Mrs Taylor’s again. The back premises are not what they should be’ (a discreet reference to the toileting arrangements). Sadly, Bart Wilford died soon afterwards of his acute rheumatic disease.

Ads for student lodgers from the Otago University Review, May 1900.

In 1932 the university council established a new board of control with council, staff and student reps; though prompted by disciplinary issues it was concerned for the well-being of students and its sub-committees included one for lodgings. That committee compiled a list of ‘approved’ lodgings and took some responsibility for their conduct and the matching of students with rooms. Long-serving physics lecturer Agnes Blackie chaired the lodgings committee for some years and recalled the procedure. ‘In early December the chairman visited the approved lodgings to find out about probable vacancies. The landladies would almost unanimously declare that nothing on earth would induce them to take students again. A second visit in January would find them cheered up again and willing to re-enter the fray’. Though Blackie was sometimes called on to make peace between landlady and lodgers, she found complaints about student boarders were rare. She developed considerable respect for these women: ‘I came to have a kindly feeling for the landladies; many of them were battle-scarred veterans who had conducted lodgings for many years, terribly over-worked, but very proud of their past students and what they had done in life’. After Blackie’s stint, the administration of the lodgings committee was taken over by a part-time lodgings registrar; this later evolved into the student accommodation office.

Students were not always easy lodgers. In a 1953 publication on residential halls, Harold Turner pointed out that a shortage of good private accommodation was partly students’ own responsibility: ‘The householder whose peace was disturbed at 3 o’clock by lodgers returning from a party, who finds his electric heater left on all night, the bedding burnt by cigarettes, ink splashed on the furnishings, bicycles repaired in the bedroom or his lodger in bed with his boots on, will not be inclined to accept students the following year’. A word of advice appeared in the 1946 Otago University Review: ‘Suppose you get something (wherein at home you would only kennel an ill-favoured cur), then let tact and discretion be your motto. Don’t comment audibly on the odd-looking whiskery old goat in the picture above the mantelpiece – it is probably the relict’s late lamented. Also, take your boots off when you pinch her coal, for be you never so scientific, you cannot explain that keeping the light burning till 2 a.m. makes you an economic proposition at fifty shillings a week’.

Some fortunate lodgers could enjoy ‘all the comforts of home’, but many experienced frustrations with ‘petty restrictions and nagging concerning the use of various facilities’. There was often, noted Turner, ‘inadequacy in the physical conditions, in the lighting, heating, provision for privacy or for quietness for study’. This was, of course, the payback for cheap accommodation. That cheapness was important, because it opened the world of university education to people of humbler means. The working class origins of most landladies also played a role in keeping students from middle class or more privileged backgrounds in touch with the concerns of working people as they dined at their table each day. Most landladies provided regular cooked meals and this was a big convenience for students.

As the number of places in residential colleges grew and flatting became popular, private board began a terminal decline and the landlady became a rare beast. Flats might be just as cold, dark and noisy as a boarding house, but they offered a new level of freedom, which became an increasing priority for young people. Boarding places couldn’t keep up with the growing student roll anyway. There was a ‘diminishing number of old fashioned land ladies’, noted the 1965 accommodation office report, though there was always a response to university appeals to the public to take in boarders. That year 12% of all Otago students were living in private board, down from 17% in 1957; by 1975 the number had plummeted to 3%.

‘Your typical landlady can be classified under two headings – a) Avaricious. b) Maternal’, wrote a 1940s student. Some were eccentric, some irritating, and others much loved. Do you have any stories to share of landladies? I’d love to hear more personal stories about these great characters from Otago’s past!

Among the brightest and the best

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1900s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, anthropology, botany, economics, geology, law, medicine, physics, Rhodes, scholarships, sports, vice-chancellors, women

James Allan Thomson, New Zealand’s first Rhodes Scholar, as he appeared in the Auckland Weekly News, 7 July 1904. Image courtesy of Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, AWNS-19040707-7-2.

