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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	Dr Henry Kenneth (Ken) Fry, DSO [1886-1959] Physician, Public Health Office, Teacher and Anthropologist A portrait of Henry Fry Early Life and Education Henry Fry was born in 1886 in North Adelaide, the fourth child of Henry Thomas Fry, a highly respected businessman and churchman, and his wife Margaret (née Phillips). The family possessed Irish ancestry through Henry Fry Senior (1851–1899), whose own grandfather was the Reverend Canon Henry Fry (1818–1895) of County Tipperary. Tragedy struck early in Fry's life when his father died from a buggy accident when Fry Junior was just 14 years old. Despite this loss, he pursued an extensive education, attending Prince Alfred College and the University of Adelaide, where he earned a BSc with Honours in 1905, an MB and BS while being named an Everard Scholar (top graduating student) in 1908, and eventually an MD in 1937. Beyond academics, he was highly active in university life, gaining a university “blue” for lacrosse, maintaining a keen interest in sailing and swimming, and serving as President of the University Christian Union. In 1909, his achievements culminated in being selected as a Rhodes Scholar, leading him to Oxford University's Balliol College, where he graduated in 1912 with a BSc (Oxon), DPH (Oxon), and DAnth (Oxon). Early Medical Career and Military Service Following his overseas studies, Fry returned to Australia and was appointed Chief Medical Inspector of Aborigines in Darwin in 1913. His career was soon interrupted by World War I; in 1914, he was appointed Captain in the Australian Army Medical Corps (AIF). He saw extensive service in the Middle East, Gallipoli, and the Western Front, ultimately reaching the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and earning a DSO alongside being Mentioned in Despatches (MID) four times. Shortly after the war, in 1918, he married Miss Dorothy Editha Deeley of Adelaide, with whom he had two children, a son and a daughter, and later seven grandchildren. By 1920, Fry had established a comprehensive private consulting practice on Glen Osmond Road in the Adelaide suburb of Eastwood. Concurrently, from 1920 to 1939, he held a lectureship in materia medica and therapeutics at the University of Adelaide, while also serving as an honorary physician to the Royal Adelaide Hospital and a visitor to the Parkside Mental Hospital, developing a special interest in psychiatry. Anthropological and Psychological Contributions and Later Years Fry also made substantial contributions to the disciplines of anthropology and psychology. In 1925, he was appointed a Member of the Board for Anthropological Research. Between 1929 and 1951, he participated as a member of nine expeditions to Central Australia to investigate the health and culture of Australian Aborigines, a passion that led him to publish over 20 scientific papers on Aboriginal kinship, psychology, and mythology. His academic publications also extended to medicine; in 1935, he published An Introduction to General Therapeutics for medical students, and in 1937, he completed his MD thesis at the University of Adelaide, titled Psychology and medicine: a historical survey and an interpretation of their interaction. That same year, he acquired a handsome “Seaview” villa and adjacent land in Crafers, Adelaide Hills, where he developed a nature reserve. From 1938 through the 1950s, he served as a part-time Public Health Officer for the City of Adelaide, actively promoting public health initiatives such as immunization against common infectious diseases and mass chest x-ray examinations to screen for pulmonary tuberculosis. During this productive era, he was also elected President of the Royal Society of South Australia in 1938 and became a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Public Health and Hygiene. It is quite clear from the above summary of Dr Fry's curriculum vitae that he was a highly successful and scholarly 20^th century Adelaide physician with interests in many aspects of medicine but particularly in psychological medicine, public health and general therapeutics. Dr Fry came from a clever family; his father was known for his prodigious memory whilst his grandfather was a distinguished Cannon in the Anglican Church. Henry Kenneth Fry and his interest in Psychology and Medicine H K Fry had a particular interest in psychological mechanisms and the relationship with medicine (i.e. psychopathology). This interest developed, according to Fry, due to a number of factors: His own introversion where occasionally he had thoughts irreversible to rational thought His scientific training and understanding of the physiology of neurological reflex responses (after Prof C Sherrington) His war observation of extreme emotive behaviour as examples of emotional reflex responses particularly during combat in War World 1 His later observations of Australian Aborigines and their ancient belief that sickness and death was caused by others through psychological mechanisms (e.g. as in pointing the bone etc.) His reading of the current psychological and neurological literature His own clinical experience from neurological and psychiatric case studies In the mid 1930s after much reading and analytical thought he proposed his own hypothesis as expressed in his 1935 MD thesis. As expressed in the preface of this dissertation the main “links” of the hypothesis were: The physiological characteristics of reflex and emotional responses are the same An emotion is a complete response of mind and body Memories and ideas are organized primarily in “layers” in relation to varying emotional tones which have physiological reflexions in the body Conflicting emotions, in addition to mixed effects of excitation, may cause inhibition in bodily functions, and mental processes producing un-adapted and irrational response These effects normally are evanescent but become “fixed” by a vicious circle of events. Fry considered his hypothesis as a whole, and as far as he could discover, was a novel one. It was the basis of his interpretation of the nature of functional nervous disorders, which brought the analytical and re-educational methods of psychotherapy into one system. Fry's 1935 MD dissertation consisted of three parts: A written 154 page thesis providing an initial historical background to the psychological literature and its relationship to medicine followed by his own interpretation of the inter-relationship A copy of his presentation read before the British Medical Association in 1920 on this same topic His 1935 publication entitled Introduction to Therapeutics prepared for the medical students of the Adelaide Medical School with particular emphasis of chapters VIII and XIV on Muscle re-education and Psychotherapy respectively in which his views are expressed in a more popular