Ralph McMeekin was educated at Warrnambool College before proceeding to the University of Melbourne where he studied medicine. His course was distinguished by first-class honours in several subjects and he was awarded the exhibition in surgery at his final examination. After serving as resident medical officer and registrar of the Melbourne Hospital, he was appointed medical superintendent and he continued in that office for five years. This was a difficult period for administration as it included part of the First World War and the influenza epidemic of 1919 when the hospital admitted many sufferers from the disease before the Exhibition Building was taken over in the emergency. He was regarded as the authority in Melbourne on Spanish influenza and there were many reports in the daily newspapers of statements he made concerning the progress of the epidemic. After he retired as medical superintendent he was appointed to the medical staff of the Melbourne Hospital, later known as the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He served as honorary physician to outpatients and later to inpatients over a period of twenty-five years. Subsequently he became a consulting physician to the Hospital for the rest of his life.

Ralph was a general physician with a special interest in neurology. He had the great gifts of clinical sense and judgement. I met him first when he administered an anaesthetic to me in an early year of my medical course. There were few specialist anaesthetists at that time and most physicians gave anaesthetics, using the old rag and bottle with ether. I had the good fortune to do my first clerking in Ralph McMeekin’s medical ward. He was an excellent teacher who demonstrated the important clinical manifestations of patients and concluded with a reasoned diagnosis. He was interested in the methods of teaching students and witty but never unkind in his remarks. He had a large private consultant practice which included many prominent citizens. He did many consultations in the country, often after a full day at his rooms, and these long hours of work must have taken toll of his reserves of energy. He was concerned with medico-legal problems and with diseases pertaining to industry.

Ralph had several interests outside his professional work. He was fond of music, keen on opera and a theatre-goer. He enjoyed golf and delighted in telling of his good shots. He was of slight physique and a sensitive man who relaxed with cigarettes which were half-smoked, often while doing ward rounds. For many years he had been a heavy smoker but the harmful effects of that habit were not understood by the medical profession in those times. He succumbed to carcinoma of the lung at an age when he should have had much wisdom and service still to offer the community.