The Rhodes Scholarship – one of the most prestigious academic awards in the world – has shaped the lives of some of Otago’s most gifted graduates. The scholarship, which provides for study at Oxford University, has been awarded since 1902 thanks to a generous bequest from Cecil Rhodes. Rhodes, an English clergyman’s son and Oxford alumnus, made his fortune as a mining magnate in southern Africa. He was an ardent promoter of the British Empire and played a large hand in African politics as Prime Minister of Cape Colony in the 1890s. His business ethics and racial views seem highly suspect today, but the purpose of the scholarship he founded – to promote peace and civic leadership by bringing together young people from the British colonies, Germany and the USA to further their education – remains admirable. The scholarships provide tuition and living costs for two or three years of study at Oxford; they are awarded to young people who demonstrate a combination of intellect, moral character, leadership, physical vigour, and an unselfishness which will lead to a commitment to public service.

There have now been 219 Rhodes Scholars from New Zealand. This country was generally allocated one scholarship per year from 1904, with two per year from 1926 until 1993, when the allocation was increased to three. Otago has a proud record of producing 61 of New Zealand’s Rhodes Scholars, and for some years now has been neck-and-neck with the much larger University of Auckland for first place honours. Rhodes Scholars are, by definition, outstanding people. All have interesting stories and it is not possible to recount them all here. Some feature in items produced to celebrate the centenary of the scholarship, including an Otago Magazine article and an exhibition at the University of Otago Library Special Collections.

Otago’s – and New Zealand’s – first Rhodes Scholar was a geologist, Allan Thomson. He taught at Oxford and worked in Australia before returning to New Zealand, where he was a palaeontologist with the Geological Survey before becoming director of the Dominion Museum. He made major contributions to the organisation of science in this country before his life was sadly cut short by tuberculosis (his initial diagnosis prevented him from taking up a position on Robert Falcon Scott’s Terra Nova expedition to Antarctica).

A considerable number of Otago Rhodes Scholars continued their careers beyond these shores. For example, there were several from the 1930s – when there were fewer scholarly opportunities in New Zealand – who became well known: doctor and Olympic champion Jack Lovelock (1931), journalist and war correspondent Geoffrey Cox (1932), Oxford English professor Norman Davis (1934), and writer and publisher Dan Davin (1936). Quite a few, like Davis, continued their academic careers at Oxford and other overseas universities.

Arthur Porritt in 1923, the year he was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, S P Andrew Ltd :Portrait negatives. Ref: 1/1-018584-F.

Other scholars brought their overseas experience back to New Zealand. Where leadership is concerned, the best known is Arthur Porritt (1923).  At Oxford he completed the medical studies begun at Otago and went on to a stellar surgical career in England, becoming president of the Royal College of Surgeons and British Medical Association. He was also a stellar athlete; his bronze-medal win at the 1924 Paris Olympics was represented by the fictional Tom Watson in the film Chariots of Fire. From 1967 to 1972 Porritt returned to New Zealand and served as the first locally-born Governor General.

Sir Arthur and Lady Porritt in vice-regal splendour for the opening of parliament in 1968. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, Further negatives of the Evening Post newspaper. Ref: EP/1968/2679/6A-F.

Some Otago Rhodes Scholars returned to their alma mater and took up significant leadership roles. Hubert Ryburn (1921) was a mathematics scholar and Presbyterian minister; he sat on the University Council from 1946 and served as Chancellor from 1955 to 1970. Otago managed to entice another former Rhodes Scholar, Robert Aitken (1924), back to New Zealand to serve as its first full-time administrative head in 1948. Aitken left his position as Regius Professor of Medicine at the University of Aberdeen to become Otago’s vice-chancellor; he left in 1953 for a position as vice-chancellor at Birmingham. A more recent vice-chancellor, David Skegg, was also a Rhodes Scholar (1972). Skegg, who graduated top of his class at the Otago Medical School, relished the opportunity to study at Oxford with distinguished medical epidemiologist Richard Doll. In 1980, at just 32 years, Skegg returned to Otago as Professor of Preventive and Social Medicine, skilfully leading that department until 2004, when he became a popular vice-chancellor. He left that role in 2011, but continues as a highly respected research professor to this day.

David Skegg outside the Bodleian Library at the time of his graduation with an Oxford D Phil. Image courtesy of David Skegg.

Others also returned to Otago, sometimes briefly, and sometimes to make a career. A couple of recent examples are Jesse Wall (2008), now on the law faculty staff, and bioethicist Tom Douglas (2003), who remains at Oxford but visited last year to foster research links with Otago staff.

