Page 18 - Pharmacy History 29 July 2006

Coincidently, Dr Benjafield was one of the members of the Court of Medical Examiners.
In 1882, Henry Gould was joined
by one of his friends from England, who had likewise served a pharmacy apprenticeship and was registered by the Pharmaceutical Society in Britain. This man, Frank Styant-Browne, was also destined to leave his mark on Tasmanian pharmacy.
Frank Styant-Browne had only worked with Gould for a brief period when
an opportunity arose for him to establish a homoeopathic pharmacy
in Launceston in association with
the ubiquitous Dr Benjafield, Frank Styant-Browne then became involved with the Homoeopathic Association
of Tasmania., and this body was behind the eventual establishment of Homoeopathic hospitals in Launceston and Hobart.
The traditionalists in medicine did
Styant-Brown Pharmacy, Launceston
not agree with the principles of homoeopathy and there was much acrimony between the medical homoeopathic supporters as evidenced by the public slanging matches between the two groups reported
in the local newspapers at the time. The Homoeopathic League wanted
to establish a ward at the Queen Victoria Maternity Hospital in Launceston so that patients could receive homoeopathic care, but the hospital board rejected this request. This decision became the centre piece of the rift between allopathy and homoeopathy and turned into an all out battle between the two rival cults.16 Frank Styant-Browne the chemist, was also a keen amateur photographer and when he became aware of the discovery of X-Rays by the German scientist Wilhelm Roentgen in 1895, he was able to procure one of the X-Ray tubes from his contacts overseas.
At a meeting of the Northern Tasmanian Camera Club in 1896,
he displayed the amazing capabilities of the Roentgen rays, as they were initially known, when a negative showing the bones in a visitor’s hand was obtained.
A similar event occurred in Hobart when Dr GH Gibson, a homoeopathic surgeon, became the first medical
man in Tasmania to use x-rays as a diagnostic procedure.
He also gave public demonstrations
to packed audiences of the seemingly magical properties of this new discovery. Such was the public interest that this scientific curiosity had sparked off.
Frank Styant-Browne’s eldest son Frank Warland-Browne, also chose pharmacy as a career and served his five year apprenticeship with his father.
He had spent two years working in Sydney to gain experience before returning to Tasmania in 1908, to complete his studies, He was the recipient of the first certificate of registration to be issued by the new Pharmacy Board of Tasmania.17
Frank Warland-Browne, practised both as an allopathic and homoeopathic pharmacist, so he had a foot in both camps.
A thorn in the side of most Tasmanian chemists were the Friendly Society Dispensaries who persisted in trading openly with the general public which was beyond their charter to dispense
medicines only to members.
In 1889 the Launceston Pharmaceutical Association went
to court on the issues, but weren’t overly successful in restraining the Friendly Societies. On this occasion the Launceston group was supported by the Hobart group, who had similar problems.
This was also one occasion when
the chemists had the support of the doctors who had their own grievances with the Friendly Societies.18
Another of the problems that faced chemists in Tasmania was the distance between the two main centres of Hobart and Launceston.
Societies of chemists at each end of the island functioned well but the dream of amalgamation was not achieved until 1891.
The chemist to whom most credit must go for the formation of the Pharmaceutical Society of Tasmania, was Henry Thomas Gould.
Following the model of the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, (now the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain) all of the Australian colonies formed Societies
to ensure educational and professional standards of their members. The Societies then worked with their
state parliaments towards the passage of pharmacy acts providing for the establishment of state pharmacy
boards to conduct examinations and to register candidates.
Across the Tasman, New Zealand followed suit, but they like Western Australia did not provide for a separate Board and all functions were managed by their Societies.
In Tasmania, because of the
earlier Medical Act of 1837 and its amendments in 1840 and 1842, a new Pharmacy Act to separate the board and
Henry Thomas Gould
18 ■ Pharmacy History Australia
volume 3 ■ no 30 ■ NOVEMBER 2006