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In this recording Miss L. E. Cook gives a talk on the history of the Plunket Society and the efforts of Dr Frederic Truby King to improve infant care and lower infant mortality rates in New Zealand.
Miss Cook worked with Dr King, and says she first met him in 1906 when he was working at Seacliff Asylum. He noted that calves on the hospital farm had been thriving after he developed a better diet for them.
She talks about his theories on mammals and the different qualities of milk they produce for their babies. In a public meeting in 1907 Dr King presented his research findings, and they began to be taken up by the public and newspapers around the country. He set up a permanent hospital at Karitane, after earlier caring for babies in his own house at Seacliff.
Miss Cook also talks about the spread of Dr King's techniques after successful results with babies continued. His first formula for dried milk was worked out after hearing about the families of men working on the Otira Tunnel, who did not have access to flat land to raise cows.
She ends by describing the move to Wellington by Sir Truby and Lady King, and the Karitane Hospital and products factory at Melrose.