Athletes Porritt and Lovelock weren’t the only famous sportsmen on Otago’s Rhodes list, which also features two All Black captains, Chris Laidlaw (1968) and David Kirk (1985). For Kirk, like some others, the scholarship provided an opportunity to branch out from his original field of study. He was a medical graduate, but studied PPE (politics, philosophy, economics) at Oxford, returning to a career in politics, then business, in New Zealand and Australia. For Kirk, Oxford also provided a welcome respite from his celebrity status in New Zealand as Rugby World Cup-winning captain.

Cecil Rhodes’s will limited the scholarship to men. By the 1960s this had become a sore point, and from 1968 to 2000 Rhodes Visiting Fellowships were awarded so women who had already embarked on academic careers could also benefit from time at Oxford. Only 32 of these fellowships were awarded, so it is remarkable that 11 went to New Zealand women, two of them from Otago: archaeologist Helen Leach (1980) and lawyer Mindy Chen-Wishart (1992). In 1977 an Act of Parliament overturned the gender restriction and made the original scholarships open to women. Otago’s first woman Rhodes Scholar was law student Christine French (1981); since then women have accounted for just over half of the Otago recipients. The Rhodes Project, established by one of the first American women Rhodes Scholars to promote public understanding of female achievement, provides information about some of the Rhodes Scholar women and their subsequent careers.

Though Otago’s first Rhodes Scholar was a scientist, the list is dominated by arts, law and medical students; the most recent Otago science student to win a Rhodes was Jane Larkindale (1996), who majored in plant biotechnology and physics and is now a research scientist in the USA. Commerce students are even rarer, though Louis Chambers (2013) was a student of economics as well as law. Talented commerce and science students of today might like to consider this a challenge!

The lives of presidents

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1890s, 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, international students, Maori, sports, women

A gathering of former OUSA presidents at the association’s centenary in 1990. Image courtesy of Hocken Collections, OUSA archives, MS-4225/306, S15-500e.

This year the Otago University Students’ Association celebrates 125 years of existence. To mark the occasion, I thought it would be interesting to look back at 125 years of student presidents. On 20 May 1890 a general meeting of Otago students decided to form an association and at a second meeting on 30 May it was formally established, with William Edward Spencer as the first president. Spencer, a 26-year-old postgraduate science student, was an “able and energetic” president. There was “no man who was more enthusiastic at [the association’s] inception than Mr Spencer,” commented his successor, Alexander Hendry. Like many students of his era, Spencer had a career in teaching. He had already worked as a pupil teacher for some years before starting university study in the mid-1880s and may well have continued to teach while completing his degrees in arts and science. After completing a year as OUSA president he became a school inspector. He later worked in senior positions for the Department of Education in Wellington, including 11 years as editor of the School Journal.

Many “able and energetic” young men and women have followed in Spencer’s footsteps as president, though of course there has been the occasional rogue among them. I’ve heard stories that one 1990s president, who shall remain nameless, could always be detected approaching by the perfume of marijuana. Others have made dubious financial decisions. Most, though, have been upstanding characters in a very demanding role as chair of the association and public spokesperson for Otago students. In some years there was stiff competition for the role, and winning the election required considerable charm, ambition and political nous.

As the photo of presidents gathered for the 1990 centenary suggests, the presidency was pretty much a male Pakeha preserve until the 1980s. There were some notable exceptions, one being the most famous former president, Peter Buck, also known as Te Rangi Hiroa, after whom an Otago residential college is now named. He was OUSA president in 1903 while completing his medical studies. He became a key figure in the Maori renaissance of the early twentieth century, represented Northern Maori in parliament, and was later a distinguished anthropologist. Another trailblazer was 1971 president Ebraima Manneh, the first international student in the role. He led OUSA during a turbulent year of student protest over the university’s discipline regulations. He later became a senior public servant in the Gambia, his home country.

