11 Dec 2022

The Radio Doctor who broadcast health care for 40 years

From Standing Room Only, 12:33 pm on 11 December 2022
Claire Macindoe

Claire Macindoe Photo: supplied

Dr_Harold_Turbott_photographed_by_Bill_Beavis_used_with_permission_of_the_Alexander_Turnbull_Library_

Dr Harold Turbott Photo: Photographed by Bill Beavis, used with permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library

Dr H. B. Turbott was The Radio Doctor for more than 40 years - pre and post the Second World War -  dispensing advice on a range of health and social issues until his retirement in 1984.

His broadcasts spanned child rearing, vaccination and communicable diseases, through to healthy ageing and nutrition.

Dr Turbott's often very enlightened opinions for the time fascinated Dr Claire Macindoe, an Ōtepoti/Dunedin-based researcher and historian.

She based her PhD thesis on him - The Radio Doctor - Broadcasting Health into the Home.   Now she's won the Judith Binney Writing Award, she plans to turn that thesis into a book.

Lynn Freeman asks Claire how she heard about Harold Turbott's broadcasts.

We'd like to thank Nga Taonga Sound and Vision for the clips of Dr Turbott in this item.