About
The Royal Women's Hospital is Australia's oldest specialist women's hospital, established in 1856 as the Melbourne Lying-In Hospital and Infirmary for Diseases of Women and Children.
We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the place now called Victoria, and all First Peoples living and working on this land. We celebrate the history and contemporary creativity of the world’s oldest living culture and pay respect to Elders — past, present and future.
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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised that this website may contain culturally sensitive material — images, voices and information provided by now deceased persons. Content also may include images and film of places that may cause sorrow.
Some material may contain terms that reflect authors’ views, or those of the period in which the item was written or recorded but may not be considered appropriate today. These views are not necessarily the views of Victorian Collections.
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The Royal Women's Hospital is Australia's oldest specialist women's hospital, established in 1856 as the Melbourne Lying-In Hospital and Infirmary for Diseases of Women and Children.
Phosphatine Falieres was invented by pharmacist Émile Falières in the 1880s and marketed as a fortifying cereal or "farine" [flour] for infants, enriched with calcium. Said to be easily mixed and easily digestible, the cereal was added to an infant’s milk. It was made in Australia and distributed by a number of pharmaceutical companies, in the 1950s by Joubert & Joubert. The Phosphatine Falieres company advertised extensively, marketing to doctors, nurses, and mothers always using pictures of rosy-cheeked children. Falières created charming three-dimensional chromolithography pop-up/pop-out/moveable images many of which had a little tab. When the tab was pulled, these colourful sales props showed happy and healthy children opening a tureen of food that was fortified with Falieres cereal. The collection of Nurse Florence Green RWHA_2018_069 contains one such item of ephemera. Green was a graduate of the Women’s Hospital’s midwifery nurse training scheme in 1914. She lived at Hawthorn. The container is a cardboard cylinder with a printed label (stained) covering the entire surface. It has a metal (rusted) lid. The word "BORAX" has been written on the side.
Victorian Collections acknowledges the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the first inhabitants of the nation and the traditional custodians of the lands where we live, learn and work.