|
The idea of an Australian national museum predates Federation. Institutions such as the Australian Museum and the National Museum of Victoria represent early attempts to build collections encompassing the flora, fauna, geology and Indigenous cultures of the continent. Australia's first truly national museum, however, was born of the vision of Colin MacKenzie. MacKenzie, a prominent Melbourne orthopaedic surgeon, believed that Australia's unique fauna was destined for extinction. In 1924 he wrote, 'Unfortunately these animals are fast disappearing, and, in less than twenty years it is computed, will, in the absence of rigid protective measures, be all extinct 1 .' A man of considerable wealth and extensive political connections, MacKenzie devoted much of his professional life to building an extensive collection of Australian animal specimens. This collection was later to become the National Museum of Australia's first collection.
MacKenzie viewed Australian marsupials and monotremes as important, not just as examples of endangered species, but also for their potential to provide insights into the treatment of disease. The complexities of the human body, he argued, could, 'only be revealed by a study of types of animals in which these can be demonstrated in their simpler form' 2 . Australian animals were unique, providing a rich field of comparative examples that could be used to better understand human anatomy. MacKenzie's study of koalas reflects this argument. He observed koalas possessed a hyper-extensiveness in their arms, allowing them to grasp gum leaves above their heads. Using detailed dissections of koala shoulders he was able to design a shoulder splint as a treatment for sufferers of infantile paralysis. The splint held the arm out from the side of the chest helping to re-educate damaged muscles. MacKenzie was later able to adapt this technique when working as a surgeon at the Military Orthopaedic Hospital in Shepherd's Bush, London, during the First World War. Here the splint technique was used to treat soldiers with wounds to their upper limbs.
These practical applications convinced MacKenzie of the usefulness of comparative anatomy in the development of treatments for injury and disease, and confirmed him in his belief that it was vital to preserve and study Australian animals. In 1919, at his own expense, he opened a laboratory and museum in Melbourne which he named the Australian Institute of Anatomical Research. Working with a number of assistants including the artist Victor Cobb, MacKenzie began building a collection of preserved specimens of Australian wildlife. This work gathered pace in the 1920s when the Victorian government allowed him to establish a field research station at Badger Creek, Healesville. This reserve gave him the capacity to breed and collect native animals for use as anatomical specimens.
MacKenzie's interest in Australian fauna reflected a strong sense of nationalism. He believed in the uniqueness of the Australian environment and his desire to collect was, in part, an expression of pride in Australia. This sense of patriotism was combined with a social Darwinist world view which saw humans at the apex of evolutionary development. As MacKenzie described it, 'man is distinguished from all other animals by the fact that he stands and walks on the two hind or lower limbs leaving the fore or upper limbs free' 3 . For MacKenzie, this erect posture was the basis of human intelligence. In a strange twist he believed that Australians were unusually blessed in this regard: Australian football as an exercise, he argued, was more conducive to erect posture than almost any other game in the world! 'It is founded on sound physiological lines and has been a no small factor in the physical development of our nation', he wrote 4 .
|
