Allan Douglas Barton: A scholar who spanned theory and practice

Shelton, W. G.; Jacobs, Kerry

doi:10.1177/1032373214564368

Cited by 11 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Paradoxically, the Australian biographical record for the same period is surprisingly strong for accounting personalities variously labelled the ‘less illustrious’ by Walker (2000: 318), ‘those beyond the limelight – the unconnected, the humble, the suppressed, the unqualified and the rogue’, (Carnegie and Potter, 2000: 305), and those engaged in ‘inglorious moments in accounting history’ (Shelton and Jacobs, 2015). These lesser lights include early authors of accounting texts, John Scouller (Goldberg, 1977, 1984), Edward Wild (Carnegie and Varker, 1995), James Dimelow (Carnegie and Parker, 1994), William Yaldwyn (Carnegie and Parker, 1996) and Francis Vigars (Carnegie et al, 2006); the first chartered accountant émigré, John Ogilvy (Carnegie et al, 2000); two early female members of the profession, Mary Hamilton (Cooper, 2008) and Harriet Amies (Hronsky et al, 2015); fraudster, William Chinnery (Scorgie, 2007); and four Irish rogues and transportees, John Kenny, Michael Hayes, Jeremiah Murphy and John Campbell (Craig, 1998a, 1998b, 1998c; Craig et al, 2004).…”

Section: Biography In Australian Accounting Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Despite the observation by Carnegie and Potter (2000: 194) that ‘wide scope seems to exist for accounting history scholars to develop … biography’ and Bisman’s (2012: 9) opinion that ‘the call [by Carnegie and Potter, 2000] for more biographical research appears to have been taken on board by scholars’, the reality is that Australian accounting historians have mostly directed their endeavours in directions other than biography. Exceptions to this trend include six notable academic accountants, namely Louis Goldberg (Burrows, 2003; Carnegie and Williams, 2001; Kerr and Clift, 1989; Parker, 1994a), Raymond Chambers (Al-Hogail and Previtts, 2001; Barton, 1982; Bedford, 1982; Brown, 1982; Carnegie and Williams, 2001; Clarke, 2000; Gaffikin, 2000; Lee, 1982; Moonitz, 1982; Wells, 2000; Wolnizer and Dean, 2000; Whittington and Zeff, 2002), Russell Mathews (Whittington and Zeff, 2002), Reginald Gynther (Whittington and Zeff, 2002), Allan Barton (Shelton and Jacobs, 2015) and Robert (Bob) Gibson (Carnegie, 2016). With the exception of Bob Gibson each of these individuals has been honoured with membership of the Australian Accounting Hall of Fame 4 (AAHF): Chambers, Fitzgerald and Gynther in 2010, Goldberg in 2011, Mathews in 2012 and Barton in 2013 (University of Melbourne, 2016a).…”

Section: Biography In Australian Accounting Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Third, there is every reason to document more fully his contributions as his standing in the accounting and business worlds was recognised in his lifetime by the award of two high-level Imperial honours and, posthumously, in 2012, by election to the AAHF which honoured him as a ‘pioneer, practitioner, administrator, author, educator and leader of the accounting profession’ (University of Melbourne, 2016c). This paper is thus a response not only to the call issued to expand the biographical literature on Australian accountants (Carnegie and Potter, 2000) beyond the ‘origins and firsts’ (Carnegie and Williams, 2001: 103), but also to the challenge posed by Shelton and Jacobs (2015: 21) to produce ‘further work … to reveal the biographical value and broader contribution of a number of these [AAHF] inductees’.…”

Section: Biography In Australian Accounting Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

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A progressive traditionalist: Sir Edwin Van-Der-Vord Nixon CMG, Accountant, (1876–1955)

Cobbin

Burrows

2019

Accounting History

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This article contributes to remedying the paucity of biographical information about Australian luminary accounting figures in the first half of the twentieth-century, a period of enormous change and development in the accounting profession, particularly in relation to its organisational structure, international links, literature, intellectual base, education and role in relation to government in both peace- and war-time. It is argued that no individual luminary is more neglected by biographers, yet deserving of extended biographical treatment, than Sir Edwin Van-der-Vord Nixon, one of the great figures in Australian accounting, whose eponymous firm was a critical antecedent to the present day EY Australia. Nixon’s career spanned the crucially important ‘coming of age’ period in Australian accounting. The key evolutionary developments in Australian accounting that provided the foundation for the modern profession are the backdrop against which Nixon’s lifelong career in accounting can be observed.

