John Walker, MD, DD

Revd Dr John Walker (1730–1803) was Professor of Natural History at the University of Edinburgh from 1779 to 1803. He was a protege of the chemist William Cullen and a colleague of Dugald Stewart, Joseph Black and several other Edinburgh professors who shaped the intellectual milieu of late Enlightenment Scotland. During his long career, he became a distinguished chemist, botanist, mineralogist, and geologist. He was a founding member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh as well as the Moderator of the Established Church of Scotland. Many of his students went on to become leading scientists in nineteenth century Scotland, England, Ireland, and America. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (469x675, 152 KB) Summary Rev Dr John Walker, Edinburghs Professor of Natural History (1779-1803) Frontispiece from a volume of the Naturalists Library (1842) (copyright has expired) Licensing This image is in the public domain because its copyright has expired... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (469x675, 152 KB) Summary Rev Dr John Walker, Edinburghs Professor of Natural History (1779-1803) Frontispiece from a volume of the Naturalists Library (1842) (copyright has expired) Licensing This image is in the public domain because its copyright has expired... Events Pope Clement XII elected September 17 - Change of emperor of the Ottoman Empire from Ahmed III (1703-1730) to Mahmud I (1730-1754) Anna Ivanova (Anna I of Russia) became czarina Births April 16 - Henry Clinton, British general (d. ... 1803 was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1583, is a renowned centre for teaching and research in Edinburgh, Scotland. ... The Scottish Enlightenment was a period of intellectual ferment in Scotland, running from approximately 1740 to 1800. ... The Royal Society of Edinburghs Building on the corner of George St. ... The Church of Scotland (CofS, known informally as The Kirk) is the national church of Scotland. ...

Early life

Born in Canongate, Edinburgh, his father was a schoolmaster and he matriculated at the University of Edinburgh in 1746. As was the case for many aspiring men in Scotland at this time, he took a divinity degree in 1749. He was soon ordained into the Church of Scotland (Presbyterian) and spent the next thirty years as a parish minister. However, this did not stop him from pursuing scientific subjects in his spare time. Whilst at university he had taken natural philosophy courses and had collected natural history specimens in and around the Lothians. During the 1750s he continued to pursue scientific subjects by studying chemistry under Prof. William Cullen and by joining Edinburgh's Philosophical Society. He distinguished himself not only by winning awards from the society, but also by publishing an article in the 1757 edition of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Under Cullen's patronage, Walker further distinguished himself as a chemist and a mineralogist and this led him to function as a scientific advisor for Lord Bute, Lord Hopetoun, Lord Cathcart, and Judge Advocate Lord Kames. The Canongate is a small district at the heart of Scotlands capital city. ... The Church of Scotland (CofS, known informally as The Kirk) is the national church of Scotland. ... Lothian forms a traditional region of Scotland, lying between the southern shore of the Firth of Forth and the Lammermuir Hills. ... William Cullen (April 15, 1710 – February 5, 1790) was a Scottish physician and chemist. ... John Crichton-Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (May 25, 1713 - March 10, 1792), was a Scottish nobleman who served as Prime Minister of Great Britain (1762-1763) under George III. He had previously served as tutor to George, who was then the Prince of Wales. ... Missing image Lord Linlithgow John Adrian Louis Hope, 1st Marquess of Linlithgow, 7th Earl of Hopetoun (25 September 1860 - 29 February 1908), first Governor-General of Australia, was born at Queensferry, Linlithgowshire, Scotland, on 25 September 1860, the eldest son of the sixth Earl of Hopetoun. ... The title of Earl Cathcart was created in the Peerage of the United Kingdom in 1814. ... Henry Home, Lord Kames (1696 - December 27, 1782) was a Scottish philosopher of the 18th century. ...

