DOCUMENT

6 The Neurological Foundation Carman, the Professor of Anatomy in the new medical school in Auckland, Gavin Glasgow, neurologist and Philip Wrightson, neurosurgeon at Auckland Hospital. In 1970 Chapman proposed to the New Zealand Epilepsy Association to sponsor a national appeal to raise capital funds for the establishment of a research foundation for neurological diseases. A medical steering committee was convened by Carman to advise the Epilepsy Association on medical aspects of the formation of the Neurological Foundation. The other members of the steering committee were Glasgow, Wrightson and Barry Cant, a young clinical neurophysiologist at Auckland Hospital, who had recently returned to New Zealand after training at the Mayo Clinic. The medical steering committee felt the Foundation should confine its support to neurological research, leaving patient support and advocacy to organisations like the Epilepsy Association and the Multiple Sclerosis Society. The Lions Clubs and several distinguished New Zealanders were recruited to support the appeal, which was launched on radio by the Governor- General, Sir Arthur Porritt. At first, Chapman was the principal organiser of the appeal, but the size of the task meant that he could not continue in that role while still working full-time for the University and so Mr. W.I. Parks was appointed as the full-time organiser. The fundraising appeal was organised in Auckland, but it was supported by branches of the Epilepsy Association and by neurologists, neurosurgeons, and neuroscientists from throughout the rest of New Zealand. The Bryant Trust of Hamilton initiated the appeal with a donation of $45,000. In the end the fundraising appeal eventually produced $70,057, which was used to start the Foundation and ultimately fund the first round of grants in 1972. The Neurological Foundation was incorporated on 28 October 1971. The first councillors were Professor Chapman, Sir Dove-Myer Robinson the Mayor of Auckland City, businessman John Seabrook, Mervyn Vile (a Christchurch accountant), Len Hart, Rolf Porter, Gerald McDouall (General Manager of the Wanganui Savings Bank) and Peter Shaw (a chartered accountant from Hamilton). Another businessman, Arnold Babington, was appointed as a special Councillor on recommendation of the New Zealand Council of District Governors of Lions International, as the Lion’s Club played a major role in the fundraising appeal and the beginning of the Foundation. The inaugural Council meeting was held on 9 December 1971 in the Foundation’s first registered office in His Majesty’s Arcade on Auckland’s Queen Street. From the beginning, the Council decided the income from donations, legacies and the annual appeal would be conserved as capital funds and that research grants would be funded from the interest, which is a model still upheld to this day. By 1982, the Foundation had more than 8,000 members and the capital funds The opening of the office of the Neurological Foundation at 66 Grafton Road in 2000. From left to right: John Burton (the Neurological Foundation's Chairman), Sir Michael Hardie Boys (Governor General of New Zealand), Dr Jon Simcock ( the Neurological Foundation's Medical Adviser), Lady Hardie Boys and Professor Dick Laverty (the Neurological Foundation's Chairman of Scientific Advisory Commitee)