Arnold Theiler's vaccine saved the day

What A Great Idea! by Mike Bruton is a stunning, full-colour book that documents South Africa’s amazing inventors and innovations. Today’s extract is about Arnold Theiler.

Arnold Theiler qualified as a veterinary surgeon in Switzerland and came to South Africa in 1891, at the age of 24. At the time, South African farmers were sceptical of foreign experts and their research-based approach. In their opinion, they “knew” their horses and cattle, and the standard remedy, for instance, for horse sickness was pouring half a bottle of linseed oil down the old nag’s throat. Rinderpest outbreaks were regarded as “God’s judgement on the people”, to be met by days of prayer.

Theiler’s breakthrough came in 1893, during an outbreak of smallpox in Johannesburg. There was a severe shortage of the vaccine and he was asked to solve the problem. Within a few weeks, he produced all the vaccine that was needed. He gradually established his reputation by using his research results to control or restrict the impact of rinderpest, horse sickness, biliary fever, gall sickness, wireworm, East Coast fever, blue tongue and a variety of other farm stock diseases. He became South Africa’s Pasteur, Lister, Koch and Jenner rolled into one!

A classic example of his practical approach was his discovery of the cause of lamsiekte, which was costing South African farmers thousands of lambs a year. He discovered that the disease was a botulism caused by the habit of licking old bones in the veld. The licking, in turn, was caused by a phosphorus deficiency in the soil. His remedy: clear away old bones and provide bone meal licks!

As state veterinarian, he was provided with funds to establish Onderstepoort and later established a veterinary faculty at the University of Pretoria. It became a model for veterinary research worldwide and was imbued with the Theiler motto: Find out! Theiler spoke German, French, English, Afrikaans, High Dutch, Spanish and Italian (all with a foreign accent), was an authority on antiques and loved good music. He made the world a better place for thousands of animals (and their human keepers). His brilliant son Max followed in his footsteps.

• What A Great Idea! is published by Jacana Media and can be purchased at major bookstores at a recommended selling price of R295