Becoming a naturalist

During the 1760s he used his aristocratic connections to tour mines throughout the Lowlands and to assemble his own sizable mineralogical collection. By the mid 1760s, Walker was known as one of Scotland's leading lay naturalists. This motivated the Church of Scotland and the Board of Annexed Estates to send him on exploratory tours of the Highland and Hebrides in 1764 and 1771. These allowed him to make religious and ethnographic observations for the church and to take scientifically oriented notes on northern Scotland's minerals, plants, animals, and climate. During the 1770s Walker published articles in the Scots Magazine and the Philosophical Transactions. By the mid part of the decade, it became clear that Robert Ramsey, the University of Edinburgh's ailing Professor of Natural History, would soon need to be replaced. After securing the support of William Cullen, Lord Kames and several other politically savvy intellectuals, Walker competed against William Smellie, a well respected natural historian and influential publisher, for the post. After much wrangling, Walker won the contest and was appointed in 1779. He held the position until his death in 1803. The Scottish Lowlands, although not officially a geographical area of the country, in normal usage is generally meant to include those parts of Scotland not referred to as the Highlands (or Gàidhealtachd), that is, everywhere due south and east of a line (the Highland Boundary Fault) between Stonehaven and... The Scottish Highlands are the mountainous regions of Scotland north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault. ... The Hebrides The Hebrides comprise a widespread and diverse archipelago off the west coast of Scotland, and in geological terms are composed of the oldest rocks in the British Isles. ... William Cullen (April 15, 1710 – February 5, 1790) was a Scottish physician and chemist. ... There is: William Smellie (1740-1795), a Scottish encyclopedist. ...

Later life

Walker's natural history lectures spanned the academic year and were divided into two sections. The first half of the year he gave his 'Hippocratean' lectures, that is, meteorology, hydrology and geology. The second half of the year was devoted to the three kingdoms of nature: minerals, plants, and animals. During the 1760s, he had accepted Linnaeus' binomial classification system and during his university tenure he readily applied it to botany. However, he did not agree with Linnaeus' classification of minerals and animals and therefore he developed his own unique system for both of these subjects. Throughout his entire career he kept his ties with the Kirk and in 1790 he was elected to be Moderator, its highest position. Sometime in the late 1790s he began to lose his sight and several of his lectures were taken over by Dr Robert Jameson, a physician and former student who had also studied in mainland Europe. By the time that he died in 1803, Walker had taught well over eight hundred students, some of whom would go on to have a significant impact on nineteenth century natural history. Some of these names include Rev. Prof. John Playfair, Sir James Edward Smith, Sir James Hall, Mungo Park, Robert Waring Darwin, Robert Brown, Thomas Beddoes, Thomas Charles Hope, and Samuel Latham Mitchell. A lecture on linear algebra at the Helsinki University of Technology A lecture is a presentation on a particular subject given in order to teach people about that subject, for example by a university or college teacher. ... Carolus Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus, also known after his ennoblement as , (May 23, 1707 – January 10, 1778), was a Swedish botanist, physician and zoologist[1] who laid the foundations for the modern scheme of nomenclature. ... The following is a list of Moderators of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland from the Reformation until 1908 and since 1918. ... Robert Jameson Professor Robert Jameson (1774-1854) was a Scottish naturalist and mineralogist, born in Leith, near Edinburgh, in July 1774. ... Professor John Playfair FRSE (March 10, 1748 – July 20, 1819) was a Scottish scientist. ... For the mayor of Toronto by this name please see James Edward Smith (Toronto). ... Sir James Hall (January 17, 1761 - June 23, 1832) was a geologist and geophysicist, born in Dunglass, Scotland. ... Mungo Park Title illustration of (1859) Mungo Park (September 10, 1771 – 1806) was a Scottish explorer of the African continent. ... Thomas Beddoes (April 13, 1760 - December 24, 1808), English physician and scientific writer, was born at Shiffnall in Shropshire. ...

References

• M. D. Eddy, 'The University of Edinburgh Natural History Class Lists', Archives of Natural History, 30 (2003), 97-117.
• M. D. Eddy, 'Geology, Mineralogy and Time in John Walker's University of Edinburgh Natural History Lectures', History of Science, 39 (2001), 95-119.
• C. W. J. Withers, 'The Rev. Dr. John Walker & the practice of Natural History', Archives of Natural History, 18 (1991), 201-220.
• C. W. J. Withers, 'A neglected Scottish agriculturalist: The georgical lectures and agricultural writings of the Rev. Dr. John Walker (1731-1803)', Agricultural History Review, 1985, 33: 132-143.