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East Barnet Urban District Council
NINETY-FIRST
ANNUAL REPORT
OF THE
MEDICAL OFFICER OF HEALTH
FOR THE YEAR 1964
To the Chairman and Members of the
East Barnet Urban District Council
As this Annual Report will be the last to be presented to the East
Barnet Urban District Council, and as the unavailablity of full figures
for 1964 makes it difficult to present the usual vital statistics, it seems
appropriate to take a brief look at the public health aspect of the
District's life as an entity of local government.
Unfortunately, our records are not complete. It has, in fact, been
impossible to trace from any source the Annual Reports for the first
16 years and we, therefore, start from 1891, in which year Dr. Walter
Roughton was appointed Medical Officer of Health. It is true that the
Council minutes show that in 1875 the then East Barnet Local Board
appointed a Dr. Saunders as a part time Medical Officer of Health,
for which he was paid £5 per annum which was intended also to cover
" travel, expenses, stationery, postage, etc.". The only reasonable
comment is that this was in the days of the penny post. Dr. Saunders,
nevertheless, held the appointment for 13 years until his resignation
in March, 1888. His successor, Dr. T. W. Thompson, accepted a temporary
appointment on the same princely terms and retained the post
for 2 years.
And now back to Dr. W. Roughton, who took office in May, 1891,
on a yearly basis at a salary of £50 per annum. Dr. Roughton was a
remarkable character. He held office from 1891 until 1917 and when
I came to this district in 1924, he was still living in a nearby area and
was well remembered by all the local doctors. He was in fact the
father-in-law of a well remembered General Practitioner who retired
just prior to the 1939 War. He took a great interest in infectious
diseases and for many years stressed the necessity of a local Isolation
Hospital—his suggestion being that a small house should be furnished
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