Person

Reilly, Pauline Neura (1918 - 2011)

OAM

Born
5 December 1918
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Died
22 April 2011
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Occupation
Ornithologist and Writer

Summary

Pauline Reilly was an ornithologist and children's book writer. She contributed significantly to bird banding programs and field surveys of penguins, lyrebirds, muttonbirds and other species across Australia and on Macquarie Island. The photographs in her book, Fairy penguins: a brief life history with photographs, were all taken and prepared by her. While President of the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union she initiated the project to produce The Atlas of Australian Birds (published 1984, with co-authors Stephen Davies and Margaret Blakers) and was chairman of the committee for this project 1976-1982. Reilly received several awards for her children's books including from the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales.

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Details

Chronology

1942 - 1944
Career position - Gunner in the Australian Women's Air Service
1958 - 1995
Career position - Member, Australian Bird and Bat Banding Scheme
1964 - 1981
Career position - Honorary Regional Victorian Organiser of the Australian Bird Banding Scheme at the CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) Division of Wildlife Research
1968 -
Career position - Founder and Leader of the Penguin Study Group of Victorian Ornithological Research Group
1969 - 1970
Career position - President, Bird Banders' Association of Australia - the first woman president
1969 - 1984
Career position - Member of the Field Investigation Research Committee of the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union
1972 - 1975
Career position - President, Royal Australasian Ornithologists' Union
1973
Career position - Leader of the expedition to the Great Australian Bight for penguin research, supported by grant from CSIRO Endowment Fund
1976 - 1982
Career position - Chairman of the Committee for The Atlas of Australian Birds
1978 - 1979
Career position - First woman to spend summer season on Macquarie Island in scientific capacity (banding penguins)
1981
Career position - Fellow, Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union (first woman Fellow)
1984
Award - Whitley Medal for Atlas of Australian Birds, Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales
1987
Award - Whitley Book Award for Best Children's Series, Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales
1988 - 1993
Career position - Vice-President, Victorian Wetland Trust
1992
Award - Whitley Book Award for Best Children's Educational Series, Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales
1992 - 1996
Career position - Member Committee of Management, Serendip Wildlife Reserve, Victoria
August 1992
Career position - Invited to open the Second International Penguin Conference
1994 -
Career position - Chair of the Standing Committee for Environment Strategy Surf Coast Shire
1994
Award - Wilderness Society Award for Children's Literature (non-fiction)
1994
Award - Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM)
2001
Award - J. N. Hobbs Medal, Birds Australia
2005
Award - W. Roy. Wheeler Medallion, Bird Observers' Club
2005
Award - Australian Natural History Medallion

Related Corporate Bodies

Published resources

Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation Exhibitions

  • McCarthy, Gavan; Morgan, Helen; Smith, Ailie; van den Bosch, Alan, Where are the Women in Australian Science?, Exhibition of the Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation, First published 2003 with lists updated regulary edn, Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre, Melbourne, Victoria, 2003, https://eoas.info/exhibitions/wisa/wisa.html. Details

Articles

Journal Articles

  • Endersby, Ian, 'Australian Natural History Medallion 2005: Pauline Reilly', The Victorian naturalist, 123 (1) (2006), 47-8. Details

Resources

See also

  • Robin, Libby, The Flight of the Emu: a Hundred Years of Australian Ornithology 1901-2001 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2001), 492 pp. Details
  • Smith, Susan and Spurling, Thomas H., 'The Science and Industry Endowment Fund: supporting the development of Australian science', Historical Records of Australian Science, 26 (1) (2015), 58-83, https://doi.org/10.1071/HR14027. Details

Rosanne Walker and Helen Cohn

Created: 30 June 1997, Last modified: 19 March 2019

EOAS ID: biogs/P003076b.htm

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