Close at Hand

From the 1920s, this medicine chest was kept and used by the Gall family on their dairy farm near Berry. It remained in the family until the property sold, around 2007. It is a simple but captivating artefact that offers an insight into basic medical care on a family-run farm in twentieth century Australia. In […]

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A Moral Prescription

The Inebriates Act of 1912 enabled involuntary admission of alcohol dependent people to institutional, or hospital, care. From 1929, Morisset Hospital was one of seven public facilities in NSW authorised to receive ‘inebriates’ into the dedicated Ward 1. Within professional circles alcoholism was viewed as a disease to be cured rather than a crime to […]

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