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Section: Biography In Australian Accounting Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Biography In Australian Accounting Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Biography In Australian Accounting Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

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A progressive traditionalist: Sir Edwin Van-Der-Vord Nixon CMG, Accountant, (1876–1955)

Cobbin

Burrows

2019

Accounting History

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“…The interest in biographical research in accounting history has grown in recent years (Bisman, 2012), with several scholars documenting the pioneering contributions of accounting practitioners and academics, both at the local and international levels (Burrows, 2019; Carnegie and Parker, 1996; Clarke, 2005; Cobbin and Burrows, 2020; Edwards, 1994; Parker, 2002; Shelton and Jacobs, 2015; Talbot, 2010). Within this field of literature, research on the life and work of renowned accounting historians has focused on several authors, including Anderson (Chandler and Edwards, 2019), De Roover (Blomquist, 1975; Herlihy, 1972; Lapeyre, 1975), Hatfield (Parker, 2002), Hèrnandez (Carmona, 2002), Kojima (Courtis, 1997), Littleton (Bedford and Ziegler, 1975; Zimmermann, 1996), Schumer (Anderson, 2002) and Yamey (Baladouni, 1996; Parker, 1996).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Enlisting accounting history in the contest between competing visions of accounting systems: Tommaso Zerbi and the origin of double-entry bookkeeping

et al. 2020

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Biographical research has attracted a significant level of interest from the accounting history community. Nevertheless, most of these studies are focused on documenting the life and work of renowned accounting scholars and practitioners. This study seeks to investigate the work of an author who is yet to attract the attention of the international community, Tommaso Zerbi, in close connection with the social and academic context in which this work was developed. The study emphasises the political and militant role that accounting history may play in academic communities by showing how accounting history research is not necessarily a value-free endeavour in the generation of new knowledge but can be enlisted in ensuring the success of a specific understanding of accounting systems in the context of academic struggles. Although mainly aiming at contributing to a national debate, the originality and value of Zerbi’s work ended up offering a significant contribution to the international debate on the origin of double-entry bookkeeping.

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“…Other pioneers of accounting education also came from the ranks of professionally qualified accountants and emphasised the links to practice, including Leslie Arthur Schumer (Anderson, 2002) and Allan Douglas Barton (Shelton and Jacobs, 2015) in Australia, and Selden Hopkins in the United States (Romeo and Rigsby, 2008). As accounting developed as a university discipline, the influence of Robert William Gibson, the editor of the initial series of Accounting History (Carnegie, 2016); Bernard Shields, who was appointed professor of accountancy at the University of Galway in 1914; William Baxter at the London School of Economics (LSE) in 1947; and Donald Cousins at the University of Birmingham, also in 1947 (Clarke, 2005), have been discussed.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Histories of accounting education – an introduction

Evans

Paisey

2018

Accounting History

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The sub-discipline of accounting education is often traced back to the advent of accounting as a modern profession during the mid-nineteenth century, with education being a key part of the accountancy professionalisation project (Willmott, 1986). Yet, before the words 'accounting' and 'accountancy' became widely used, earlier forms of accounting, sometimes called 'reckoning' and often associated with merchants' accounts, were used and book-keeping education can be regarded as a forerunner to accounting education (Parker, 1994). It is not unreasonable to assume that whenever these early forms of accounting took place, those participating in accounting required instruction. Despite this, our understanding of how accounting education evolved is largely confined to the recent past and, even then, is far from comprehensive. The paucity of archival evidence from earlier periods perhaps explains the limited discussion of accounting education before the nineteenth century, but some new insights have recently been offered into the development of accounting education alongside the development of double entry bookkeeping in fifteenth-century Italy. Edwards (2011) examines accounting education in Britain in the early modern period (1550-1800) at the time of rapid commercial expansion and early industrialisation. He notes, 'Education is not yet the subject of significant study by accounting historians' (Edwards, 2011: 37). Significantly, his vocabulary shows that he does not confine his discussion to a narrow view of accounting education but discusses the teachers and their institutions as well as what was taught, and notes too that often those who practised accounting were self-taught. Likewise, this Special Issue adopts a wide definition of accounting education. As Sangster (2015) shows, historians of the origins of modern accounting have generally accepted that the earliest known instructional treatise on double-entry bookkeeping was published by Luca Pacioli in 1494. Sangster et al. (2008) interpret this work as a manual for small businessmen to learn how to keep accounts. Sangster (2015) presents detailed evidence of an earlier bookkeeping manual from 1475 by Marino de Raphaeli which he describes as the earliest known instructional treatise on double-entry bookkeeping, a work that provides fascinating insights into how bookkeeping was taught in fifteenth-century Venice. As Sangster (2015: 31) states, Concerning de Raphaeli's treatise, it is unlikely that we shall ever know if this was the only manuscript of its type, but there can be no doubt that, as the first known example of how double entry bookkeeping was taught, it holds a very special place in the history of accounting, accounting practice, and accounting education. Since the publication of the new series of Accounting History commencing in 1996, the journal has published a range of contributions on the history of accounting education, some of 742427A CH0010.

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Allan Douglas Barton: A scholar who spanned theory and practice

Cited by 11 publications

References 42 publications

A progressive traditionalist: Sir Edwin Van-Der-Vord Nixon CMG, Accountant, (1876–1955)

A progressive traditionalist: Sir Edwin Van-Der-Vord Nixon CMG, Accountant, (1876–1955)

Enlisting accounting history in the contest between competing visions of accounting systems: Tommaso Zerbi and the origin of double-entry bookkeeping

Histories of accounting education – an introduction

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