Australia’s first trained social worker

The
Catholic Weekly
Online

Sydney
23 May 2004

Swans fly high with Vinnies Appeal

Bishops’ urgent call on detainees

Maronites celebrate new saint

Agencies divided over ‘best’ or ‘cruel’ Budget

It all comes down to love, Susie tells aid luncheon

Boys Town, AA, Grow and Fr Tom

Pitter patter: Why not support groups for dads, too?

Aust bishops commend new Mass translation

Cardinal at All Saints jubilee

Bishop to speak about ‘morning after’ pill

Prayer for end to drought

Cardinal’s Comment: Light years better, but system’s still tough

Dinner tribute to archbishop in Goulburn parish merger

Editorial: A just solution

Letters: We knelt in street

Conversation: Dr Brigid Vout, director of the Life Office - Spreading the message ‘with compassion’

A different Australia

Oilfield justice would be nice, too

Cardinal hears the view of young leaders

Speaking out!

St Patrick’s College proud of $5m makeover

Club has great tradition of service and facilities

Club proud supporter of parish, children

Vale – the ‘soldier’s padre’

Australia’s first trained social worker

Faith plays role for Alan

Girls will sing at St Peter’s

Eaglereach: ultimate wilderness experience

Parish Mass a vital part of Tadgh’s game plan

Australia’s first trained social worker

Norma Parker Brown 1907–2004

By DJ GLEESON

THE distinguished pioneer Australian social worker and founder of professional Catholic social welfare, Professor Norma Parker Brown, died in Melbourne on Easter Saturday, aged 97.

Norma, as she was affectionately known to everyone, established Catholic social work at St Vincent’s Hospitals, Melbourne (1932) and Sydney (1936), and was instrumental in the formation of Catholic welfare bureaus (Centacare) in Melbourne (1935), Sydney (1941) and Adelaide (1942).

The eldest of five children, Norma Alice Parker was born into a working class Catholic family in Perth in 1907. Her mother, Annie Westhoven, came from an Anglo-German Catholic family; her father, Ernest, from a Wesleyan Methodist tradition.

Norma attended Sacred Heart High School, Perth, and won an Exhibition (i.e. scholarship) to study Arts at the University of Western Australia (UWA) in 1925 with the intention of being a teacher. At UWA she joined the Newman Society, founded by the scholarly and pastorally dynamic priest, Mons John Thomas McMahon, and also formed a lifetime friendship with Constance Pauline Moffit (1906-88) who would become another pioneer Catholic social worker.

The young women’s interest in social work was stimulated by an academic, Ethel Turner Stoneman, and Mons McMahon who arranged two scholarships.

Thank you for visiting the Catholic Weekly Online. To read this article in full, please subscribe to the print edition, or buy the paper for $1 at your local NSW Catholic church. Click here to email comments to the editor.