Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01306:reg:61:p2
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01306
Segment Type: reg
Provision Reference: reg 61 (pt 2/2)
Character Range: 110642–112149

latter half of 1937, Cumpston was forced to inform the Minister for Health, now W.M. Hughes, that MacKenzie was 'mentally quite incapable of any professional work, and … [had] largely to be looked after by somebody else.' MacKenzie resigned in November 1937 and

  returned to Melbourne with his wife. He died there on 29 June 1938. A bronze plaque to his memory was subsequently erected in the foyer of the Institute and his ashes placed behind it.64

  In characterising the Institute of Anatomy during MacKenzie's period as Director, one description that could fairly be applied was that it resembled an extended family or clan. The family influence at the Institute was very strong. Before he married her, MacKenzie's wife had been his research assistant, while Dr Charles MacKay, who was appointed medical assistant at the Institute in 1936 and became its Acting Director on MacKenzie's retirement, was MacKenzie's first cousin. Other Institute staff, such as the histologist Mr W. Owen and the photographic artist Miss Lovett, were long-term members of MacKenzie's close-knit group of loyal assistants. As already noted, too, MacKenzie established an annual endowed lecture at the Institute in honour of his mother. The Charles MacKay Lecture, established in 1933, was inaugurated in honour of MacKenzie's maternal grandfather, the endowee being MacKenzie's sister.

Figure 23: Hotel Acton, Beauchamp House Australian Institute of Anatomy from City Hill 1927–35 (National Archives of Australia 2018)