Remembering Peter Haggett

In the Summer 2025 issue of GA Magazine.

Dudley Stamp and his influence

Dudley Stamp was the President of the GA in 1950, 75 years ago this year.

I posted previously about a display at the RGS of one of the 24 plaster relief models that was produced to be used for photographic plates in his 1951 book 'The Earth's Crust".

You can also watch a talk that George gave on the link here. Part of the 'Be Inspired' series. 

This post is a review of the talk linked to above, which is well worth watching.

• Admitted to KCL at the age of 15
• Active service with Royal Engineers during the War
• Masters in Geology at the time
• University of Rangoon

Geological advisor to oil company, and worked with Arthur Holmes in Burma - oil company later folded.

Had a knack for breaking down concepts and making them clear.

Worked with Longman for years, to produce books such as 'The World'.

Left to become Professor at LSE - not an academic researcher as such

Champion of geographer.

Prolific output "if you really believe in your own work, publish and be damned"

Land Utilisation Survey - first set out at GA Conference in 1929 (E. Field in Northamptonshire had done a smaller project)

Interest in land use was prompted by the survey in 1931. Led to him travelling all over the country. Hoped to produce a series of 3D models from photographic slides.

Gave many lectures and spoke at debates and appeared in the media.

Appeared on Desert Island Disks.

Saw incrasing geographical awareness as being of national importance.

Popularised geography - also through the 'New Naturalist' series. The final contribution was published posthumously.

Served as President of RGS from 1963-66 (the former being the year of my birth) and his portrait hangs in the East Staircase.

Models are in the RGS collections - made by Thomas Bayley. The talk goes back to their origins, some examples - many of which are in storage due to their fragility and the development of modelling itself.

Well worth a listen...

Dudley Stamp's 3D models

I was down at the Royal Geographical Society earlier in the week, and they had a display of Dudley Stamp related items including one of his plaster relief models. I'd seen these in storage when I had a tour of the Society's HQ about 6 months ago, and it was good to see some of them now out in one of the display cases near the Map Room. They are the best collection still existing.

The book with an image of the model.

An oblique view of the model. Thomas Bayley made this, and 23 others for use in photographic plates in Dudley Stamp's 1951 book 'The Earth's Crust'.

Vertical image of the model of the Peruvian landscape.

The models formed the basis of PhD research by George Tobin which is described here.

You can also watch a talk that George gave on the link here. Part of the 'Be Inspired' series.

More on this in a separate post...

Images: Alan Parkinson, shared under CC license on Flickr.

The Stamp Archive

Sussex University holds the Laurence Dudley Stamp archive.

This holds 53 boxes of papers linked to Laurence Dudley Stamp.

I'm interested in the unpublished autobiography that is in one of the boxes.

I've renewed my British Library readers card, so hoping I can start to do a little more relevant research as my time becomes less tied to the school academic year.

The RGS offers a Dudley Stamp Memorial Award.

A nice description of him here:

His lively and genial personality, reinforced by a supreme breadth of knowledge about the world and those who wrote about it, by a formidable energy and capacity for work, zest for travel and an accurate memory, was indeed widely appreciated. 

His accomplishment in developing studies of land utilization, starting from the great survey of Britain that he initiated in the depths of the 1931 depression, was justly honoured. He was one of the first members to join this Society, and while his travels in his later years more commonly took him to the great cities of the world rather than the silent ice, he retained his sympathy with the aims of a new and developing branch of the earth sciences.

GA Conference 2025

A few things from the GA Conference 2025.

Rewatch the GAConf25 Keynote lectures

Public lecture on The Whispers of Rock: Stories from the Earth by Dr Anjana Khatwa Presidential Lecture on Connected Geographies by Hina Robinson, GA President 2024-25 Keynote lecture on Nairobi National Park – a case study of connected geographies by Paras Chandaria Keynote lecture on Meaning Making in the Primary Geography Curriculum by Rebecca Leek

If you attended the conference, visit the official Flickr album to see if you were captured by the official photographer.