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Scantlebury Brown, Vera

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Agent TypePersonActivities & OccupationsMedical practitionersGenderFemaleHistoryVera Scantlebury Brown was born in Linton, Victoria, in 1889, the daughter of George James and Catherine Millington. Her father was a general practitioner with an interest in psychiatry. She was educated at Toorak College and the University of Melbourne Medical School from which she graduated Bachelor of Medicine (MB) in 1914. She worked as a resident at the Melbourne Hospital and Children's Hospital until 1917 when she went to England and served as assistant surgeon in the Royal Army Medical Corps Endell Street Military Hospital. This was the only First World War hospital entirely staffed by women suffragists.

Back in Melbourne in 1919 she received honorary appointments at the leading women's and children's hospitals as well as the Victorian Baby Health Centres Association and the Free Kindergarten Union of Victoria. In 1924 she was awarded the degree of Doctor of Medicine. In 1926 she became part-time director of the newly-created infant welfare section of the Victorian Health Department. Infant welfare advanced rapidly under her guidance where she pioneered compulsory training for infant welfare nurses and published influential guides to infant feeding and child care. She was equally pioneering in the areas of ante natal and pre-school care.
Dr. Vera married University of Melbourne lecturer (later associate professor) Dr. Edward Byam Brown on 18 September 1926, and they had two children.
Deeply admired for both her professional abilities and her personal qualities, Vera S Brown was appointed O.B.E. in 1938. She died on 14 July 1946 after a long battle with cancer.Search records of this agent

Item

Cerificate accompanying OBE

Autograph book

Letter and cablegram from Dr Flora Murray

World War I military uniform buttons and insignia worn by Dr Vera Scantlebury at Endell Street Military Hospital

Index to sections of Truby King’s biography

Index to Department of Health Victoria documents

Index to Sister Dawson’s material

Index to Royal Commission on Health

Index to interviews

Interview records

Index to volumes of diary/letter books

Index cards to diary/letter books

Biographical notes on Dr Vera Scantlebury Brown. [Written by Wendy Kapper. 43 pp.]

Material compiled by Sister Edith Dawson

A Guide to the Care of the Young Child by Vera Scantlebury Brown and Kate Campbell (Department of Health, Victoria, 1947).

Case notes

Blank notebook

Notes made on visit to NZ and USA

Draft history of Baby Health Centres Association Marking notes for Mothercraft Nurses Exam, 1932

Victorian Baby Health Centres Association: Report Book of Medical Officer (VSB)

Letters to Dottie (sister)

Letters to Mother

Accession

[2013.0058] PAPERS AND MEMORABILIA OF VERA SCANTLEBURY BROWN

[1984.0082] PAPERS OF VERA SCANTLEBURY BROWN

People and Organisations

James, Catherine M.

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Dr Vera Scantlebury and her brother Dr George Clifford Scantlebury

Dates

Date1889-1946

Names

Given NameVeraFamily NameScantlebury Brown

University of Melbourne Archives

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Scantlebury Brown, Vera