W.J.B. ("Till") Green matriculated at High School Paarl in 1919 and graduated (BVSc) in December 1924 at the Veterinary Faculty of the Transvaal University College at Onderstepoort as one of the first group of locally trained veterinarians. During his student days he played in the college's first rugby team for four years. In 1925 he became a member of the South African Veterinary Medical Association. That same year he was appointed as veterinary research officer in the Department of Bacteriology of the Onderstepoort Veterinary Research Institute. There he assisted Dr J.R. Scheuber* in perfecting the formolised blackquarter vaccine that came to be generally used in the country and reported on 'Immunization against anaerobes of the gas gangrene type in South Africa by means of antitoxins' in the 15th Annual Report of the Director of Veterinary Services (1929).

From November 1928 Green was placed in charge of the Allerton Laboratory in Natal, returning to Onderstepoort in 1930. A few months later he undertook a three-year bovine tuberculosis survey in Durban, as head of the tuberculosis campaign conducted jointly by the Veterinary Division and the municipal authorities. Around this time he also contributed articles on 'Fowl typhoid' and 'Intestinal worms of poultry and their control' to Farming in South Africa (1930). In June 1933 he briefly returned to Allerton before finally returning to Onderstepoort in August 1934 to continue his research on tuberculosis and lecture on veterinary hygiene and animal management in the Faculty of Veterinary Science.

Green died in his sleep of heart failure at his home at Onderstepoort. He was a reserved person by nature, and a conscientious and painstaking worker. He was married to Nellie Eva, born Little, with whom he had a son and a daughter.

List of sources:
Author and Subject Index to the Government Veterinary Reports of the Transvaal and Union of South Africa (1903-1932). Pretoria: Department of Agriculture, June 1937.

Author and Subject Index to the Onderstepoort Journal of Veterinary Science and Animal Industry (1933-1950) and the Onderstepoort Journal of Veterinary Research (1951-1968). Pretoria: Department of Agriculture, June 1969.

Google scholar. http://scholar.google.co.za Publications by W.J.B. Green.

Journal of the South African Veterinary Medical Association, 1927, Vol. 1(1), pp. 84-85: List of members; 1929, Vol. 1(3), pp. 77-82: Register of veterinarians of the Union of South Africa.

National Archives Pretoria (TAB). Source MHG, Vol. 0, Ref. 93102. Death notice, William John Burger Green.

[Obituary] William John Burger Green (1901-1936). Journal of the South African Veterinary Medical Association, 1936, Vol. 7, pp. 131-132.

Posthumus, P.J. Past Veterinarians in South Africa, Vol. 1, 10th edition, [1992].

Compiled by: D.W. Verwoerd

Last updated: 2020-04-23 17:30:14