For many years women served on the OUSA as “lady vice-president” – a role popularly abbreviated to “lady vice”. In 2006 the OUSA, which bestowed life membership on its former presidents, extended the privilege to Nola Holmes (nee Ross) as a representative of “all of the women who served OUSA on the executive and in assisting roles since our beginnings whose contributions, before the 1980s, were largely unacknowledged.” Ross, the lady vice-president in 1947, was remembered for holding the association together when the University Council forced president John Child to resign after he made controversial speeches about sexual and religious freedom. Finally, in 1983, Phyllis Comerford served as OUSA’s first female president and she was succeeded by another woman, Robyn Gray. Since they broke the barrier, a third of the presidents have been female. They include the only person to serve two terms in recent times, Harriet Geoghegan, who was president in 2010 and 2011.

Quite a few people served two terms as president in the association’s earlier decades, but only one has served for three years – the gloriously named Philippe Sidney de Quetteville Cabot (best known as Sid). Cabot was president in the mid-1920s; he had previously been president of the Teachers’ College Students’ Association. He was also one of the instigators of the national organisation, the National Union of Students, serving as its founding president. Cabot completed several degrees at Otago and overseas, eventually becoming a clinical psychologist. He was very good at sport, playing a game for the All Blacks in 1921. Other presidents known for their sporting prowess include Colin Gilray (1907 president) and Frank Green (1936) in rugby and Bill Hawksworth (1934) in cricket. 1988 president Jon Doig, the first from the School of Physical Education, became Chief Executive of the Commonwealth Games Council for Scotland.

Unsurprisingly, several presidents continued in politics beyond their student days. Besides Te Rangi Hiroa, the best known is Grant Robertson, OUSA president in 1993, who is now member of parliament for Wellington Central and a highly-ranked member of the Labour caucus. Those who have worked long-term for the association remember him as one of the most capable presidents. A few others from recent decades have directed their political skills towards the public service, with several working for Foreign Affairs and Trade: David Payton (1974 president), Kirsty Graham (1992), Chris Tozer (1996) and Renee Heal (2007). From an earlier generation, Doug Kennedy, 1937 president, renowned for his pranks and radical politics, became Director General of Health for New Zealand. Until the 1960s many presidents were, like Kennedy, medical students (though few of them shared his radical politics). After that medical presidents became rare, and in recent decades law and/or politics students have been prevalent among presidents.

Some presidents went on to mark their mark in the academic world. Alexander “Swotty” Aitken, the 1919 and 1920 president, was a famous mathematician. Others had distinguished academic careers in demography (Mick Borrie, 1938), physics (Jack Dodd, 1946), economics (Frank Holmes, 1947) and medicine (Jack Stallworthy, 1930-1931; Ken North, 1953; Murray Brennan, 1964). Many became well-known doctors or lawyers, and 1968 president Bruce Robertson was a Court of Appeal judge. Some, like 2001 president Ayesha Verrall, are at earlier stages of careers which hold much promise.

Congratulations to OUSA on reaching its 125th anniversary! Do you have any stories to share of former presidents? And I’d love to get in touch with Phyllis Comerford or Ebraima Manneh if you’re out there! (my email is ali.clarke at the university).

2014 OUSA president Ruby Sycamore-Smith was the 12th woman to take on the role. She is pictured during art week. Image courtesy of OUSA.

Otago’s war effort

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1940s, chemistry, clothing, home science, human nutrition, medicine, physics, Studholme, war, women

A tarpaulin lean-to operating theatre of the 6 New Zealand Field Ambulance near Cassino, Italy. Many Otago medical graduates found themselves working in facilities like this during World War II. Photographed by George Robert Bull on 25 April 1944. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, Department of Internal Affairs War History Branch collection, DA-05591-F.

In the midst of all the centenary commemorations of World War I, the 75th anniversary of World War II has been rather overshadowed. As I’ve written here before about the impact of World War I on the University of Otago, I’m marking Anzac Day this year by considering the university’s involvement in the second great conflict of the 20th century.

As had been the case during the ‘Great War’, many Otago staff and students served with the forces during World War II and the conflict had an enormous effect on those people and their families and friends. The exact numbers involved are unclear, but the university annual report for 1942 gives figures for that stage of the war – as of December 1942, 13 members of staff and about 725 students and former students were on active service, and 28 had died. Since the total student roll of the university just before the war was around 1400, this was a very significant contribution. Many other students spent their vacations completing military training. For medical and dental students, this was done through the Otago University Medical Corps. Some students not involved in military training were instead manpowered to carry out essential work on farms during breaks.

