Person
Flecker, Hugo (1884 - 1957)
- Born
- 7 December 1884
Prahran, Victoria, Australia - Died
- 25 June 1957
Cairns, Queensland, Australia - Occupation
- Medical practitioner, Radiotherapist and Toxinologist
Summary
Hugo Flecker was a medical practitioner and one of Australia's pioneer radiologists who was known internationally for his research on poisoning by jellyfish. As a radiotherapist he was one of the first in Australia to use deep X-ray therapy and his published reports are among the earliest in Australian medical literature. In 1932 he moved from Melbourne to Cairns, his practice becoming a centre for radiological opinion and advice on snakebites, scorpion stings and the ingestion of toxic plants. He published the first report of coneshell poisoning in Australia in 1936. Flecker determined that unexplained deaths of swimmers were caused by extremely venomous box jellyfish, one species of which was named Chironex fleckeri in his honour. As foundation President of the North Queensland Naturalists' Club he greatly influenced the documentation and study of the region's flora. The Flecker Botanic Gardens, Cairns, were so named in 1971.
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Details
Chronology
- 1908
- Education - MB ChM, University of Sydney
- 1911
- Education - Member, Royal College of Surgeons, London
- 1911
- Education - Licentiate, Royal College of Physicians, London
- 1912
- Education - Fellow, Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh
- 1914 - 1917
- Career position - Served with the Australian Imperial Forces
- 1918 - 1921
- Career position - In general practice, Temora, New South Wales
- 1921 - 1932
- Career position - In private radiology practice, Collins St, Melbourne
- 1923 - 1932?
- Career position - Honorary Radiologist, Austin Hospital for Incurables, Melbourne
- 1926 - 1932?
- Career position - Honorary Radiologist, Homeopathic (later Prince Henry's) Hospital, Melbourne
- 1927 - 1932?
- Career position - Lecturer in Radiological Anatomy, University of Melbourne
- 1932 -
- Career position - In practice as radiologist and radiotherapist, Cairns, Queensland
- 1932 - 1945
- Career position - Foundation President, North Queensland Naturalists' Club
- 1937
- Education - Diploma in radiology, Sydney
- 1939
- Education - Fellow, Faculty of Radiology, England
- 1946 - 1957
- Career position - Vice-President, North Queensland Naturalists' Club
- 1957
- Award - J. P. Thomson Medal, Royal Geographical Society of Australia
Published resources
Book Sections
- Pearn, John H., 'Flecker, Hugo (1884-1957), medical practitioner, radiotherapist, toxicologist and natural historian' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 14: 1940 - 1980 Di-Kel, John Ritchie, ed. (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1996), pp. 182-183. http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A140195b.htm. Details
Conference Papers
- Clarkson, J.R., 'Hugo Flecker and the North Queensland Naturalists' Club', in History of Systematic Botany in Australasia: Proceedings of a Symposium Held at the University of Melbourne, 25-27 May 1988 edited by Short, P.S. (Melbourne: Australian Systematic Botany Society, 1990), pp. 171-178.. Details
Journal Articles
- Lester, I. A., 'Obituary: Hugo Flecker', Medical Journal of Australia, 1957 (2) (1957), 809-10. Details
- Macdonald, Colin F., 'Roentgen's discovery of the X-rays and the pioneer Melbourne radiologists', Victorian historical magazine, 36 (4) (1965), 136-53. Details
- Pearn, John, 'Hugo Flecker's Contributions to Medicine and Natural History', Medical Journal of Australia, 161 (1) (1994), 66-67, 70. Details
Resources
- Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q21539192. Details
- 'Flecker, Hugo (18841207-19570625)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-1462109. Details
See also
- Franks, Andrew J., 'A brief history of bryological exploration in Queensland', Queensland naturalist, 58 (4/6) (2020), 25-47. Details
- Paterson, R. A., 'The first fifty years of x-ray use in Queensland', Memoirs of the Queensland Museum, 27 (1989), 567-88. Details
- Pearn, John and Fenner, Peter, 'The Jellyfish Hunter - Jack Barnes: a Pioneer Medical Toxinologist in Australia', Toxicon, 48 (2006), 762-767. Details
- Ryan, James, Sutton, Keith and Baigent, Malcolm eds, Australasian Radiology: a History (Sydney: McGraw-Hill, 1996), 542 pp. Details
- Winkel, Kenneth D.; Mirtschin, Peter and Pearn, John, 'Twentieth Century Toxinology and Antivenom development in Australia', Toxicon, 48 (7) (2006), 738-754 . Details
Helen Cohn
Last modified: 3 July 2018