The seminar is a record of the recollections of a number of people associated with the School of Dental Science. As such, it is not necessarily endorsed by the School.

Introduction

Seminar Participants:
Professor Emeritus Henry Atkinson
Dr Mina Borromeo
Dr Felicity Crombie
Dr Owen Crombie
Dr Gerry Dalitz
Dr Don Dalley
Dr Jeremy Graham
Dr John Hales
Dr John Harcourt
Professor Mike Morgan
Ms Louise Murray
Dr Hector Orams
Mr Garry Pearson
Dr John Rasmussen
Professor Emeritus Peter Reade
Dr John Rogers
Mr Dennis Rowler
Dr Patricia (‘Pat’) Storey
Mr David Thomas
Ms Sandra Turner
Dr Ann Westmore
Dr Maurice White

Others, not in attendance, who provided input after the meeting: Dr Darryle Bowden; Dr John Dawkins; Dr Gerry Dickinson; Professor Alan Grant; Dr Ian Johnson; Dr Geoff Kenny; Professor Robin Marks; Dr Wal McDougall; Dr Bryan Radden; Professor Eric Reynolds

Mike Morgan:[1] Thank you very much for coming along this morning to this historic event. I’m the Deputy Head of School[2], standing in for Eric Reynolds[3] who is not able to be here this morning. He sends his apologies.

The recording of oral history is an important activity and that is exactly what will happen today. We are going to talk about a number of themes, which will be recorded, and the transcript will be sent out to all here and to others who could not be present. I think we’ll gain an appreciation of things that have happened, things that may have been forgotten and things that were never previously recounted.

It’s wonderful to see such a wide variety of people from different areas of dentistry - from the School, the Dental Hospital, private practice and other professional staff. So thank you very much for coming.

I’d like to thank Ruth Strutt[4] and Sandra Turner[5], herself a student of history, who really set up this project with Ann Westmore, to whom I’ll now hand over.

Ann Westmore:[6] We’ll start with some background on Witness Seminars which are a way to efficiently capture historical reminiscenses about a particular academic discipline or organisation. The idea is for people involved in that history to sit down and discuss key themes, determined by participants themselves.

Today we are exchanging views about the history of the School of Dental Science, previously known as the Dental School or School of Dentistry,[7]and dentistry in Victoria. In the process, participants may recall things they have not thought about for a long time. Sometimes we find that people have different recollections of the same event, and that is to be expected. If you have a different recollection, don’t hold back because history is often a meshing of different perspectives.

Witness seminars were started in England by the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, and since the 1990s the Institute has conducted many Witness seminars on different aspects of British medicine. A lot of that material has been published in small booklet form or, increasingly, on the web.

We have borrowed from this experience in holding a small number of Witness seminars in Victoria in recent years, several of which can be viewed on the World Wide Web. After today’s seminar, I will produce a transcript which will be circulated to all of you so that you can check the accuracy of what you said and make changes or additions if you think that would be helpful. The transcript will be fully footnoted, providing information about every person participating or mentioned, as well as about other organisations or events relevant to the history of dental medicine.

The whole idea of this seminar is to produce a detailed account for the use of future historians or people interested in dental history. It is a form of group oral history that attempts to capture history while people are still able to contribute their recollections.

I’ll be circulating a page which I’d ask each of you to fill out by the end of the day. It will provide me with basic biographical information which I’ll include in the footnotes.

Finally I’d like to thank the School and Sandra, Ruth and Mike for all their assistance and for organising this event so well.

To start, it would be helpful if each person here today briefly gives their name and their relationship with the School or with an organisation involved in dentistry.

Witness to the History of Australian Medicine