form. For further information the reader is referred to Prof Robert Goldney's recent paper discussing and praising Fry's contribution to Australian psychiatry. Prof Goldney is an Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Adelaide. Henry Kenneth Fry and his interest in General Therapeutics I would now like to concentrate on Dr Fry's contribution to general therapeutics as illustrated in his 1935 textbook for medical students and secondly in his insightful contribution to anthropology, particularly concerning Aboriginal mentality. An Introduction to General Therapeutics title page. Table of Contents Dr Fry's An Introduction to General Therapeutics was published in 1935 by Cassell and Co, London. It consists of 223 pages divided into 16 chapters on a wide range of therapeutic approaches (see contents). In the preface Dr Fry writes This small book represents an attempt to fill a need, which it is believed to exists, for the presentation of a concise survey of modern methods of treatment, dealing with the principles underlying their use, and the possibilities and limitations in practice. The temerity of essaying to do justice to subject-matter of this scope in a small work is realized. But never-the-less the hope is entertained that the book may help medical students to formulate more clearly their ideas concerning the methods of treatment with which thy are acquainted. Prof Donald Simpson in his MD thesis The Adelaide Medical School, 1885-1914: a study of Anglo-Australian synergies in medical education wrote of Fry's book He wrote a very readable text book for his course: it is full of insights, some of them well ahead of his times, such as his warning against intravascular thorotrast. As a specialist immunologist I found chapter XV on Immunology and Immunotherapy particularly interesting. It is an up-to-date account (for the mid 1930s) of the current understanding of immune mechanisms and immune responsiveness based on Ehrlich's hypotheses for cell receptors where amboceptors, haptophores, toxophores, receptors (first, second and third orders), agglutinins, precipitins, antigens etc. were all defined. Nowadays we use a different language employing similar mechanisms but with a proven molecular understanding of B cell receptors, T cell receptors and antigen presentation via the MHC complex. Fry then explains active and passive immunization with the use of a variety of vaccines derived from living and dead organisms. He states vaccines have proved to be of great value in prophylaxis e.g. T.A.B. vaccine made it possible for armies in the Great War to avoid any epidemic appearance of typhoid or paratyphoid diseases, which in other wars have been more fatal than battle casualties. Fry is right!! Another interesting chapter was on Climatology where Fry was well ahead of his time and understood the importance of climate variation in disease pathogenesis. Henry Kenneth Fry and his interest in Australian Aborigines Dr Fry was greatly interested in anthropology, particularly involving the Australian Aborigines and this commenced during his medical student studies and reached its fulfillment in him gaining the Oxford diploma in this topic. As such he was the first Oxford trained anthropologist to work in Australia. Fry joined nine expeditions to Central Australia between the years 1929-1951 to study the tribal Aboriginal mobs that inhabited this area. In the Australian Dictionary of Biography Phillip Jones writes Medical members of the team successfully treated the Aborigines for scurvy and received tribal status which facilitated their future research in the region. Fry assisted the ethnologist Norman Tindale in taking unique film records and in gathering sociological data, and conducted psychological and sensory tests. He devised a succinct but flexible framework to record Aboriginal classificatory kinship systems. Termed the 'Fry Framework' by Tindale, it enabled the documentation of varying kinship structures across Aboriginal Australia. Tindale's 'Fry Frameworks' for two hundred Aboriginal groups are held in the South Australian Museum, as are Fry's anthropological notebooks. In 1935 Fry published a seminal paper in the Medical Journal of Australia on Aboriginal mentality based on his observation from these early expeditions. He wrote that the study of the mentality of the Australian Aborigine has a strong academic interest and at the same time has a practical and vital importance, because this ancient race is dying out and the chief factor in the present process of extermination is psychological. Fry noted that There is, however, one sentiment that is dominant in the mental life of the Aborigine and that is his intense reverence in his native state for the sacred ceremonies, legends and objects...Aboriginal beliefs are in harmony with the Aboriginal's mode of thought, these beliefs provide a sanction for the undisputed authority of the older men, by whom the structure of the native social system is maintained. Under this system the members of native society are adapted to their natural environment. Contact with white civilization emancipates the young men from the authority of the older men and destroys both the system of beliefs and the environment of animal and vegetable life and of water supply to which the natives are adapted. Undermined in this way both from within and without the native social system disintegrates quickly ... hence, the native black fellow is faced with extraordinary difficulties in any attempt which he may make to become adapted to the conditions of our society ... For natives who have become detribalised there is a strong need to encourage occupations whereby they may retain or regain their self-respect and the will to live. Interest in Conservation Finally, I recommend a visit to the H K Fry Reserve in Crafers. It is a delightful natural Reserve situated on the upper reaches of the tributaries of the Brown Hill Creek and in spring it abounds with a variety of orchids and native flowers. The hardworking “Friends” of the Reserve have done a great job in keeping it free of the usual weeds and blackberries so commonly found on the upper reaches of these hillside creeks. Furthermore, it provides a quiet ambience to appreciate and acknowledge the magnificent contribution made to our community by this outstanding but humble Adelaide physician. Further reading: Goldney R. : 'HK Fry: an early contributor to Australian psychiatry". Australasian Psychiatry. 2012;20(3):246-248. doi:10.1177/1039856212437799 Jones, Philip : "Fry, Henry Kenneth (1886-1959)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol14, 1996 Dr. Henry Kenneth (Kenneth) Fry DSO-Virtual War Memorial Australia (Virtual War Memorial Australia) Edgeloe VA. : "The first 12 South Australian Rhode Scholars". J Hist Society of South Australia, 1989, (17), p. 134-151. Peter Roberts-Thomson (President SAMHS 2022-2025) -o0o-