Student enrolments dropped off during the first half of the war, hitting a low of 1348 in 1942 before steadily rising again to 1839 in 1945; the end of the war led to a big influx of students in 1946, when the roll reached 2440. Variation was huge between the different faculties. There was a significant wartime drop in the number of arts students, but it was the small commerce and law faculties which fared the worst. Meanwhile, science and home science numbers increased, and those in medicine flourished as the demand for doctors both military and civilian grew. The medical school struggled to resource this student growth and had to introduce restrictions on entry to second-year medical classes for the first time in 1941. One unfortunate result of such restrictions was public resentment towards war refugee doctors (mostly Jews from Germany, Austria, Hungary and Poland) who had been accepted into New Zealand. Some were required to complete further training at the medical school – they were seen to be taking places ahead of New Zealand students. The attitudes of both medical school and university towards these refugees were decidedly mixed.

In 1942 the medical school accounted for 40% of Otago students, a percentage only reached once previously, and that was during World War I. Med students were a traditionally conservative group and their dominance contributed to what OUSA historian Sam Elworthy has described as “the death of political radicalism” on campus during the war. Of course, other wartime influences played their part. Students wanted to demonstrate their loyalty in an environment of public suspicion, where citizens believed healthy young men who continued at university were shirking their patriotic duty. Wartime did offer new leadership opportunities for women, who increased from around 25% of students in the mid-1930s to 40% in 1942 (a percentage they would not reach again until 1976, after dropping back below 30% after the war). Women were elected to the students’ association executive, edited Critic and became presidents of the dramatic and literary societies.

Otago’s Professor of Chemistry, Frederick Soper, co-ordinated New Zealand’s war efforts in chemistry. He is photographed around December 1946. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, New Zealand Free Lance collection, PAColl-8602-66.

As well as supplying numerous personnel to the military forces, the University of Otago made important contributions to the war effort through its scientific work. Government scientists and the universities cooperated on various  projects. At Otago, Professor Robert Jack and his colleagues in the physics department worked on infrared sensors for the detection of shipping. Frederick Soper, the chemistry professor (later vice-chancellor), chaired the chemical section of the national Defence Science Committee, whose projects mostly related to producing products in short supply due to the war, including munitions and many other items which were normally imported. Otago staff worked on an antidote for war gas, production of chemicals required for naval sonar and smoke bombs, and the testing of New Zealand ergot (an essential drug used in obstetrics). Stanley Slater of the chemistry department produced morphine using opium which had been confiscated by the police under drug legislation (the same project was carried out during World War I by Prof Thomas Easterfield at Victoria University of Wellington).

War and post-war food shortages also inspired various university projects. Leading Otago scientist Muriel Bell was appointed government nutrition officer, setting the food ration scales and continuing her applied research into New Zealand foods. Among many other things, she was well-known by the public for her rosehip syrup recipe, designed to supply Vitamin C to young children. The School of Home Science got involved in the war effort right from the beginning, using Studholme Hall to train local women in large quantity cookery, so they would be prepared in case of emergencies in hospitals. The school’s clothing and textile experts advised on the manufacture of garments for soldiers.

I haven’t found any references to deadly weapons being produced on campus, but one of the university’s neighbours became a munitions factory during the war. Engineering firm J & AP Scott, located on the corner of Leith and Albany streets, produced 3-inch mortar shells and cast iron practice bombs, with the government doubling the size of their building to aid this war work. The university later took over the Scott building, which has been the home of Property Services for many years.

A 1920s advertisement for engineering firm J & AP Scott, which manufactured munitions during World War II. The university later took over the building. Image courtesy of Hocken Collections, from the Otago Motor Club Yearbook 1927-8, Automobile Association Otago records, 95-056 Box 97.

In the 1970s, looking back on World War II, Frederick Soper commented that it was “popular to accuse the Universities of being ivory towers but I should like to affirm that University policies do respond to national needs.” The research efforts of New Zealand universities during the war led to growing support for their research in the post-war period. One very significant result was the re-introduction of the PhD degree in 1946 – it had first been offered in the wake of World War I but withdrawn after just a few years. For better and for worse, the war of 1939-1945 clearly had a major impact on Otago. Do you know of any other stories relating to the university and the war?

