Frank Tidswell

Francis (Frank) Tidswell (1867 – 26 February 1941) was an Australian physician who served as the Director of the Government Bureau of Microbiology, New South Wales from 1908 until 1913. In this role he has been noted as "a pathologist of distinction who never sublimated his personality to his public service role." From 1925, until his death in 1941, Tidswell was the Director of Pathology at the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children in Sydney. In an obituary, The Medical Journal of Australia wrote of him as an "extremely clear thinker, young in mind and receptive of new ideas. In his gentleness of manner, and quiet courtesy, the [children's] hospital has lost a most valued specialist." Tidswell is considered one of Australia's pioneering microbiologists.

Birth and education

Tidswell was born in Sydney, the fifth of nine children born to Frederick Squire Tidswell (1831–1898) and his wife Mary Ann (1836–1912). The fourth child, Francis Thomas Tidswell (1864–1866) had died the year before his birth and the sixth child was the architect Thomas Tidswell (1870–1950). He was raised in rural NSW until the age of 13 when his family moved to Sydney. Fred Tidswell owned the Coogee Bay Hotel and bought Nugal Hall the Mortimer Lewis designed home in Milford Street Randwick and members of the family lived there until 1903. Tidswell attended Newington College (1881–1884) and then went up to the University of Sydney graduating as a Bachelor of Medicine and Chemistry in 1892. He then studied at University College, London, and was awarded a D.P.H., by the University of Cambridge in 1893.