David Wright won’t mind if I say he has OCD. Obsessive Collecting Drive.
It’s easily diagnosed.
When you enter his cottage near Fearn in Easter Ross, you find yourself in an Aladdin’s cave of toys and curiosities from ceiling to floor, with boxes and boxes of yet more treasure lining the spare room.
David’s been a collector all his life, and it’s toys he goes for at the moment.
But one of his past obsessions now forms an important part of the Highland archive, and a small section of it is now on long-term display in Inverness Museum.
In the 1990s while working as a nurse at Migdale Hospital in Bonar Bridge, David started collecting medical memorabilia, and not by halves.
Over a period of 20 years, he amassed more than 2,000 items, including three ambulances.
How David’s medical collection started
His medical collecting fire was lit when he discovered some historic medical books in a charity shop in Inverness in 1995.
It took him two supermarket trolley trips to cart away the books, which dated from 1861 to 1959.
He later discovered they had originally belonged to four generations of doctors in the Drumnadrochit area.
From that point and, he stresses, before the internet made collecting much easier, he started gathering his mighty hoard.
David telephoned or hand-wrote letters to Highland GPs and retired doctors, asking them to donate bygone equipment, and to his surprise he had an overwhelming response.
One of his earliest acquisitions was a 1930s baby scale from Dr Gaius Sutton, in Tongue.
Donations to David’s medical collection came from all over the Highlands
Dr Monica Main, from Helmsdale donated an entire collection of chemists’ bottles used by Chisholm’s of Brora from the 1930s to the 1950s.
The oldest item in the collection is a second century AD Roman probe, which David describes as being like a firework sparkler.
It was bought for him by a family friend, as was a 17th century medicine bottle from Holland.
His array includes opthalmic instruments, bedpans, sterilisers, syringes, Gladstone bags and doctors’ diagnostic kits.
There are World War II first aid kits, gas masks and stretchers – and an early Neil Robertson stretcher made of bamboo cane and canvas, with belts and buckles.
‘It’s not a straitjacket!’
“Most people think at first it’s a straitjacket but it was formerly used to take seriously injured people off mountains or rough terrain, ” David said.
One of his favourite items is an Ever Ray medical electricity kit from 1939, which was claimed as a cure-all for “anything from a mild ailment to a severe chronic illness.”
The Ever Ray even claimed to encourage hair growth, cure aching muscles or relieve spinal pains, by means of high-frequency pulses through glass tubes activated by an electrical control box.
“It still works, but its use is banned now,” David says. “It’s similar to the modern ultrasound treatment carried out by physiotherapists.”
David purchased old ambulances
David went on to purchase three old ambulances over the years.
He started with a 1984 Ford Transit Hanlon, formerly used by the St Johns Ambulance Service in Colchester.
“It was made of fibreglass and had sliding doors to cope with narrow streets.”
He took the ambulances to shows
David’s game plan was to use the ambulance take parts of the collection to shows, which he did.
That ambulance eventually found its way to service in Africa.
David then bought a Mercedes ambulance, pictured above, again from Colchester, as Scottish ambulances tended to be too far gone by the time they were sold off.
That ambulance later went with a charity to Bulgaria where it was used by the fire service as a front line ambulance.
Enough was enough
David’s final ambulance was a Ford Transit Panel, ex military, white on the outside and with a green interior as a form of camouflage.
“After that I decided enough was enough,” he said.
David’s medical collection went on display at the Migdale
His then employer, Caithness and Sutherland NHS Trust, encouraged David’s unusual pastime by giving him a room rent-free at Migdale Hospital to display his collection.
Eventually, the massive accumulation of treasure needed a proper home, and David donated it to the Inverness Museum.
A small part of it, with other items, is now part of the museum’s new long-term Health, Wealth and Happiness display.
Curator Kari Moodie says David’s collection is incredibly important to the Highlands.
“We had very few items on healthcare in the Highlands prior to David’s first donation for an exhibition we held in 2012.
“This was on the centenary of the Dewar Report which was such a landmark, making the Highlands a blueprint for medical care which would eventually be the model for the NHS.
“After that David formally donated his collection to us, and it was shown here at the Highland Folk Museum and other places.
“We are so grateful to David for his generosity – his collection has been the foundation for projects, funding, and displays.
“Even more importantly, it has enabled us to grow our Highland medical collection into a significant resource that will continue to benefit visitors and researchers, now and far into the future.”
The new display includes David’s own ambulance driver’s uniform, harking back to the days when ambulance drivers were simply drivers, unlike the paramedics of today.
You’ll also be able to see two different electrical machines, a mysterious ‘blood circulator’, a Palmer injector gun for diabetics, lots of vintage bottles and boxes, a set of Boots baby scales, among many other fascinating items.
You can see the display at Inverness Museum and Art Gallery, Castle Wynd, Inverness.
Opening hours Fridays and Saturdays 11am to 4pm; closed Sun, Mon; Wednesdays and Thursdays 12 to 4pm.
Inverness Museum and Art Gallery is run by High Life Highland.
Conversation