It finished with a mention for the artist and illustrator Ronald Lampitt.
It's also known that Ronald Lampitt, much admired by geographers and certainly one of my favourite artists, worked in this area of intelligence. His 'geographical eye' and recurring tendency to view almost everything he illustrated from above seems likely to have been strongly influenced by his wartime work, but perhaps also by working with geographers?
It's also known that Ronald Lampitt, much admired by geographers and certainly one of my favourite artists, worked in this area of intelligence. His 'geographical eye' and recurring tendency to view almost everything he illustrated from above seems likely to have been strongly influenced by his wartime work, but perhaps also by working with geographers?
I'd never been able to find out much about his role during the war until recently when I stumbled across reference to his work by the scientific military intelligence expert RV Jones in his book 'Most Secret War'. It seems that he was very close to the V-weapon investigations as well, so there would be a possibility that he worked with Linton at some point. I summarised the findings in this thread:
https://twitter.com/mildthing99/status/1256611375411073024
Lampitt was recruited by Albert Hugh Smith, who was clearly very close to RV Jones. He later went on to become Professor of English at UCL and acclaimed scholar of Scandinavian Studies and English placenames, so he clearly had geographical interests. Perhaps he had links with Bill Mead at UCL who was also a Scandinavian expert?
There are plenty of examples of Lampitt's illustrations on the Ladyburd Fly Away Home website and social media feeds.
https://ladybirdflyawayhome.com/ronald-lampitt/
During the war he worked in Intelligence and although (perhaps inevitably) the nature of this work is unknown, it is possible that his wartime work helped develop his exceptional topographical accuracy and the ability to animate technical drawings into something visually rich and appealing.
https://twitter.com/mildthing99/status/1256611375411073024
Lampitt was recruited by Albert Hugh Smith, who was clearly very close to RV Jones. He later went on to become Professor of English at UCL and acclaimed scholar of Scandinavian Studies and English placenames, so he clearly had geographical interests. Perhaps he had links with Bill Mead at UCL who was also a Scandinavian expert?
There are plenty of examples of Lampitt's illustrations on the Ladyburd Fly Away Home website and social media feeds.
https://ladybirdflyawayhome.com/ronald-lampitt/
During the war he worked in Intelligence and although (perhaps inevitably) the nature of this work is unknown, it is possible that his wartime work helped develop his exceptional topographical accuracy and the ability to animate technical drawings into something visually rich and appealing.
The blog explores the wartime careers of quite a few post-war GA Presidents.
Mike Dempsey's blog post also shares his love of Lampitt and his work.
Mike Dempsey's blog post also shares his love of Lampitt and his work.
I can see that there is a potential book in unpicking the contributions made by several post-war Presidents, including Michael Wise, who was also President of the RGS, and an important post-war Geographer that many people will not be familar with.
Illustrations: Ronald Lampitt
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thanks for commenting on the blog, particularly if you are letting me know more about a particular Past President. I'll be in touch shortly as I will shortly be notified of your comment by e-mail.