Moncur, Norma
VETERINARY SURGEONS BOARD OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA
FIRST FEMALE REGISTERED BY THE BOARD
Norma applied to the Board in May 1936. The Board was only established a few months earlier, and in March 1936 it had advertised widely for applications for registration. At that time, there were two categories of registration. The first was as a Veterinary Surgeon. To be successfully registered as a surgeon, the applicant had to demonstrate that they had practiced as a veterinary surgeon for at least the previous 7 years, and had derived income from this practice as their sole means of livelihood. The second category was for registration as a Veterinary Practitioner. This required the applicant to demonstrate they had practiced veterinary medicine for at least the previous 5 years, and had derived a substantial portion of their income from their veterinary practice. Applicants for registration were required to submit specific documentation including their birth certificate, references, witnessed declarations about length of practice, and completed application documents.
Norma Moncur applied to be registered as a Veterinary Surgeon. Norma declared she was 49 years of age at the time, and was born in Scotland. She came to Australia when aged 2 with her parents, but her letter with her application noted that her parents were not clear about their daughter’s birthright. As a result, she could not produce her birth certificate. Her application declared that by 1936, Norma had practiced veterinary medicine for 30 years, having learnt her skills from her Uncle, who had a medical qualification (it may have been a veterinary qualification) from America. She wrote to the Board saying that her certificates acknowledging her skills had been burned in a house fire, and as her uncle was no longer living, it was not possible to replace them. Norma said she was a joint owner of a wheat farm in Geranium, SA, which had no income for a number of years, and in April 1936 it became insolvent. Norma declared that her veterinary practice had been her sole source of income for more than 7 years, and she included references from a number of farmers in and around Lameroo where she treated mainly horses and cattle, as well as other farm animals. “If a cure was possible you are the woman for the job” wrote one farmer in his testimony.
Norma’s application was considered by the Board and it was deferred in June 1936 so that further information and evidence could be obtained. The Board was particularly interested in Norma’s interest in the wheat farm, and the extent of income she derived from this source. It also sought a sworn statement from her declaring her identity. This document was provided by Norma with her letter of 26 June 1936, along with her declaration that veterinary surgery was her sole source of income for the last 9 years. She wrote to the Board that she was unable to provide financial detail about the income from the farm, reiterating that she, her husband and son had received no income from the farm for some years and this had prompted the ‘reassignment’ of the farm through insolvency.
After investigating and substantiating the claim about the farm’s insolvency, the Board wrote to her in August 1936 saying that as she was married, she was supported by her husband. “...in view of the fact that you are a married woman, supported by your husband, and the farm you occupy is in the joint names of yourself and your husband, it cannot be said that you have practiced veterinary surgery as a sole means of livelihood” wrote the Board on 7 August 1936.
The Board declined her application as a Veterinary Surgeon. It was suggested she apply for registration as a veterinary practitioner, and if so, she needed to provide evidence of her income from veterinary practice for at least the previous 5 years.
Norma was not content with this decision. After a short stay in hospital, she wrote back to the Board on 18 September 1936 advising that her husband had a chronic knee problem and it was in fact her that supported her husband because he was unable to work. Income from the farm was negligible (hence the insolvency application), and it was her son who helped with the farm and lent her money from time to time. Further, she advised that they had sought assistance from the Farmers Assistance Board because of her husband’s disability. They had been told that no pension could be granted for at least 3 years. Norma’s letter to the Board in September 1936 was written in a very lively style, and suggested there were two real reasons the Board were reluctant to grant her registration as a Veterinary Surgeon; firstly she was a woman; and secondly the Board had already granted registration to a veterinary surgeon in the general area of Lameroo (a Mr Long). Norma asserted that the Board was a powerful body with the ‘power to make or break others of their profession just as it pleases them’. She said she understood Mr Long had a brother in law on the Board who was influencing the decision on her application. In this letter, she also wrote
‘You have put me to no end of trouble with the hope that I would get tired and want my money back, but gentlemen, I am a tryer; I never say die till a dead horse kicks me, so you see I am not going to give in so easily, so I hope to save all unpleasantness you will again consider my applicable, and more favourably this time as it would certainly look very bad to turn down the only woman applicant you have; in fact it would look as though you were jealous of my work and ability, and I feel sure you are all very proud of me’.
The Board was not happy with her response, and returned her letter admonishing her for its language, and advising it did not accept her arguments. The application for being registered as a veterinary practitioner remained open however, and Norma was asked to provide the evidence sought regarding her income, and attend a Board meeting for an interview.
