REVEREND DR JOHN FRASER (1834-1904)
by David Andrew Roberts
 |
| Reverend Dr. John Fraser (1834-1904),
Image from Maitland and District Historical Society, A
New History of Maitland. Maitland: Maitland City Council,
1983: 35. |
Born in Scotland (Perth) and educated at the
University of Edinburgh, Dr John Fraser migrated to Australia
and lived at Maitland, where he established a High School c1861
at Sauchie House on Church St. (now Maitland Boys High School).
An ethnologist, linguist and advocate of Christian missions, Fraser
authored numerous scholarly articles, including an essay on "The
Aborigines of NSW" that won the 1882 Royal Society of NSW
Prise. His crowning achievement was a comprehensive and authoritative
edition of Reverend L.E. Threlkeld's language studies, An Australian
Language, published in 1892 (Fraser
1892), a monumental work "hampered by his peculiar theories
of racial and linguistic origin" (Gunson
1974, I: 1). Fraser died in the New Hebrides in May 1904.
|
