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Margaret in 1947) Georgina and her sisters lived for most of their lives at this address with Jessie the last one to die there in 1981 one year after
Georgina in 1980. Of the five sisters only Georgina, Margaret and Jessie married. Georgina cared for her sister Margaret when she died in 1939. Over the years the sisters lived in Shorter Street and if married briefly as was Georgina for only eight years, returned to live in the family home when widowed. Georgina also kept her maiden name of Johnstone for all the time she was a registered nurse. As the sisters aged they also supported and, in turn, cared for each other.
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Act which gave preference to nurses who had enlisted and served during the war. McCready had already resigned from her previous position at
Cessnock Hospital at this point and had been appointed and accepted the position at Maitland Hospital. She also wrote to the committee informing them that she had enlisted in the Australian Forces and was located at Randwick Military Hospital for some months in 1914. However Mr Enright continued with his objections until E. B. Harkness, the Under Secretary in the Chief Secretary's Department, ruled that Matron Johnstone's appointment could not be upset.
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106:, (Civil) 8 June 1963 for services to the nursing profession. It was during her term as a supervisory nurse inspecting hospital standards for the NSW Board of Health in 1929, that Georgina found the low salaries and poor working and living conditions for nurses throughout NSW. She found that, many hospitals fell below Nurses Registration Board (NRB) requirements and nurses had no industrial cover. Supported by
191:, Renfrewshire, Scotland in 1888. George Johnstone moved the family to Glasgow when Georgina was in her early twenties and she worked first at a chartered accountant office. She also enrolled at evening college to learn shorthand. She then enrolled in general nursing at the newly open Eastern district Hospital, graduating in 1912 when she was 24.
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McCready was praised in March 1923 when selected as Matron at
Maitland Hospital, despite one of the Hospital Committee members, Mr W J Enright, objecting to her appointment He believed that as she was not a 'war nurse' her appointment was contrary to the Returned Soldiers and Sailor's Employment
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During her term of service at the hospital Matron
Johnstone has won for herself the reputation of a capable and efficient nurse, and a tactful disciplinarian. Her departure will be keenly regretted not only by the medical and nursing profession and the committee, but by the patients and the numerous
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Georgina and her father visited relatives in New South Wales in 1913, and all of the
Johnstone family immigrated to Australia in 1914. They would live in their house at Shorter Avenue, Dumbleton (later Beverley Hills) in Sydney thereafter. With both parents gone (George Johnstone died 1930 and
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Georgina was at the
Renwick Hospital for Infants in 1915-1916 and sub-matron at St George Cottage Hospital from January 1916. By 1920 Georgina Johnstone had been appointed Matron at Cessnock Hospital where she remained to 1923 leaving to take up the position of Matron at Maitland Hospital. Georgina
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It was after her husband’s death, and her absence from her nursing career for the duration of her marriage, that she was recruited for her role as a supervisory Nurse with the NSW Board of Health, this a catalyst for her on the next part of her professional life with the NSW College of
Nursing and
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McCready and her sister Jessie worked in several hospitals after arriving in
Australia with their parents and siblings in 1914 and garnered substantial knowledge and experience of nursing, hospital administration and the broader health sector of NSW. Both were required to sit examinations with the
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the NSW Nurses
Association. Georgina did not return to hospital nursing but immersed herself into a prominent new role of trade unionist and activist for the profession of nursing as well as reformer, policy shaper and founding member of both the nurses’ union and the
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and in partnerships with Iono
Nowland (assistant to the registrar of the NRB) Georgina formed the NSW Nurses Association at an emergency meeting 27 March 1931. The 1931 Executive included Nowland as President and Johnstone as Honorary Secretary.
98:(NSWCN) in 1949. She was the Founding president for the College from 1949 to 1950 and chaired the first meeting of the provisional council for the college. Also, McCready was one of the first supervisory sisters in the
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In Pursuit of Nursing Excellence: A History of the Royal College of Nursing, Australia, 1949-99, Oxford University Press, Melbourne & Oxford, 1999.
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Georgina married Samuel McCready in 1932 at St Stephens Church in Sydney. McCready was a dairy farmer at Keerrong in the local government area of
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Australian Trained Nurses Association (ATNA) in 1914 before they could continue with their nursing careers, and they completed midwifery at
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Matron Georgina Johnstone (later McCready) seated front row, with nurses from Maitland Hospital of which she was matron from 1923 to 1926
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Georgina Johnstone was the eldest daughter of George Johnstone and Margaret Gibson and was born at the industrial port town of
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260:, Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre. Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University. Mary Dickenson,
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345:, Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre. Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University. NSWCN,
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in 1929. The McCready Scholarship was established in 1954 by the NSWNA in her honour. She was appointed MBE (
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NSW, Births, Deaths and Marriages Registers, for all of the sisters and parents of Georgina McCready.
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240:, Canberra: National Centre of Biography, Australian National University
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The Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol 15, 2000 (online in 2006).
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An Unsentimental Union, The NSW Nurses Association, 1931-1992,
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1980, op cit. Hazel Woolston, ‘McCready, Georgina (1888-1980),’ in
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An Unsentimental Union, The NSW Nurses Association, 1931-1992,
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also worked for a time at Broken Hill & District Hospital.
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1980, op cit. Mary Dickenson, op cit. Hazel Woolston, op cit.
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Hale & Iremonger, Sydney, 1993. Russell, G. Smith,
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1980, Series CN13, Box 1, NSWCN Archives, Parramatta.
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1980, Series CN13, Box 1, NSWCN Archives, Parramatta
341:Georgina McCready (1888-1980), Biography Entry, in
256:Georgina McCready (1888-1980), Biography Entry, in
90:, nee Johnstone, MBE, was a founding member of the
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137:She was described in the local press as follows:
16:Australian nurse and trade unionist (1888-1980)
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234:"McCready, Georgina (1888–1980)"
175:, OBE, FCN (NSW), 1908-1992 and
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450:19th-century Australian women
445:20th-century Australian women
364:Australian College of Nursing
165:Australian College of Nursing
122:Crown Street Women’s Hospital
104:Member of the British Empire
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179:(nee Looker), OBE.
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314:Dickenson, Mary (1993).
100:NSW Department of Health
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379:December 1954, p.iv,
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177:Margaret Frances Guy
169:Muriel Knox Doherty
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167:. The others were
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88:Georgina McCready
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210:References
70:Occupation
64:Australian
377:The Lamp,
126:Petersham
189:Greenock
128:in 1928.
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200:Lismore
171:, RRC,
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115:Career
78:Spouse
383:NRB,
73:nurse
320:ISBN
55:1980
52:Died
38:Born
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