Page 2 - Pharmacy History 32 July 2007

EWditorial
elcome to this our 32nd edition of Pharmacy History Australia, which
marks the 10th anniversary of its publication.
The Academy joins with the Victorian College of Pharmacy and the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia, Victorian Branch, in celebrating the contribution that these two bodies have made over the past 125-150 years, of Australian Pharmacy.
This edition is in two parts, the first looking at two pioneer Victorian pharmacists Joseph Bosisto and George Nicholas and we then try and establish who actually opened the first retail pharmacy in Victoria. We meet Samuel Croad and others, including a little known contender for the title, Edward Wollaston.
To keep a balance on the content of your journal we look at a scholarly contributed article by Professor John Pearn, of Queensland, to mark the tercentenary of the birth of Carl Linnaeus, who invented the binomial system of biological nomenclature. Pharmacists have always been involved with botanical drugs and it is a timely reminder of the knowledge that once was ours has slowly seeped away. There is still time to take in the International History of Pharmacy Congress in Spain, and there is more information about that event within these journal pages and we have also included some easy reading articles of general interest.
I wish to thank all those readers who responded to the Readership Survey
in the last issue and some of the suggestion offered will be incorporated in future issues.
Finally I hope that as many members as possible can attend the seminar at PAC in August this year. If your team is not playing in the AFL, then this
is a pleasant and interesting way to spend a couple of hours on a Saturday afternoon. I look forward to meeting you there.
F
President’s column
The Pharmaceutical Society of Victoria - First in Australia
ounded 150 years ago, Victorian pharmacy has been governed by the various moods, distractions and ambitions of a ruling city. Whether it was Melbourne as frontier settlement, as a confident boom town, as Australia’s
Geoff Miller
most American city, the wowser capital, Australia’s most fervent imitator of England, the centre of federal government and its bureaucracy, the Olympic city, capital of finance, business, comedy and the other lesser arts, or simply as Sydney’s chief rival. Melbourne has been the main power house of ideas and the most fertile centre for creative activity in Australian pharmacy; it held these positions without significant, sustained challenges from the 1850s until the 1970s. Australian pharmacy was forged in Melbourne.
A question posed in the 1994 publication, A History of Pharmacy in Victoria, is how was it that the early chemists and druggists of Victoria established institutions and standards which were so powerful as to be able to shape the whole of Australian pharmacy well into the 20th century?
The first chemist shop to be opened in Victoria is attributed to Surgeon Barry Cotter who in 1835 arrived as part of the settlement led by John Batman on behalf of the Port Phillip Association and established his premises on the North East corner of Queen and Collins Streets, Melbourne.
Chemists in the British Empire then had only negative recognition afforded them in the Apothecaries Act of 1815, which had deliberately excluded them from control by the apothecaries and left them free to trade in drugs and medicines, something that was open to any other retailer as well.
In 1851 Gold was discovered and the face of Victoria was rapidly changed. Gold seeking migrants included men of various levels of education and skill including chemists who made a notable contribution to the development of pharmacy in Victoria. With the impetus of the Gold rush (which Henry Lawson called ‘the roaring days’), in 1857 pharmacists established The Pharmaceutical Society of Victoria. A trigger for this outcome had been a legislative move by some Medical Practitioners
to have a Medical Board control medicines by licensing all vendors and testing their competence.
Several meetings of pharmacists were held in early 1857 with a view to forming an organisation to protect the trade and stand ready to defend it against any attempt to infringe upon the rights and privileges of Chemists and Druggists. At the meeting held in the Mechanics Hall on 6 March 1887, George Williams of the provisional committee informed the meeting of the recommendation that the proposed organisation should have a life based on ’higher ground’.
Desirable as it is to be properly organised, that we may be in a position to repel unjust attacks, it is of greater consequence that we should have an organisation that will enable us to perfect ourselves in the art and science of pharmacy, afford opportunity and appliances for carrying out our experiments and be
a means of increasing our knowledge and promoting our comfort. None need be ashamed to acknowledge that there is yet much to learn and a wide field still open for profitable investigation.
This historic recommendation ushered in the birth
of pharmacy professionalism and we are all very appreciative and grateful.
The History of Pharmacy in Victoria by Gregory Haines. 1994. Published by Aust. Pharm. Publishing Co Ltd.
Editor
Editor’s note
Contributions from members are always welcome, especially family histories of pharmacists.
Ross Brown, President
2 ■ Pharmacy History Australia
volume 3 ■ no 32 ■ JULY 2007