Off to war

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1910s, classics, dentistry, languages, medicine, mining, war, women

Alexander Trotter, who graduated MB ChB from Otago in 1913, took this snapshot of some of his colleagues from the NZ Medical Corps in Jericho. They include Capt Warren Young (an Otago medical graduate of 1916), Capt Martin Ryan (a dentist) and Col Robert Walton (an Edinburgh medical graduate). Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, AM Trotter papers, MS-3397/008, S14-589a.

The barrage of World War I centenary events is now upon us, and this month Dunedin commemorates the embarkation of the first troops who departed here for the war in Europe. It seems an appropriate time to think about the impact of the war on the University of Otago.

At the beginning of 1914 there were just over 600 students enrolled at Otago, 70 per cent of them male; a considerable number were part-timers. Numbers attending dropped off rapidly as young men headed off for the front. The chancellor reported at the end of March 1915 that “at least a hundred students are wearing their King’s uniform, and small detachments are constantly leaving to join the reinforcements.” The March 1915 annual reports of the “special schools” revealed the large impact of war. Of the 29 students in the School of Mines, 9 left in August 1914 to become part of the main expeditionary force, and by March a further 5 had joined them on active service. The tiny dental school, which had just 8 students enrolled in 1914, provided 3 of those to the armed forces. The medical school, too, contributed significantly. Like the dental and mining schools, it allowed students who had nearly completed their degrees to finish early, expediting their departure: “In consequence of the demand for surgeons a special final examination was held last August [1914], and sixteen of the fifth-year students who passed either joined the Expeditionary Force or replaced others who did so.”

The university council took great pride in the contribution being made by its students and former students to the war effort. It had been horrified by news of the “wanton and lawless destruction” of the “ancient and honoured University of Louvain” by German troops invading Belgium; many irreplacable books and manuscripts were lost along with buildings. In an October 1914 letter of sympathy to Louvain, the council noted its pride “that many of its own alumni have gone forth to serve as comrades in arms of the Belgians in the cause of freedom and humanity.” An early sign of the tragedy of war can be seen in the minutes of the following month’s council meeting, which record sympathy at the “cruel death of Dr Angus McNab on the battlefield. While in the act of rendering surgical aid to wounded soldiers it has been reported that he was bayoneted by the Germans, although he was wearing the red-cross badge on his arm.” McNab completed a BSc and BA at Otago in the 1890s, and went on to become a medical specialist in London.

In May 1915 the university council recorded its last sympathy motion for war-related deaths, noting its “mingled feelings of sorrow and pride” at “news of the death at the Dardanelles of three students of the University of Otago – Lieutenants R. Duthie, J.S. Reid, and E.M. Burnard.” All three died at Gallipoli. Death at war, it would appear, then became so common that it no longer warranted a special mention: by the end of the war nearly 100 staff and students had been killed. Their names were recorded in the University of Otago Calendar and photographs of “fallen comrades” appeared in the student publication, the Otago University Review, but there was no longer space for recording them in the council minutes. The council did, however, continue to record military honours awarded to university people, sending congratulations to the families of those concerned.

Putting aside the personal tragedies of the many deaths and injuries, the biggest headache the war created for the university authorities was retaining sufficient staff to keep its normal activities going. Of course, they had no idea how long the war would last, and nobody suspected in 1914 that it still had four years to run. When William Phillipps, a demonstrator in biology about to leave on military service, requested 3 years of leave in February 1915, the council resolved “to grant Mr Phillipps leave for twelve months or until the end of the war should the war terminate in less than twelve months.” Deciding whether or not to grant leave, and how long for, was tricky, and once conscription was introduced in 1916 the council also had to decide whether or not to appeal against the calling up of its employees.

There was a particular demand for people with medical expertise, and replacements for medical school staff could be difficult to find. When Percy Gowland, Professor of Anatomy, asked the council in February 1917 if he might proceed to the front, it sympathised, but informed him that “his services are indispensable to the Medical School.” When Gowland was called up in the ballot in 1918, the university appealed. At the same October meeting of the Military Service Board, it appealed against the calling up of William Carswell, surgical tutor and assistant lecturer, and Alexander Kidd, who worked in the anatomy laboratory. Kidd had asked the council for leave to proceed to war, but Gowland stated he was “essential for the proper working of the Anatomical Department.”

