John FryerPrint Page

The Fryer Memorial Library of Australian Literature commemorates John ("Jack") Fryer, a former University student who died in 1923 from the effects of poison gas received while serving in World War One. 

Fryer was born in Springsure in 1895, and he attended the Rockhampton Grammar School by winning a District Scholarship. He won a University Scholarship which took him to the University of Queensland in 1915. 

He volunteered for military service in the first Australian Imperial Force (AIF). He was commissioned in 1916 and went to France early in 1917.  He was wounded severely in early August and was hospitalized, and returned to Australia in July 1919.  He recuperated in the bush, working at his sister’s new home until he started University again in the first term of 1920 undertaking study towards a Classics Honours degree.

By mid-1922 he had developed tuberculosis, and was too sick to sit for his final honours examinations.  He returned home to Springsure and died on 7 February 1923.  

The Student’s Dramatic Society commemorated their Vice–President, Jack Fryer, by establishing the Fryer Memorial Library of Australian Literature in early 1927. The Library was established by a donation from the Society of a modest sum of ten pounds. 

One of the most pleasing features in the promotion of non-material activities in this State is the effort that is being made by leading members of the University of Queensland to advance the study and appreciation of Australian literature. In this Dominion; evidence no less welcome or striking is the establishment of a special library of Australian literature within the University. From the dissatisfaction felt and the desire to perpetuate the memory of a fine scholar, John Denis Fryer, a returned soldier who died from the effects of poison gas, sprang the scheme for the formation of a library that designed to supplement chiefly on the sides of literature and history " the great central library," to quote Dr Robinson's words, "for which Queensland still waits." As yet the Fryer Memorial Library is only a nucleus, but already there are in it books no other copies of which are to be found In Queensland.
The Telegraph (Brisbane), 19 October 1929.

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