Overview of
records in the Archives - Personal Papers
GB2134/B/PIC William Pickles
(1885-1969)
Biography
William Norman Pickles, general practitioner and epidemiologist,
was born 6 March 1885 in Leeds, son of John Jagger Pickles, a
general practitioner, and Lucy Pickles. Pickles was educated at
Leeds Grammar School and afterwards studied medicine at the medical
school of the then Yorkshire College. In his third year he
proceeded with his clinical studies at the Leeds General Infirmary,
where he qualified as a licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries
in 1909. After serving as resident obstetric officer at the
Infirmary, he began a series of temporary jobs and locums in
general practice. In 1910 he graduated MB BS London and became MD
in 1918.
His first visit to Aysgarth was as a locum for Dr Hime in
1912. After serving as a ship's doctor on a voyage to Calcutta, he
returned to Aysgarth later that year as second assistant to Dr
Hime. In 1913 he and the other assistant Dean Dunbar were able to
purchase the practice. Pickles served as general practitioner in
Aysgarth until he retired in 1964. His only break was when,
interrupted by the First World War, he served as surgeon-lieutenant
in the Royal Naval Volunteers.
In 1926 Pickles read and was inspired by 'The Principles of
Diagnosis and Treatment in Heart Affections' by Sir James
Mackenzie, who had made many important contributions to medical
knowledge from his general practice in Burnley. An epidemic of
catarrhal jaundice broke out in Wensleydale in 1929 affecting two
hundred and fifty people out of a population of five thousand seven
hundred. Pickles was able to trace the whole epidemic to a girl who
he had seen in bed on the morning of a village fete and who he
never thought would get up that day. In this enclosed community
Pickles was able to trace and to establish the long incubation for
this disease of 26 to 35 days. He published an account of the
epidemic in the British Medical Journal 24 May 1930. Two years
later he published record of an outbreak of Sonne dysentery and in
1933 he recorded in the British Medical Journal the first out break
of Bornholm disease (Epidemic Myalgia). His first published medical
paper was on Vincent's disease and was published in the Royal Naval
Medical Journal in 1918.
In 1935 Pickles described some of his work to the Royal
Society of Medicine . After this meeting a leading article in the
British Medical Journal stated "It may mark the beginning of a new
era in epidemiology". Major Greenwood, an outstanding
epidemiologist of the time, suggested that he should write a book
on his observations, which was published in 1939 as 'Epidemiology
in Country Practice'. It became a medical classic- and is still in
print today- establishing Pickles's reputation. It showed how a
country practice could be a field laboratory with unique
opportunities for epidemiologists.
Pickles had become famous, and subsequently received many
honours. He was Milroy lecturer at the Royal College of Physicians
of London (1942) and Cutter lecturer at Harvard (1948). In 1946 he
shared the Stewart prize of the BMA with Major Greenwood, in 1953
the Bisset-Hawkins medal of the Royal College of Physicians, and in
1955 he was elected an honorary fellow of the Royal College of
Physicians of Edinburgh and was awarded the first James Mackenzie
medal. He was honoured with an Honorary Doctorate of Science from
Leeds University in 1950, and in 1957 was appointed CBE. He became
the first president of the College of General Practitioners in
1953, a post he held until 1956. He sat on numerous committees
including the General Health Services Council and Register
General's Advisory Committee and lectured extensively both at home
and abroad.
In 1917 he married Gerturde Adelaide , daughter of Harry
Tunstill, a wealthy mill owner from Burnley. Pickles died 2 March
1969, his wife died later the same year.