A familiar wartime sight. This unidentified photograph is from the papers of Roland Fulton, one of many Otago medical graduates to serve in World War I. After qualifying in 1914 he headed to England for further training in surgery; he served with the Royal Army Medical Corps during the war. Image courtesy of Hocken Collections, RAH Fulton papers, MS-1667/008, S14-589b.

Some senior staff did head overseas to the war, often for long periods. Daniel Waters, Professor of Metallurgy and Assaying in the School of Mines, served as an officer in the New Zealand Tunnelling Company for a couple of years; he returned to the university after being discharged no longer fit for service at the end of 1917. Henry Pickerill, Dean of the Dental School, served from 1916 to 1919 with the New Zealand Medical Corps, becoming famous for his pioneering work reconstructing the jaws and faces of those injured by war. The Professor of Surgery, Louis Barnett, joined the Royal Army Medical Corps in Malta early in 1915 and was transferred to the New Zealand Medical Corps in Egypt in October 1915. He returned to New Zealand early in 1917, after the university had convinced the military authorities he was essential to the training of the country’s future surgeons. Thomas Adams, Professor of Classics, enlisted early in 1917 and did not return to New Zealand until 1920, having been seconded for army educational duties in England.

Some subject areas struggled in the war years due to a lack of students. With its dean away and very few students, the Dental School was under threat of closure, but managed to survive the war years before expanding greatly in the post-war period. One casualty of the war was the university’s German language programme. In 1915 lecturer Frank Campbell resigned because he had no students. The council regretted “the loss of a teacher of his experience and the removal, even for a time, of so important a study as that of German from the subjects of instruction within the University.”

A more common difficulty, though, was finding substitutes for staff serving overseas. One solution was to appoint women, who were more readily available and not liable to conscription into the military. Isabel Turnbull became assistant to Adams in 1915; for the three years he served overseas she took on full responsibility for Otago’s teaching of Latin. Gladys Cameron was appointed to teach in bacteriology and public health in 1917, and Phyllis Turnbull as assistant in French in 1918; other women became demonstrators. Outside the School of Home Science, women academics had been non-existent at Otago prior to the war. Now new opportunities were opening to them, though sometimes these were temporary. Women also became more prominent as students during the war years, accounting for almost half of students in 1918 before men took over again in 1919.

The ‘Great War’ clearly had an enormous impact on the university, its staff and its students. It is also clear that the university made an enormous contribution to New Zealand’s war effort, with the council  minutes recording numerous students, staff and alumni mentioned in despatches and awarded military honours. For more information about the university and World War I, see this recent article in the alumni magazine, which also features on article about the war commemorations by Professor Tom Brooking.

Nourishing science

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1880s, 1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, consumer and applied sciences, food, food science, home science, human nutrition, medicine, physiology, public health, Wellington, women

One of Otago’s best known nutrition researchers, Dr Muriel Bell. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, Margaret Madill papers, r.6653, S14-589c.

Otago’s Department of Human Nutrition is the largest such university department in the Southern Hemisphere, and boasts an enviable international reputation. Its staff are often called on for their expertise in this country and beyond – two of the fifteen members of the World Health Organization’s Nutrition Guidance Expert Advisory Group are Otago human nutrition professors, Jim Mann and Murray Skeaff. Otago’s history in nutrition research goes back over a century, long predating the creation of a specialist department. It involves the story of some remarkable people, including several pioneering women scientists.

It could be argued that the university’s first nutrition researcher was Frederic Truby King, appointed Lecturer on Mental Diseases at the medical school in 1889 to complement his role as Superintendent of Seacliff Lunatic Asylum. Among many other things, he was interested in the role of diet in mental health. This later evolved into his famous work on infant nutrition and the founding of the Plunket Society, which promoted infant health and welfare.

