Page 17 - Pharmacy History 34 February 2008

of private houses, and was situated not far from the fire station.
Water filters were a common necessity in both town and country and many of the popular pre- Federation water filters bore coats of arms bearing kangaroos and emus.
Illustrated is a filter bearing this device, made by the New Zealand Stone Company of South Melbourne.
Whatever the brand of filter, they had to be kept clean and full of water. It was usually the apprentice’s lot to clean the candle and fill up the filter. This would explain why perhaps collectors have difficulty in getting complete pieces, as the top was very susceptible to breakage.
Water filters used to be a thing of the past, but in recent times, as people have become super-sensitive about health, they have regained some popularity. Many water filters are genuinely old, but they are fairly common in colonial Australia. Water availability and quality was often poor and many diseases unknown to current generations, flourished in the unsanitary water that was often in household use at the time.
Acknowledgments
Our thanks are due to the Pharmaceutical Journal published by the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain in December 2007, for permission to reprint this article.
Also to the author Peter Homan, who researched and produced the original paper.
The comments on candy filters
in Australia
For permission to use the notes on candy filters and the photograph,
we thank Travis Dunn, the editor
of Australian Bottle and Collectors Review which is published quarterly in Whittlesea, Victoria.
A bit of ephemera
The image below depicts a photo-processing (D&P) folder from the pharmacy of Cyril J Cahill MPS PhC (1st place NSW final exam!) in Tamworth. We believe that it dates from the early 1920s.
In the late 1940s (early 1950s?) Cyril Cahill opened pharmacies in a number of towns around Tamworth.
The late Pat Develin worked in the Tamworth pharmacy. Another of the pharmacies Cyril opened was in Manilla, sold to Lindsay Dale about 1956-57, then sold on to Justin Flannery and now owned by Patrick Mahony.
We’d love to have further information about Cyril and his pharmacies if anyone has any.
Thanks to AusPharm for this bit of Ephemera.
volume 4 no 35 September 2008 Pharmacy History Australia 17