Gnowangerup History

Alan's Parents, Childhood and Young Adulthood

Alan McWhinney (known later as `Mac') was born in Fremantle in 1905, the fourth surviving child of Arthur and May McWhinney. Times were tough for the family. Arthur, who lost his bank job in Victoria in the crash of the mid-1890s, came to the Western Australian Goldfields in 1896, followed soon afterwards by his fiancee, May Barling, a nurse. Arthur became an agent in Coolgardie, and the couple married and started their family there. But Arthur didn't settle anywhere very well, and the family moved often.

A Family Man
When the pharmacy at Kojonup was put up for sale Alan (by this time `Mac' to most people) and his friend Frank Freemantle (Katanning pharmacist) both wanted to purchase it, so they tossed for it. Frank won, and put Mac in as manager. Frank's wife said to Mac one day, `There's such a nice young teacher in town. I'd like you to meet her! ' and Mac replied smugly, `I already have done! ' The teacher was Hilda Routledge.

Around 1931 a pharmacy became available in Denmark, and Mac bought the business and settled in the own. His first shop was hardly more than a tin shed, but better premises were soon found. Mac and Hilda married in July 1933. In 1937 Mosman Park became their home, and Mac opened a pharmacy there. By 1941 they had three daughters (Nora, Ruth and Mary) and were living in Peppermint Grove.

The War Years, and Afterwards
During World War 11 Mac spent several years on Bougainville Island as a pharmacist at a camp hospital. When the Japanese invaded Darwin early in 1942 Hilda and the children, like many others in metropolitan Perth, were evacuated. They went to Katanning, where friends Chris and Allie Ball accommodated them.

After 1945 life quickly assumed a peaceful pattern. Mac became WA's Chief Pharmacist in the Commonwealth Health Department. The war was discussed rarely and reluctantly, but both Mac and Hilda were involved with Legacy, an association committed to alleviating difficulties for those families whose menfolk did not return from the war. Advice and practical help were offered, and Mac was involved with the organisation of annual health checks at Swan Barracks for Legacy children.
Sometimes alone, sometimes with the family, Mac would go fishing at North Cottesloe beach - not usually with much success, but he liked to be there. He had an innate need to spend time in the natural environment. He was a keen gardener, and maintained an extensive and beautiful garden. He had above-average skills in carpentry, and made useful furniture, and extended the family home several times.
Mac suffered for years from Meniere's Syndrome, which caused occasional bouts of acute giddiness and nausea, and he retired in 1964. With the girls qualified, and married, Hilda and Mac discovered travel. They were particularly fond of the United Kingdom (always`Home' to Mac, whose mother was born in England) and made ten trips there. They also went to the Continent, Japan, the USA, Canada, New Zealand, and many parts of Australia

An Interest in History
In the late 'sixties Mac and Hilda moved to Applecross, and for several years Mac, with Hilda's help, worked on A History of Pharmacy in Western Australia, which was published in 1975. He also collected items of historical interest associated with pharmacy: these were donated to the West Australian Museum, and are displayed there as the McWhinney-Scurlock Pharmacy. In 1998 Mac was made an Honorary Fellow of the Australian Academy of the History of Pharmacy.

Mac's interest in history was not confined to pharmacy. His mother had come to Australia in 1888, and on each visit to England Mac spent hours in record offices, searching for her birth certificate, or clues about her family. In 1999 something triggered a search on the lnternet. A vital clue was found, and in a few weeks he had a copy of the long-sought document. An extensive family tree was discovered, and contact made with distant and somewhat amazed relatives who had no record of Mac's mother beyond the census of 1881!

Mac was associated with the Pharmaceutical Society of Western Australia for 73 years-as a member from 1923, a councillor for a total of 23 years, and President for four years. He was made a life member in 1971. He helped establish Pharmacy as a degree course at Curtin University. Mac's extraordinarily long association with his chosen profession is commemorated in an annual prize given since 2001 by his daughters to the Curtin University Pharmacy graduate who has the highest aggregate mark in his or her degree.
Mac showed his ability to weather difficulties when Hilda died in October 1993. He was very independent. He washed and ironed his own clothes, he bought and used a microwave oven, and he learned to cook, frequently making cakes for `the girls'. He had two more overseas trips -to England in 1994, and to Gallipoli, England and Scotland in 1995. Mac wasn't one for souvenirs, but he carefully chose a pebble from Anzac Cove, where his father had landed and fought. He had been home for only a few months when he broke his hip. Undaunted, in 1998 he went to Darwin to see his sister. In the coach on a long, tedious stretch, the guide had some competitions to break the monotony. Several mathematics questions were dictated, and the passengers started work. Hardly anyone finished, but Mac, then 93, was among the first, and all his

answers were correct.
A quiet achiever, Alan (Mac) McWhinney died, aged nearly 95, in March 2000. Overcoming a less than auspicious start to life, he made a huge contribution to his profession. He laid the foundations for the preservation of the history of pharmacy in WA, and was honoured by his fellow pharmacists. His family is proud to record that Mac's first steps as an independent professional were taken in a small town in the south west of Western Australia - Gnowangerup.