Dr Louis Charles Anthony Ariotti
M.B.E., O.A.M., M.B.B.S., F.R.C.D., F.R.A.C.S., F.A.M.A.S., F.A.M.A.
Dr Louis Charles Anthony Ariotti was a world-renowned outback surgeon and GP, widely regarded as the archetype of a rural doctor.
In his practice, he acted as a neurologist, urologist, paediatrician and more; he performed complex heart and brain surgeries and shoulder reconstructions; he removed countless appendixes, delivered thousands of newborns, and made innumerable perfect stitches.
He was a friend, a benefactor, and a war hero who treated casualties on both sides of the war. He was on the verge of being knighted by the Queen of England before the practice was abolished.
A fellow of the Royal College of Surgery and the Australian Medical Association, he had streets named after him, churches built by him, and still has awards given in his name.
He trained in Australia, Scotland and China, and could have had a long and lavish career in the capital cities, but instead chose to spend more than forty years of his practice serving the remote, arid community of Charleville and its surrounds. Not only did his patients come from far and wide, but so did students and doctors come to learn at the knee of the master.
The child of impoverished Italian immigrants, raised in Innisfail, and fatherless from a young age, his story is one of perseverance, dedication and faith. He was funny, fastidious, creative, honourable, respectful, inventive, tough, kind, jolly and generous.
He was the last of his kind.
And he was my grandfather.