Departures of note

Charles Melbourne Ward, known as Mel Ward, was a stage performer turned naturalist who caught 25,000 crabs from locations around the world. His interest in crabs began in childhood, and in 1926 a species he found on a Queensland beach, Cleistostoma wardi (now Paracleistostoma wardi), was named after him. That recognition led him to quit the stage and pursue marine zoology as a career.

Born in Melbourne on 6 October 1903 to stage actor Hugh Ward and concert singer Grace Ward, he travelled with his parents and was educated in various places, including New York and Darlinghurst, Sydney. He left school in 1919 to work as an acrobat, comedian, dancer and actor, starting with The Bing Boys on Broadway, and also played the clarinet and saxophone. He met Halley Kate Foster while she was looking for shells and he was searching for crabs; they married on 27 October 1931 and settled in Double Bay. She was a string musician, and they played together when not working.

Ward collected species in Australia and around the world, including Samoa, Fiji, Hawaii, Cuba, Panama, Mexico and both coasts of the United States. In Panama he discovered 14 species previously unknown to the area. His wife joined him on collecting tours that sometimes lasted several months. In 1927 he gave a collection of fish species from the Great Barrier Reef to the Australian Museum. He was a fellow of the Zoological Society of London (1929), a fellow of the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales (1936) and a life-member from 1947. The Australian Museum appointed him an honorary zoologist.

Ward was one of the marine scientists on the Embury Expeditions to the Great Barrier Reef from 1928 to 1934, leading scientific excursions and giving lectures. He made his own diving helmet in the 1930s from copper, brass, glass, rubber and synthetic seal putty, which was used in the film Lovers and Luggers, and was among the earliest scientists to use underwater cameras. He also had an interest in Aboriginal Australian history and culture, collecting artefacts and books, and opened The Gallery of Natural History and Native Art at the Hydro Majestic Hotel in 1943. He died on 6 October 1966 at his home in Medlow Bath from coronary artery disease and was buried in Blackheath cemetery. His collections were left to the Australian Museum as the Melbourne Ward Collection.