Laura Fowler

	South Australian Medical Heritage Society Inc Website for the Virtual Museum
Home Coming meetings Past meetings About the Society Galleries of the Virtual Museum Main Galleries Medicine Surgery Anaesthesia X-rays Hospitals,other organisations Individuals of note Small Galleries Dentistry Nursing Ethnic medicine - Aboriginal - Chinese - Mediterran	Laura Fowler (1868-1952) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We are most grateful to Kay Clapton, on behalf of the Yesteryear Group of the Oaklands VIEW club, for permitting us to present this article. Laura's Scottish parents emigrated to South Australia with her father George Swan Fowler joining the wholesale grocery business established by his two older brothers. The business expanded: opening branches in London, Fremantle, Broken Hill, Kalgoorlie as well as an import-export shipping agency. The company manufactured groceries and began the well-known "Lion" brand.¹ Fowler's "Lion" Factory façade. Laura attended the Monsieur & Madame Marvel's School for Young Ladies on North Terrace opened by the proprietors in 1874.² Subjects included reading and writing, some basic arithmetical work, elements of history and geography, the scriptures and natural science with students learning by rote. The school probably offered languages as well as music and drawing.³ Female students generally prepared for a life of gentility and were not encouraged to study Mathematics or Latin. The Fowlers travelled to England where son James studied at Cambridge and Laura boarded at the select Argyle House School. Afterwards Laura and her sister stayed with relatives in Germany to study languages, music and painting.⁴ James remained behind to complete his MA while George, wife Janet and children (Marion, Laura and David) returned to SA in 1884. They made Wootton Lea,⁵ a large mansion in Glen Osmond previously owned by Mr F H Faulding, their home. Finances were sometimes strained with the fluctuations in business fortunes.⁶ Laura was not squeamish and helped her father breed leeches for sale to pharmacists.⁷ As the daughter of a well-to-do Baptist merchant a life of ease and indolence was not encouraged. Laura needed to matriculate before she could study at the University of Adelaide which had opened in 1876 and officially admitted women on equal terms with men from 1881. Laura studied Mathematics and Latin, matriculated with a first-class pass and was admitted to the medical course in 1887.⁸ Unlike her female contemporaries studying medicine in Sydney and Melbourne, she was accepted into the class with little opprobrium. In 1891 Laura became Australia's first female surgeon.⁹ Her appointment as House Surgeon of the Children's Hospital was greeted enthusiastically.¹⁰ A matriculation photograph of Laura Fowler, 1891. In 1893 Laura married Dr Charles Hope, eldest son of Mr and Mrs John Hope, pioneer pastoralists of Wolta Wolta Homestead, Clare.¹¹ The newly-weds departed for India as self-supporting medical missionaries and frequently treated patients suffering from typhoid, cholera and malaria. In 1902 they studied at the UK's Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. As the Australian Army did not allow female doctors to serve in WWI, the Hopes joined The Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign Service and were sent to Serbia where Laura directed a unit. They were captured and spent two months imprisoned in Hungary before returning to England in 1916. They were each awarded the Serbian Samarian Cross in 1918. The Hopes returned to India and worked variously in Kalimpong, Faridpur, Naogoan and Pubna. Charles was sought after as an eye surgeon. Laura was awarded the Kaisar-i-Hind medal for public service in India.¹² They retired in 1934 and lived at Erindale. Charles died aged 81 years in 1942 with Laura dying a decade later, aged 84 years. They did not have children. References The Fowler Lion Factory on North Terrace, Adelaide built in 1906 https://www.flickr.com/photos/82134796@N03/16753320980 Reid, Helen MJ, MA, Med, Dip Ed, Cert Ed, Age of Transition: A Study of South Australian Private Girls' Schools 1875-1925, a doctoral thesis submitted to Graduate School of Education, University of Adelaide, 1996, page 115: North Terrace 1874, relocated to Norwood in 1881 and then Brighton in 1882. Ibid, page 85. MacKinnon, Alison, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life, Cambridge University Press UK, Institute for Social Research, University of South Australia, 1997, page 77 In 1921 Wootton Lea was sold to the Presbyterian Church of South Australia and became the Presbyterian Girls' College. MacKinnon, Alison, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life, Cambridge University Press UK, Institute for Social Research, University of South Australia, 1997, page 78 Jones, Helen, Hope, Laura Margaret (1968-1952), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian National University, 1996 MacKinnon, Alison, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life, Cambridge University Press UK, Institute for Social Research, University of South Australia, 1997, page 79 She graduated in Medicine and Surgery and won the Elder Prize: Lumen, Adelaide pioneers: Laura Fowler, The University of Adelaide Magazine; Adelaide AZ: University of Adelaide second in the world and Australia's first to admit women students on equal terms in 1881; photograph from the digital.library.adelaide.edu.au Trove: Pictorial Australian (Adelaide, SA: 1885-1895), Our Illustrations: Miss Laura Fowler, M.B., Ch.B., Tuesday 1 March 1892, page 13 https://www.claremuseum.com/post/the-hope-family-of-wolta-wolta Jones, Helen, Hope, Laura Margaret (1968-1952), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian National University, 1996 -o0o-

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We are most grateful to Kay Clapton, on behalf of the Yesteryear Group of the Oaklands VIEW club, for permitting us to present this article.