The arrival of John Malcolm as Otago’s first Professor of Physiology (previously combined with anatomy) in 1905 marked a new step in research into nutrition at the university. Malcolm, a Scot, researched the nutritional values of various New Zealand foods, most notably local fish. His introduction of vitamin assays to this country led to practical advice on diets. This benefited animals as well as humans, with the diet he devised ensuring the survival of the dogs on Admiral Byrd’s 1928 Antarctic expedition.

One of Malcolm’s students, Muriel Bell, became a well-known nutritionist and long-serving member of the Department of Physiology. She graduated in medicine in 1922, then lectured in physiology while completing a doctorate on goitre. After some years working overseas, she returned to the department in 1935. As her entry in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography notes, her “forte was applied research into subjects of practical everyday importance, such as the vitamin content of New Zealand fruit, vegetables, fish and cereals.” She was a public health campaigner as well as a research scientist, and the Department of Health employed her part-time as a nutritionist for many years. She provided advice on war and post-war food rationing, and famously published a recipe for rosehip syrup to provide 1940s youngsters with adequate Vitamin C.

These three significant nutrition researchers were part of the Otago Medical School, but in 1911 another location for nutrition research arrived with the establishment of Otago’s School of Home Science. Food was a key topic within the home science syllabus, though this involved, in addition to nutrition, the study of food preparation and science, including the development of new food products. These were the origins of today’s two separate departments, human nutrition and food science. A Master of Home Science degree, introduced in 1926, brought a new focus on research to the school, with nutrition by far the most popular topic for dissertations.

Elizabeth Gregory, another well-known Otago nutrition expert. Image courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library, reference 1/2-C-024999-F.

One early master’s graduate of the Home Science School, Elizabeth Gregory, went on to further postgraduate study in nutrition. She completed a PhD – A study of fat metabolism, with special reference to nutrition on diets devoid of fat – at University College, London, before returning to Otago as lecturer in chemistry and nutrition in 1932. She was Professor and Dean of the Faculty of Home Science from 1941 to 1961. Like her physiology colleague Muriel Bell, with whom she often consulted, Gregory was frequently looked to for her expertise in public health issues relating to nutrition.

Among the 1940s home science students taught by Gregory was a woman who became a world-leading nutrition researcher: Marion Robinson. After completing a master’s degree at Otago she went on to further study at Cambridge. In 1958 she returned to Otago’s Faculty of Home Science, where she worked for the next thirty years. In a new laboratory set up in an old shed, Robinson studied the metabolism of various trace elements, becoming famous for her work on selenium. Meanwhile, Robinson also developed the teaching programme in human nutrition further, and it became available as a subject for BSc, including an honours programme, in the 1970s, as well as remaining a significant part of the home science degree.

The arrival of Jim Mann from Oxford as the new Professor of Human Nutrition in 1987 marked a new phase of nutrition teaching and research. In particular, it increased the links with the health sciences, for Mann is a medical doctor who was also appointed professor in the Department of Medicine and clinical endocrinologist for the health board. Human nutrition soon split out from its longstanding home in home science (which had by then become the Faculty of Consumer and Applied Sciences) and became an autonomous department within the Faculty of Science.

Research in the department also branched out from the previous work on micronutrients to new work on macronutrients and chronic diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer. With changes in society, over-nutrition had joined under-nutrition as a major concern. Of course, under-nutrition remained a big problem in the developing world, and as the department grew the 1996 appointment of Rosalind Gibson brought in new international expertise in the study of micronutrients, especially zinc and iron deficiency.

After World War II rationing was over, the only future health professionals to take nutrition very seriously were those studying home science in preparation for their postgraduate training as dietitians. More recently, that has changed, with nutrition widely recognised as highly significant for human health and included more extensively as part of health science programmes. And research is no longer confined to the Department of Human Nutrition, with some health science departments – Otago’s Department of Public Health in Wellington for instance – active in research into nutrition and health. In true interdisciplinary fashion, the university’s Edgar Diabetes and Obesity Research Centre brings together researchers from the departments of anatomy, biochemistry, medicine (in both Dunedin and Wellington), public health (Wellington), social and preventive medicine and human nutrition.

Do you have any stories to share from Otago’s long history of nutrition research? Any suggestions as to what Muriel Bell is investigating in the wonderful photograph taken in her laboratory? Some of that equipment looks intriguing!