100 Years of Geography at the University of Glasgow

Professor Chris Philo (Chair of Human Geography) has generously compiled this history of the establishment and emergence of geography at the University of Glasgow, drawing on earlier existing histories and material held in the University's institutional archives. The focus falls on the earliest years of Geography teaching, and Chris' account ends with a series of questions, and requests for further information, that former staff and students might wish to respond to.

Immediately below, and before the historical account begins, there is a List of Contents on the left to help you navigate around the 'Short History', and a series of photographic portraits of key individuals contributing to the establishment of the Department, and of its various Heads of Department up to the present.

Introduction

This year, 2009, sees us celebrating 100 years of teaching and researching Geography as a distinct academic subject within the University of Glasgow. While elements of what could be described as 'Geography' had been studied in the University previously, by various scholars and under other disciplinary headings, it was during meetings of the University Court in 1908 and early-1909 that decisive steps were taken to establish "the office of Lecturer in Geography" (CM, 1907-08, C1/1/15, p.147f). Captain (Sir) Henry George Lyons was appointed to this post, and hence became in effect the first 'Head of Department', not that the department then amounted to much more than just him and his efforts alone. Nonetheless, it is evident that here was the formalised commencement of Geography at the University of Glasgow: indeed, if we wish to identify an actual birthday, it should be 14th January, since it was on that date in 1909 that Lyons's appointment was announced to the University Court (CM, 1908-09, C1/1/16, p.42f).

The history of Geography at the University of Glasgow over the intervening 100 years is inevitably a long, complex one, with many different components tangling together facets of research, teaching and administration, alongside personalities, events, achievements and calamities. It will only be possible here to scratch the surface of this history, but in what follows we will provide a few key pointers, albeit concentrating primarily on the earlier period. After all, the dynamic of a Centenary is in large measure about asking us to look back to our 'origins', more or less explicitly contrasting what we find there with what we know of now. Our account is supported by in-depth archival research in the University of Glasgow Archives, and at the end of this account you will find detail on a number of linked documents, based on the likes of University Court Minutes, the University Calendar and indeed various similar primary sources, where we have extracted and transcribed information pertaining to our history. These documents can now be said to entail a fundamental 'archive' of this history, to be supplemented by other, less easily recordable and presentable sources (such as artifacts that we plan to display in exhibition cases). In addition, our account is also itself indebted to brief histories written by others, which will also be detailed below together with, in one case, a hyperlink to a copy of an original typescript.