Laura's Scottish parents emigrated to South Australia with her father George Swan Fowler joining the wholesale grocery business established by his two older brothers. The business expanded: opening branches in London, Fremantle, Broken Hill, Kalgoorlie as well as an import-export shipping agency. The company manufactured groceries and began the well-known "Lion" brand.¹

Laura attended the Monsieur & Madame Marvel's School for Young Ladies on North Terrace opened by the proprietors in 1874.² Subjects included reading and writing, some basic arithmetical work, elements of history and geography, the scriptures and natural science with students learning by rote. The school probably offered languages as well as music and drawing.³ Female students generally prepared for a life of gentility and were not encouraged to study Mathematics or Latin.

The Fowlers travelled to England where son James studied at Cambridge and Laura boarded at the select Argyle House School. Afterwards Laura and her sister stayed with relatives in Germany to study languages, music and painting.⁴

James remained behind to complete his MA while George, wife Janet and children (Marion, Laura and David) returned to SA in 1884. They made Wootton Lea,⁵ a large mansion in Glen Osmond previously owned by Mr F H Faulding, their home. Finances were sometimes strained with the fluctuations in business fortunes.⁶ Laura was not squeamish and helped her father breed leeches for sale to pharmacists.⁷ As the daughter of a well-to-do Baptist merchant a life of ease and indolence was not encouraged.

Laura needed to matriculate before she could study at the University of Adelaide which had opened in 1876 and officially admitted women on equal terms with men from 1881. Laura studied Mathematics and Latin, matriculated with a first-class pass and was admitted to the medical course in 1887.⁸ Unlike her female contemporaries studying medicine in Sydney and Melbourne, she was accepted into the class with little opprobrium. In 1891 Laura became Australia's first female surgeon.⁹ Her appointment as House Surgeon of the Children's Hospital was greeted enthusiastically.¹⁰

In 1893 Laura married Dr Charles Hope, eldest son of Mr and Mrs John Hope, pioneer pastoralists of Wolta Wolta Homestead, Clare.¹¹ The newly-weds departed for India as self-supporting medical missionaries and frequently treated patients suffering from typhoid, cholera and malaria. In 1902 they studied at the UK's Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine.

As the Australian Army did not allow female doctors to serve in WWI, the Hopes joined The Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign Service and were sent to Serbia where Laura directed a unit. They were captured and spent two months imprisoned in Hungary before returning to England in 1916. They were each awarded the Serbian Samarian Cross in 1918.

The Hopes returned to India and worked variously in Kalimpong, Faridpur, Naogoan and Pubna. Charles was sought after as an eye surgeon. Laura was awarded the Kaisar-i-Hind medal for public service in India.¹²

They retired in 1934 and lived at Erindale. Charles died aged 81 years in 1942 with Laura dying a decade later, aged 84 years. They did not have children.

References

The Fowler Lion Factory on North Terrace, Adelaide built in 1906 https://www.flickr.com/photos/82134796@N03/16753320980
Reid, Helen MJ, MA, Med, Dip Ed, Cert Ed, Age of Transition: A Study of South Australian Private Girls' Schools 1875-1925, a doctoral thesis submitted to Graduate School of Education, University of Adelaide, 1996, page 115: North Terrace 1874, relocated to Norwood in 1881 and then Brighton in 1882.
Ibid, page 85.
MacKinnon, Alison, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life, Cambridge University Press UK, Institute for Social Research, University of South Australia, 1997, page 77
In 1921 Wootton Lea was sold to the Presbyterian Church of South Australia and became the Presbyterian Girls' College.
MacKinnon, Alison, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life, Cambridge University Press UK, Institute for Social Research, University of South Australia, 1997, page 78
Jones, Helen, Hope, Laura Margaret (1968-1952), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian National University, 1996
MacKinnon, Alison, Love and Freedom: Professional Women and the Reshaping of Personal Life, Cambridge University Press UK, Institute for Social Research, University of South Australia, 1997, page 79
She graduated in Medicine and Surgery and won the Elder Prize: Lumen, Adelaide pioneers: Laura Fowler, The University of Adelaide Magazine; Adelaide AZ: University of Adelaide second in the world and Australia's first to admit women students on equal terms in 1881; photograph from the digital.library.adelaide.edu.au
Trove: Pictorial Australian (Adelaide, SA: 1885-1895), Our Illustrations: Miss Laura Fowler, M.B., Ch.B., Tuesday 1 March 1892, page 13
https://www.claremuseum.com/post/the-hope-family-of-wolta-wolta
Jones, Helen, Hope, Laura Margaret (1968-1952), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian National University, 1996

Laura Fowler (1868-1952)

References