Sir Cecil Colville (1891–1984), medical practitioner, was the first president of the Australian Medical Association. Born in St Kilda, he was educated at Melbourne Grammar School and then proceeded to the University of Melbourne, graduating with first class honours in surgery and obstetrics and gynaecology. In the First World War he served in the Royal and Australian Army Medical Corps on the Western Front. Colville is especially notable for his more than 64 years in private practice in Hawthorn and Camberwell, Melbourne. From 1924 to 1951 he was honorary paediatric surgeon at the Alfred Hospital, devising a procedure for correcting cleft palates, especially in very young children. He was Chairman of the Victoria branch of the British Medical Association from 1939 to 1966, and president of the federal council of the BMA from 1955 to 1962. He was awarded the gold medal of the British Medical Association in 1961, and its Australian equivalent in 1964.
Gift of Richard Due 2010
© Roger Dargie and Faye Dargie
Richard Due (1 portrait)
On one level The Companion talks about the most famous and frontline Australians, but on another it tells us about ourselves.
Scientists tend to conjure up images of men in white coats in labs but this is just one stereotype in an evolving history of how we have perceived scientists, and how their profession has been understood over the years.
Sir William Dargie, painter and eight times winner of the Archibald Prize for portraiture, died in Melbourne on July 26, 2003, aged 91.
