The Geographer's Craft (1967) - Percy Maude Roxby

While researching something on the history of the RGS, I came across a book called 'The Geographer's Craft' by Emeritus Professor T.W. Freeman (of Manchester University) published in 1967.

It can be accessed via the Internet Archive site and borrowed if you have a free account.

One of the chapters focussed on two British Geographers, and one of them was Percy Maude Roxby.

It included the image opposite.

Roxby was GA President in 1933.

The chapter starts with a description of Roxby which is excellent - he had panache.

He was 6'5" tall and saw each lecture as a performance.

There is a reminder that he trained as a Historian originally. He was influenced by lectures by Herbertson and Mackinder, and also Linton Myres.

He became particularly interested in China, which became a preoccupation.

He was also interested in the geography of East Anglia.

He produced his own regionalisation of East Anglia.

According to Roxby, I live in an area he called High Norfolk (some of this is now called Breckland)

It is described by Roxby as having:

Mainly heavy and tenacious boulder clays, mixed arable farming, many commons.

He died suddenly in 1946, 2 years after retiring from his Chair at Liverpool University.

Sir (Henry) Clifford Darby

Clifford Darby was never a GA President, but he was associated with the GA in some ways, and was certainly a significant figure in British Geography.

He was present at the 50th anniversary celebrations of the GA's Cambridge Branch, as featured in a previous blog post.

This piece from the British Academy gives a detailed biography of his life and geographical achievements, which were many.
(PDF download)

He was able to gain a scholarship to Cambridge from his village in Wales where he was born in 1909. He lived in lodgings as he couldn't afford the college lodgings. His tutor was former GA President Alfred Steers.
He was also connected with several other former GA Presidents.

Early in his academic career, he was chosen to assist Frank Debenham with some research in Southern Africa. When he returned he used his experiences in his other work.
His dissertation was on the role of Fenland in English history. His early work was a little deterministic, but he reworked it later for a different emphasis on the changing landscape and the draining of the Fens. An area of personal interest given the location of my school in Ely. Not everyone at the University was as encouraging - I liked this story:

His supervisor was Bernard Manning - not the comedian.
He was involved in conversations between the GA and the Historical Association following a joint meeting on "the new historical geography" in 1932. He shared the Common Room with a range of interesting characters including M.R. James (who also wrote about East Anglia)
He also assisted George Philip in the production of their atlases.

During the Second World War, as shown above, he joined many other geographers in helping with the war effort.

In 1945, he took over from another former GA President Percy Maude Roxby at the University of Liverpool.
He took over from Alfred Steers on his retirement in 1966 at the University of Cambridge, having also spent time at UCL (an insitution with strong connections with many former GA Presidents)
He died in 1992.

Source:
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Clifford-Darby
https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publishing/proceedings-british-academy/87/darby-henry-clifford-1909-1992/

Update: December 2020

In 2003, Chris Kington asked a number of former Presidents what had sparked their passion for geography. He lent me the letters and Dick Lawton mentioned the influence of Roxby and other geographers including Clifford Darby and Bill Mead on his own academic career at the time.

He says they taught him not only about geography, but how to be a geographer...