HISTORIC PHOTOS REVEAL SAMOA IN THE 1910’s
Caption :The Leber-Prowazec visit resulted in the appointment of a German eye surgeon, Dr Otto Glantz, to Apia Hospital between 1913-15 to attend to the epidemic of trachoma in Samoa. In this photo, he stands at the surgery door entrance with arms folded, while assistants and patients who have had surgery sit outside. No other identities are known. It was ‘one eye at a time’ for obvious reasons. Photo By : Klinkmüller Family Collection, Auckland (edited).
26 old glass plate photographs have been released of two Scientists who were on a mission to treat an epidemic eye disease that spread across Samoa back in 1910-15s. "The Leber-Prowazek Medical Mission Photos" is a series of rare and valuable images from the dawn ages of Samoan history.
The images which are currently in the city of Heidelberg in Germany revealed Theodor Leber and Stanislaus von Prowazek , two scientists who journeyed to Samoa back in 1910 on a medical quest. The two travelled by foot in both islands of Upolu and Savaii ,and also traveled on paopao (samoan canoes) visiting the islands of Manono and venturing in Apolima
The two scientists successfully treated a total of 3,155 Samoans (out of a population of 33,554) with some Melanesians and Europeans present on island at the time , this is according to a 1992 thesis by Rainald Schmeig on Alfred Leber.
The thesis read that the medical quest by the two visitors recorded 80% of people had eye disease , it is believed that the main reason for its infection was from the eye part trachoma caused by a parasite called filarial. This is a bacterial infection that was caused by itching and irritation of the eyelids, contact of the skin to the eye and even worse it could lead to blindness.
Samoa was the first Pacific Island the scientists visited for their medical quest with the German Administration funding their trip with some personal savings the two pre-arranged before they entered Samoa assisted them while they were on assignment.
According to Researcher and former Executive councillor at NZ Academy of Fine Arts , Tony Brunt the hundred or so Leber-Images which are in Heidelberg Germany are a collection of precious records of Samoa's timeline.
"The Leber images in Heidelberg are very important but were only scanned by Gerry Barton in 2002 using a makeshift set-up before good scanners were available. Hence, their quality - sharpness and
resolution - are capable of major improvement if rescanned with a modern backlit scanner" he told EyeSpy Radio on Wednesday this week.
"What is interesting about Leber's images is that he took some on seaborne fautasi which would not have been easy to do with a clumsy glass plate camera" he added.
`Leber and Prowazec later on traveled to other destinations in the Pacific after Samoa. Dr Leber, passed away in 1958, spent most of the rest of his life practising ophthalmology or fulfilling leading academic roles in medical schools in Indonesia and India. Dr von Prowazec went on to co-discovered the pathogen of epidemic typhus a few years after leaving Samoa and died of typhus himself in 1915 while working in a German prison hospital.