Doreen Moira Langley as Flight Officer, WAAAF, interviewed by Joyce Thomson

Doreen Moira Langley (SERN 110802) as a flight officer Women's Auxiliary Australian Air Force, 1943-1945, interviewed about her experiences before, during and after her time in the WAAAF. Langley studied science and nutrition at university, and went on to work in a number of roles during WW2 including improving food for pilots and producing cooking manuals using rations and deyhdtrated food.

Langley was born in London on 23 January 1920 to an English mother and an Australian military father. Langley was educated at Warrnambool, where her father was headmaster of the local high school. Langley noted that her mother had strong opinions regarding the necessity for women to be independent from men, including having a tertiary education.

Langley describes how at age fourteen she was sent to board at Melbourne Church of England Grammar School, and reflects on her experiences including painful menstruation; thinking poorly of her appearance and sporting activities, but well of her academic ability; observations of unhealthy relationships between mistresses and pupils; being School Head in her last year and winning a prize for all-round excellence, and reading Vera Britain’s Testament of Youth. She also notes her father’s friendship with Jim Fairburn, a state member of parliament, which assisted her mother into a job on the Melbourne Herald, writing social notes at twopence a line, which helped pay the boarding fees. Langley recalls at this time the “general sadness” about the abdication of Edward VIII, and concern about Hitler and Poland.

Langley was awarded a bursary for four years at Janet Clarke Hall and studied science, maths, zoology, physics, chemistry, biochemistry, bacteriology and nutrition. There were many female tutors, and they were well respected by the men, but few if any women held high positions in the Melbourne University union.

In her late teens Langley was “pro-Russia, anti-Nazi and a utopian socialist”, and engaged in political arguments at home and in discussion with students at university. When in the third year of her studies the Second World War was declared, it was widely expected that England and her allies would win quickly; a good degree seemed more important than the war.

Following graduation Langley worked in two different positions before being offered a job as a dietician with the Fourth General US Army Hospital at the New Melbourne Hospital, where she felt satisfied to be contributing to the war effort. She made long-term friends with several US soldiers, who were billeted there. When the Americans moved north, she could not accompany them as she had no military rank or position, so she returned to her family in Bendigo and wrote a book about her experiences. The book was positively critiqued but paper shortages prevented its being published widely.

After some months unemployment Langley decided to join the WAAF. At the WAAF Recruiting Centre in Russell Street she was formally interviewed, a process which included writing an essay, taking a number of adaptability tests and having a medical examination. She was accepted after some difficulty securing release from Manpower, and was eventually sent on a course at Queen’s College. There RAAF and WAAF students, studied and lived separately. Langley describes initial difficulty adjusting to drill and discipline but enjoying the bivouac. Her first posting was to 4 Maintenance Group, to take charge of three large mansions in Toorak, being used as barracks for the WAAF. Initially the post lacked activity but she later organised WAAF functions and parties and describes a difficult relationship between two WAAAF.

In February 1944 she met with Wing Commander Creole, Director of DSS, who wanted to start a new branch to improve RAAF food particularly for pilots. A second member of the team was Section Officer Allen, who had spent a month in Port Moresby demonstrating the use of dehydrated foods. The third member of the team was Under Officer Hudson who had been a cook at Government House and did much practical work in converting rations into ‘edible food’. With so many of the ingredients being dehydrated, food at its best was average. Dehydrated mutton was the worst ingredient to use. When pamphlets were produced, the material would be provided by the section (Langley, Allen and Hudson) and printing and production was provided by Army Education.

She went to work at RAAF Headquarters, working on nutritional matters, visiting hospitals and convalescent depots, helping to improve the use of rations. She also travelled widely to lecture to mess officers, including Broome and Darwin.

Post War Life: After discharge, Langley took a post-graduate course in nutrition at the Institute of Anatomy in Canberra covering economics, food preparation, statistics and field work, which lead to her involvement in the “1947 New Guinea Nutrition Survey Expedition” with a team comprised of Dr Clemments, a medical officer, a parasitologist, two biochemists, dentists, a Department of Information photographer, an agriculturist and an anthropologist from the New Guinea Administration. The Institute of Anatomy officially advised the Department of External Territories on ration scales so information about native foods needed to be collected in order to establish the nutritional status and health of the people. A film of the expedition was made by Jim Fitzpatrick. The report was called the “Report of the New Guinea Nutrition Survey Expedition 1947”, and was still being used by the Garoka PNG Hospital in 1980.

Langley describes the eight month expedition as often uncomfortable, but never dull, with a lot of travel done by water. The team spent a month in each of five villages, each with a different food staple. These were Besowna in the Hughen Gulf (taro); Carapet in the Marken Valley (bananas): Partup near the Warbalu Goldfields (sweet potato): the Trobian Islands (yams and fish) and west to Coriabi in the Perari Delta (sago). Contact in the villages as mainly through missionaries and local government officers. There were two groups of Europeans: the “New Order” who wanted to bring education, trades and skills and the islanders into the 20th Century. The other group wanted to exploit the islanders and their resources for profit. Langley expresses disappointment in the lack of interest shown by Australians in a country in which many Australians had suffered during the war.

Langley found a job with the Medical Research Council Nutrition Unit in West Africa, paid for by the Colonial Office. The work involved surveying the nutritional status of a Gambian village with a Muslim population; during Ramadan, a time of fasting, their weight would drop, to build up again afterwards. However a number of problems arose and after eight months Langley resigned.

Langley accepted a job in Suva, Fiji, as a nutritionist in the South Pacific Health Service (SPHS) alongside New Zealand-trained Susan Holmes as chief nutritionist. The job involved nutritional education, broadcasting and nutritional surveys of areas that came under the SPHS. She visited Tonga and Nurai Island and did some hospital nutrition in Latoka and Suva. After two years she returned to Australia and became a lecturer in nutrition with the Department of Education in Sydney. Nutritional lecturing in the South Pacific is about eating what is scarce; in Sydney one lectures about choosing from what is in abundance. She was later appointed to be Principal of the Women’s College in 1957, coinciding with the release by the Menzies Government of the Murray Report, which advocated more residential colleges for Australian universities.

There were 97 residential students when Langley took over as Principal of the Women’s College and about 270 when she left. She soon realised that looking after a building built in 1894 was not very different from her WAAF job looking after the Toorak mansions. When the housekeeper resigned, Langley had to maintaining the college and cater for the students, so she reflected that her WAAF experience came in very useful. Langley goes on to further discuss events, initiatives and changes instigated during her time as Principal and board member at Sydney University and subsequent events such as undertaking a diploma course in criminology, and volunteering at the Manly-Waringa Citizens’ Advice Bureau (MWCAB).