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Dr Henry Kenneth (Ken) Fry, DSO [1886-1959]

Physician, Public Health Office, Teacher and Anthropologist

A portrait of Henry Fry

Early Life and Education

Henry Fry was born in 1886 in North Adelaide, the fourth child of Henry Thomas Fry, a highly respected businessman and churchman, and his wife Margaret (née Phillips). The family possessed Irish ancestry through Henry Fry Senior (1851–1899), whose own grandfather was the Reverend Canon Henry Fry (1818–1895) of County Tipperary. Tragedy struck early in Fry's life when his father died from a buggy accident when Fry Junior was just 14 years old. Despite this loss, he pursued an extensive education, attending Prince Alfred College and the University of Adelaide, where he earned a BSc with Honours in 1905, an MB and BS while being named an Everard Scholar (top graduating student) in 1908, and eventually an MD in 1937. Beyond academics, he was highly active in university life, gaining a university “blue” for lacrosse, maintaining a keen interest in sailing and swimming, and serving as President of the University Christian Union. In 1909, his achievements culminated in being selected as a Rhodes Scholar, leading him to Oxford University's Balliol College, where he graduated in 1912 with a BSc (Oxon), DPH (Oxon), and DAnth (Oxon).

Early Medical Career and Military Service

Following his overseas studies, Fry returned to Australia and was appointed Chief Medical Inspector of Aborigines in Darwin in 1913. His career was soon interrupted by World War I; in 1914, he was appointed Captain in the Australian Army Medical Corps (AIF). He saw extensive service in the Middle East, Gallipoli, and the Western Front, ultimately reaching the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and earning a DSO alongside being Mentioned in Despatches (MID) four times. Shortly after the war, in 1918, he married Miss Dorothy Editha Deeley of Adelaide, with whom he had two children, a son and a daughter, and later seven grandchildren. By 1920, Fry had established a comprehensive private consulting practice on Glen Osmond Road in the Adelaide suburb of Eastwood. Concurrently, from 1920 to 1939, he held a lectureship in materia medica and therapeutics at the University of Adelaide, while also serving as an honorary physician to the Royal Adelaide Hospital and a visitor to the Parkside Mental Hospital, developing a special interest in psychiatry.

