Arnold Cook
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2021}}
{{Use Australian English|date=April 2011}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Arnold Cook
| image = Arnold Cook 1950.jpg
| caption = Cook c. 1950
| birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1922|05|5}}
| birth_place = Narrogin, Western Australia
| death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|1981|06|30|1922|05|5}}
| nationality = Australian
| occupation = Economist
}}
File:Public art - Arnold Cook, Association for the Blind, Vic Park, Perth.jpg
Arnold Charles Cook (5 May 1922 – 30 June 1981) was an Australian academic and senior economics lecturer at the University of Western Australia (UWA). He was blind since his teenage years and is noted for, in 1950, bringing the first overseas, professionally trained guide dog to Australia and for being instrumental in establishing the first guide dog training centre in the country.{{cite web |title=To Guide and Guard: An early history of Guide Dogs in Australia |last=Hasluck |first=Alexandra |publisher=Association for the Blind of Western Australia |year=1966 |url=https://www.visability.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/history-guideguard.pdf |accessdate=18 June 2012 |archive-date=25 March 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190325080114/https://www.visability.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/history-guideguard.pdf |url-status=dead }}{{cite web |title=Thirty Years of Economics: UWA and the WA Branch of the Economic Society from 1963 to 1992 |last=McLure |first=Michael |publisher= University of Western Australia |year=2009 |url= http://www.uwa.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/606306/09_18_McLure.pdf|accessdate=18 June 2012}}
Biography
Cook was born in Narrogin on 5 May 1922, the first son of Charles Ernest Stanley Cook and Grace Florence Bell.{{cite web|url=http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~mywamob/mywamob/2576.htm|title=Arnold Charles Cook|work=ancestry.com|accessdate=4 February 2011}} He later lived in Geraldton and was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa at the age of 15; he was totally blind by the age of 18.
In 1944 he commenced his Bachelor of Arts, majoring in Economics at the University of Western Australia and graduated with first-class honours in 1947.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article46247685 |title=News and notes|newspaper=The West Australian |location=Perth |date=12 December 1946 |accessdate=3 February 2011 |page=7 Edition: SECOND EDITION |publisher=National Library of Australia}} While at University he met Enid Doreen Fuller and they were married in December 1946. Between 1948 and 1950 he studied at the London School of Economics after winning a UWA Hackett Research Studentship for study abroad valued at £800.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article18052659 |title=Blind boy wins scholarship |newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald |location=New South Wales|date=6 December 1947 |accessdate=3 February 2011 |page=4 |publisher=National Library of Australia}} A public appeal raised another £600 to assist him and his wife's living expenses.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article48569858 |title=Perth university blind lecturer |newspaper=Barrier Miner |location=Broken Hill, New South Wales|date=13 August 1948 |accessdate=3 February 2011 |page=3 |publisher=National Library of Australia}}
While in the United Kingdom Cook made contact with the British Guide Dogs for the Blind Association at Leamington Spa from whom he acquired a black Labrador guide dog "Dreena" which he brought back to Perth in August 1950.{{cite web|url=http://www.guidedogswa.com.au/guide-dogs/history-of-guide-dogs/ |title=History of Guide Dogs |publisher=Association for the Blind of Western Australia |accessdate=2 February 2011 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110217045635/http://www.guidedogswa.com.au/guide-dogs/history-of-guide-dogs/ |archivedate=17 February 2011 }}{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article47885202 |title=Welcome home for Dreena |newspaper=The West Australian |location=Perth |date=8 September 1950 |accessdate=3 February 2011 |page=3 |publisher=National Library of Australia}} UWA offered him a position as economics lecturer and Cook and Dreena became familiar, if not novel, sights around the city as they caught public transport between his home in Belmont and the campus at Nedlands. Alexandra Hasluck described Dreena as "... the most famous dog in all Western Australia for a while."
In 1951 Cook helped establish the first guide dog school in Australia in Perth as part of the local Guide Dogs for the Blind Association.{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article47886021 |title=Helping the blind|newspaper=The West Australian |location=Perth |date=13 September 1950 |accessdate=3 February 2011 |page=11 |publisher=National Library of Australia}} In 1957 the organisation expanded into Victoria and ultimately became Guide Dogs Australia.
Cook travelled to the United States on sabbatical to study in 1957 and again in 1965, earning a doctorate at Harvard University in 1961.
As well as being the founder of the Guide Dog Movement in Australia, Cook was the foundation president of the Retinitis Pigmentosa Foundation of Western Australia and patron and foundation president of the Western Australian Guild of Blind Citizens.{{cite web|url=http://monumentaustralia.org.au/monument_display.php?id=60968&image=0|title=Arnold Cook & Dreena, Kings Park|publisher=Monument Australia|accessdate=18 June 2012}}
He died of a heart attack at his home in Nedlands on 30 June 1981.
In 1985, Cook's societal contribution received recognition through the unveiling of a bronze statue featuring him and his guide dog, Dreena, at the entrance to the Ivy Watson Playground in Kings Park. The statue was a commission from the Western Australian Guild of Blind Citizens. Another statue of the pair was unveiled in 2007 at the offices of the Association for the Blind of Western Australia in Victoria Park.{{cite web|url=http://monumentaustralia.org.au/monument_display.php?id=93385&image=0|title=Dr Arnold Cook & Dreena, Association for the Blind|publisher=Monument Australia|accessdate=18 June 2012}} There is also a bust of Cook at Guide Dogs NSW.{{cite web|url=http://monumentaustralia.org.au/monument_display.php?id=21292&image=0|title=50th Anniversary Guide Dogs NSW|publisher=Monument Australia|accessdate=18 June 2012}}
References
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Category:Blind scholars and academics
Category:Australian blind people
Category:People from Narrogin, Western Australia
Category:University of Western Australia alumni
Category:Academic staff of the University of Western Australia
Category:Alumni of the London School of Economics