Australian Dictionary of Biography

Dr Gwen Pinner

ACT Heritage Library

Mancell Gwenneth Pinner (1922–1998), radiologist, was born on 24 June 1922 in Melbourne, elder daughter of Victorian-born parents John Thomas Pinner, accountant and public servant, and his wife Mancell Jeannott, née Drysdale. In 1927 the family moved to Canberra, where John was appointed as assistant-accountant in the Federal Capital Commission. They settled at Braddon and Gwen attended the nearby Ainslie Public School (1927–33). On 9 May she gifted a bouquet of flowers to the Duchess of York at the official opening of the provisional Parliament House. Excelling academically, she was awarded a scholarship to attend Canberra Church of England Girls' Grammar School (1934–39), and in 1937 the family moved to Deakin in the city’s south, which would remain her home for most of her life.

Pinner was twice dux of her school, and in 1938 she won the Council of Canberra University College’s prestigious Lady Isaacs prize. She also received the head prefect’s prize and the Dr Nott cup for outdoor sport (both 1939). These achievements earned her a university scholarship and she enrolled in medicine at the University of Melbourne (MB, BS, 1945). She was among a small cohort of women who graduated in 1945 - eleven women compared to seventy-six men - but benefited from a World War II policy that shortened medical degrees from six to five years.

Towards the end of her studies, Pinner successfully applied to undertake an internship at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. She began in March 1945, but was subsequently diagnosed with tuberculosis (TB) and underwent a long-stay hospitalisation and recuperation (1945–47). Once recovered, she applied to become head of a survey team examining the incidence of TB infection in the Australian Capital Territory and Queanbeyan for the Commonwealth Department of Health. The survey ran from 1949 to 1950 and found that the rate of positive reactions was low, except at the Wreck Bay Aboriginal Reserve at Booderee/Jervis Bay, where more extensive testing was subsequently undertaken. In August 1949 Canberra Community Hospital (CCH) appointed her as a consultant for TB patients.

Returning to the Royal Melbourne as an assistant radiologist in 1950, Pinner was awarded a diploma of diagnostic radiology at the University of Melbourne (1952). Two years later she was the first woman to receive the College of Radiologists of Australasia’s (later Royal Australasian College of Radiologists (RACR)) Thomas Baker memorial fellowship, which allowed her to spend eighteen months in Britain, Sweden, and North America, including three months at the prestigious radiology department at the Royal London Hospital. She published her reflections on the trip in March 1957, noting that ‘[e]verywhere I travelled radiologists went out of their way to show me interesting and unusual cases’ (Pinner 1957, 11). In May she was elected a fellow of the Faculty of Radiologists (London).

In 1956 Pinner joined Ron Hoy and Bruce Collings at a private radiology practice in Canberra. It had a wide geographical reach, servicing Canberra, Queanbeyan, Goulburn, and Cooma. She later supported the establishment of John James Memorial Hospital, a doctor-owned private hospital established in 1970 at Deakin, though she retained her position at CCH. John James (which became part of the Calvary group in 2006) was the only private hospital operating in Canberra for many years.

The first CCH director of radiology, Graham Utley, was appointed in October 1972. That same year, Pinner was elected a fellow of the RACR. Utley admitted that, while there were no reports of complaints or disagreements, ‘the working relationship with Gwen Pinner was awkward at times.’ As a senior radiologist, she had been functioning as the head of the department and ‘I think that she probably felt a bit of a loss there’ (Utley, in Powell 1999, 106). Pinner continued to run a private practice, walking the fine line of diplomacy as she did so.

A quiet and dignified practitioner, with a superb memory and excellent communication skills, she was the first woman to serve as president of the RACR (1984–85, vice president 1983–84). She was a member and later president of the Canberra Association of University Women in the mid-1960s. In 1988, at the opening of the new Parliament House in Canberra, she was asked to reprise her role in presenting a bouquet, this time to Queen Elizabeth II. She later recalled the earlier event only vaguely, saying that she did ‘not remember being overawed by the proceedings.’ The latter ‘was a much grander and more elaborate affair’ (Pinner 1988, 3).

Pinner retired in 1987. While never a vocal player in medical politics, she was held in high regard by colleagues. As one of her partners in practice observed: ‘Gwen was a brilliant radiologist and had a wonderful eye for spotting the abnormality in X-rays’ (Davis 1998). Beyond radiology, she enjoyed reading, concerts (especially ballet), tennis, golf, and dogs, owning ‘a succession of much loved highly strung poodles’ (Davis 1998). Following a short illness, she died on 27 February 1998 in Canberra and was buried alongside her parents in Woden cemetery. Pinner Place at Macgregor in Canberra’s north-west was named in her honour.