Anthropological and Psychological Contributions and Later Years

Fry also made substantial contributions to the disciplines of anthropology and psychology. In 1925, he was appointed a Member of the Board for Anthropological Research. Between 1929 and 1951, he participated as a member of nine expeditions to Central Australia to investigate the health and culture of Australian Aborigines, a passion that led him to publish over 20 scientific papers on Aboriginal kinship, psychology, and mythology. His academic publications also extended to medicine; in 1935, he published An Introduction to General Therapeutics for medical students, and in 1937, he completed his MD thesis at the University of Adelaide, titled Psychology and medicine: a historical survey and an interpretation of their interaction. That same year, he acquired a handsome “Seaview” villa and adjacent land in Crafers, Adelaide Hills, where he developed a nature reserve. From 1938 through the 1950s, he served as a part-time Public Health Officer for the City of Adelaide, actively promoting public health initiatives such as immunization against common infectious diseases and mass chest x-ray examinations to screen for pulmonary tuberculosis. During this productive era, he was also elected President of the Royal Society of South Australia in 1938 and became a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Public Health and Hygiene.

It is quite clear from the above summary of Dr Fry's curriculum vitae that he was a highly successful and scholarly 20^th century Adelaide physician with interests in many aspects of medicine but particularly in psychological medicine, public health and general therapeutics. Dr Fry came from a clever family; his father was known for his prodigious memory whilst his grandfather was a distinguished Cannon in the Anglican Church.

Henry Kenneth Fry and his interest in Psychology and Medicine

H K Fry had a particular interest in psychological mechanisms and the relationship with medicine (i.e. psychopathology).
This interest developed, according to Fry, due to a number of factors:

His own introversion where occasionally he had thoughts irreversible to rational thought
His scientific training and understanding of the physiology of neurological reflex responses (after Prof C Sherrington)
His war observation of extreme emotive behaviour as examples of emotional reflex responses particularly during combat in War World 1
His later observations of Australian Aborigines and their ancient belief that sickness and death was caused by others through psychological mechanisms (e.g. as in pointing the bone etc.)
His reading of the current psychological and neurological literature
His own clinical experience from neurological and psychiatric case studies

In the mid 1930s after much reading and analytical thought he proposed his own hypothesis as expressed in his 1935 MD thesis. As expressed in the preface of this dissertation the main “links” of the hypothesis were:

The physiological characteristics of reflex and emotional responses are the same
An emotion is a complete response of mind and body
Memories and ideas are organized primarily in “layers” in relation to varying emotional tones which have physiological reflexions in the body
Conflicting emotions, in addition to mixed effects of excitation, may cause inhibition in bodily functions, and mental processes producing un-adapted and irrational response
These effects normally are evanescent but become “fixed” by a vicious circle of events.

Fry considered his hypothesis as a whole, and as far as he could discover, was a novel one. It was the basis of his interpretation of the nature of functional nervous disorders, which brought the analytical and re-educational methods of psychotherapy into one system.

Fry's 1935 MD dissertation consisted of three parts:

A written 154 page thesis providing an initial historical background to the psychological literature and its relationship to medicine followed by his own interpretation of the inter-relationship
A copy of his presentation read before the British Medical Association in 1920 on this same topic
His 1935 publication entitled Introduction to Therapeutics prepared for the medical students of the Adelaide Medical School with particular emphasis of chapters VIII and XIV on Muscle re-education and Psychotherapy respectively in which his views are expressed in a more popular form.

For further information the reader is referred to Prof Robert Goldney's recent paper discussing and praising Fry's contribution to Australian psychiatry. Prof Goldney is an Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Adelaide.

Henry Kenneth Fry and his interest in General Therapeutics

I would now like to concentrate on Dr Fry's contribution to general therapeutics as illustrated in his 1935 textbook for medical students and secondly in his insightful contribution to anthropology, particularly concerning Aboriginal mentality.

An Introduction to General Therapeutics title page.

