I raise the issue of miner’s phthisis – a wasting disease which our city history ignores or just does not recognise is buried in our past.  

Bendigo was world renowned for the depth of its mines. For 100 years from the 1860s to the 1960s the goldminers of Bendigo suffered in epidemic proportions from this wasting disease, which not only affected them but their families. 

Bendigo miners died from lung ailments at six times the rate of Victorian adult males –  related females and non-mining males had tuberculous death rates above their respective Victorian averages.

Eventually, it was treated as an occupational sickness with social, economic and political implications that resulted in marked improvements in working conditions  better medical treatment and improved productivity (Kippen 1995).

It took the local member for Bendigo, Mitta Cook, and the Deputy Leader of the Labor Party, Mr Cain Senior, to push for a Parliamentary  Act to include compensation in 1928.

Doctor Walter Ernest Isaac Summons (1881-1970 ) a medical practitioner from Ballarat was chosen by Sir Richard Stawell to investigate miner’s phthisis at Bendigo due to the deaths and disease.   His investigation produced a contribution to the history of  pneumoconloses caused by rock dust and the need for ventilation for the workers.

In 1938, 890 miners were receiving an allowance in Bendigo for phthisis disease caused by the rock dust from deep mining.   By 1986 only 52 remained (C.Cleary, 1999).

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Dr Summons’s report on ventilation in 1906 and on epidemiology of lung disease in 1907 were founded in detailed studies of work practices and exact clinical observation.   His reports and proposals were coolly received in Bendigo. Which may explain why this history has been ignored and not acknowledged

Neither owners nor miners had supported the research.   Fears of further State Government intervention with higher costs concerned the owners, more concerned with profits and resentment around work habits by the workers.

Dr Summons served in both world wars, commanding  Australia’s largest hospital at Abbassia, Egypt.  The youngest colonel commanding a military hospital in 1918, he took charge in 1940 of 2/7th Australian General Hospital in the Middle East  and served on the Victorian Public Health Commission between 1919 and 1968.

Did Bendigo honour this man for his work, which saved countless lives? And do we remember the 820 miners who died in Bendigo who created the wealth of our city?   In my opinion, no.

I sincerely hope that if we obtain a history museum that we show the history of  Bendigo “warts and all” and not sweep our history under a carpet. We certainly need a true history of our great city  –  not fairy-floss.                     

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