She wrote back on 9 October 1936, saying that she had given her returned letter to an eminent Doctor and respected ‘gentleman’ in the region, to get his advice on the content and style of her letter. His advice to her (she wrote ‘…well, he laughed until the tears rolled down his cheeks and sometime elapsed before he could speak’) was that the language used in the letter was not rude, her use of words was appropriate, and that the only problem with her letter was that she was too ‘straightforward’. Norma wrote of her regret that the Board took umbrage at her previous letter – saying
‘Everybody who knows me knows I am Jack Blunt, a spade is a spade with me. Please don’t think me rude because of straightforwardness’
Norma accepted the invitation to appear before the Board in December 1936, and prior to this appearance the Board asked her to send in figures identifying farm income from 1930. This she did to the extent that the figures were available to her, and after the Board considered this information, it suggested she reapply as a practitioner as it did not approve her application for Veterinary Surgeon.
On 17 November 1936, Norma wrote again advising the Board that the local community had raised a sum of almost £2,000 to help her to fight the decision of the Board.
‘I feel sure from the beginning you were determined I should not go through, why I don’t know, probably because your veterinary surgeons resent a woman being as clever as they are….I have not made one shilling from the farm so I am going to law to see if any justice still exists. I have the money and the brains so I am not going to be shelved’.
Norma attended the Board meeting on 1 December 1936, and after being sworn in, immediately asked a question of the Board. She said her application to the Board had been divulged, as it was now well known around Lameroo that her certificates from America testifying to her veterinary skill had been burned. Norma said that no one knew about this except the Board; furthermore, she said she was told by her local source that she had written to Board and told them the certificates had been burned in a fire. When asked to name her source, she declined, only saying it was lady in Lameroo whose husband was a Freemason, and that she had found out from her husband. The Board denied leaking any information, and she took their word on their assurance. Further information was to come to light at the interview however.
Norma then asked to make a statement, and declared she was not married. She had divorced her husband 30 years ago, and had since lived alone. She stated the property was in the name of A & N Moncur – A was her son and was the real owner of the property. But as he was illiterate, she agreed to her name being listed as joint owner to help her son with the running of the farm. She then explained that another man lived at the property, at the invitation of her son. (It later appeared this man’s wife had left him after a serious car accident, and her son had invited him to live on the property – this was not explained at the interview however). At the interview, Norma said that for reasons of proprietary, she let people in the district assume he was Mr Moncur. She then said that in fact, Moncur was not his name, and nor was it her real name. She had used Moncur since her divorce. It was a made-up name some 30 years earlier, and everyone knew her as Norma Moncur. The Board said she could not be registered in that name, and she insisted she had advice that she could (Norma later disclosed that this advice came a lawyer, Mr Cleland who later became Justice Cleland).
The Board then turned to the issue of livelihood, and said it had denied her registration as a surgeon because she had been unable to prove that her practice was her sole income for 7 years. The Board also said it would need to get legal advice on her application if she challenged the decision. Mr Kneebone said
‘Presuming Mrs Moncur does not want this made public, it would be better for her to amend her application for registration to that of a practitioner’.
It again challenged her income status, suggesting that her husband must have had paid her maintenance since the divorce. She said
I am sorry you don’t think I am truthful. I am telling you that I never had one shilling from him after the separation’.
The outcome from the Board meeting was that she was advised to consider her position and advise whether she wished to continue with her application as either a Surgeon or a Practitioner. She asked the Board what would be the difference between operating as a Veterinary Surgeon or a Veterinary Practitioner, and was advised ‘It will not make any difference. You can operate. The difference is purely a legality’.
She was advised to get an accountant to go through her books and submit accounts showing the extent of her livelihood derived from her veterinary practice.
A few days later, Norma wrote to the Board reluctantly agreeing to apply as a practitioner, and asking for her original application to be returned. She wrote that ‘it makes me sick when I think of it – it is putting me down …after 30 years of experience – is it fair?’ She suggested she should have been tested through practical experience rather than the extent of her income, and said she may ‘don my fighting togs and come up again’ next year. She hinted that it may have been Mr Kneebone who leaked information about her application, and that he clearly had reached the wrong conclusion about ‘Mr Moncur’. The inference was that he assumed Norma was living with ‘Mr Moncur’ on the farm in a de-facto relationship. In a later letter in January 1937, she said Mr Kneebone was vindictive towards her, but doesn’t know why.
In February 1937 the Board approved her application as a practitioner, after receiving information from accountants in Pinaroo regarding her income from veterinary practice (which was estimated to be £526/15/0 plus £130 in kind for lodgings at farms over the last 7 years). The approval was conditional on the Board getting legal advice in relation to the name of ‘Moncur’ being used as it was not her ‘real’ name. This advice substantiated Norma’s position on the use of the name ‘Moncur’.
So in late February 1937, Mrs Norma Moncur was approved for registration as the first female through the Veterinary Surgeons Board. Her number was 139. But she insisted that her registration certificate be made out in her name as Norma Moncur only, not “Mrs”. She maintained her registration until it lapsed in 1940, for reasons unknown, though it is known that she was in hospital in 1940 and had heart problems.
Norma Moncur died in 1971, and is buried at the Lameroo Cemetery.