Table of Contents

Dr Fry's An Introduction to General Therapeutics was published in 1935 by Cassell and Co, London. It consists of 223 pages divided into 16 chapters on a wide range of therapeutic approaches (see contents). In the preface Dr Fry writes This small book represents an attempt to fill a need, which it is believed to exists, for the presentation of a concise survey of modern methods of treatment, dealing with the principles underlying their use, and the possibilities and limitations in practice. The temerity of essaying to do justice to subject-matter of this scope in a small work is realized. But never-the-less the hope is entertained that the book may help medical students to formulate more clearly their ideas concerning the methods of treatment with which thy are acquainted. Prof Donald Simpson in his MD thesis The Adelaide Medical School, 1885-1914: a study of Anglo-Australian synergies in medical education wrote of Fry's book He wrote a very readable text book for his course: it is full of insights, some of them well ahead of his times, such as his warning against intravascular thorotrast.

As a specialist immunologist I found chapter XV on Immunology and Immunotherapy particularly interesting. It is an up-to-date account (for the mid 1930s) of the current understanding of immune mechanisms and immune responsiveness based on Ehrlich's hypotheses for cell receptors where amboceptors, haptophores, toxophores, receptors (first, second and third orders), agglutinins, precipitins, antigens etc. were all defined. Nowadays we use a different language employing similar mechanisms but with a proven molecular understanding of B cell receptors, T cell receptors and antigen presentation via the MHC complex. Fry then explains active and passive immunization with the use of a variety of vaccines derived from living and dead organisms. He states vaccines have proved to be of great value in prophylaxis e.g. T.A.B. vaccine made it possible for armies in the Great War to avoid any epidemic appearance of typhoid or paratyphoid diseases, which in other wars have been more fatal than battle casualties. Fry is right!!

Another interesting chapter was on Climatology where Fry was well ahead of his time and understood the importance of climate variation in disease pathogenesis.

Henry Kenneth Fry and his interest in Australian Aborigines

Dr Fry was greatly interested in anthropology, particularly involving the Australian Aborigines and this commenced during his medical student studies and reached its fulfillment in him gaining the Oxford diploma in this topic. As such he was the first Oxford trained anthropologist to work in Australia. Fry joined nine expeditions to Central Australia between the years 1929-1951 to study the tribal Aboriginal mobs that inhabited this area. In the Australian Dictionary of Biography Phillip Jones writes Medical members of the team successfully treated the Aborigines for scurvy and received tribal status which facilitated their future research in the region. Fry assisted the ethnologist Norman Tindale in taking unique film records and in gathering sociological data, and conducted psychological and sensory tests. He devised a succinct but flexible framework to record Aboriginal classificatory kinship systems. Termed the 'Fry Framework' by Tindale, it enabled the documentation of varying kinship structures across Aboriginal Australia. Tindale's 'Fry Frameworks' for two hundred Aboriginal groups are held in the South Australian Museum, as are Fry's anthropological notebooks.

In 1935 Fry published a seminal paper in the Medical Journal of Australia on Aboriginal mentality based on his observation from these early expeditions. He wrote that the study of the mentality of the Australian Aborigine has a strong academic interest and at the same time has a practical and vital importance, because this ancient race is dying out and the chief factor in the present process of extermination is psychological. Fry noted that There is, however, one sentiment that is dominant in the mental life of the Aborigine and that is his intense reverence in his native state for the sacred ceremonies, legends and objects...Aboriginal beliefs are in harmony with the Aboriginal's mode of thought, these beliefs provide a sanction for the undisputed authority of the older men, by whom the structure of the native social system is maintained. Under this system the members of native society are adapted to their natural environment. Contact with white civilization emancipates the young men from the authority of the older men and destroys both the system of beliefs and the environment of animal and vegetable life and of water supply to which the natives are adapted. Undermined in this way both from within and without the native social system disintegrates quickly ... hence, the native black fellow is faced with extraordinary difficulties in any attempt which he may make to become adapted to the conditions of our society ... For natives who have become detribalised there is a strong need to encourage occupations whereby they may retain or regain their self-respect and the will to live.

Interest in Conservation

Finally, I recommend a visit to the H K Fry Reserve in Crafers. It is a delightful natural Reserve situated on the upper reaches of the tributaries of the Brown Hill Creek and in spring it abounds with a variety of orchids and native flowers. The hardworking “Friends” of the Reserve have done a great job in keeping it free of the usual weeds and blackberries so commonly found on the upper reaches of these hillside creeks. Furthermore, it provides a quiet ambience to appreciate and acknowledge the magnificent contribution made to our community by this outstanding but humble Adelaide physician.