Nicholson, (Edward) Max, CB, CVO
- Nicholson, Max, 1904-2003
- Date:
- 1945-1991
- Reference:
- GC/142
- Archives and manuscripts
Collection contents
About this work
Description
Publication/Creation
Physical description
Contributors
Arrangement
Arranged by sections as follows:
GC/142/1-4, 23-24 E M Nicholson items
GC/142/5-8, 25 Simon Population Trust
GC/142/9-10, 26 Population Statistics and Trends
GC/142/11-20, 27 Other bodies concerned with population
GC/21-22, 28-29 Miscellaneous papers relating to population questions
GC/142/30-32 Related issues
Acquisition note
The first accession (Acc 432), correspondence between Nicholson and CP Blacker (1895-1975) of the Eugenics Society, was given to the Contemporary Medical Archives Centre (now the library at Wellcome Collection Archives and Manuscripts Department) in August 1992 by Mr Nicholson. Additional material (Acc 462), mainly generated by Nicholson's connection with the Simon Population Trust, was received from him in January 1993, and an additional group of miscellaneous material (Acc 698) in March 1997.
Wellcome was in contact with David Hubback, Secretary of the Simon Population Trust, in 1989 about their archives but it is not clear, following his unexpected death in 1991, whether many of these now survive.
Biographical note
Nicholson's career was primarily in ornithology, natural conservation and questions of the relationship between development and the environment. These papers relate to his concern with issues of population.
Carlos Paton Blacker and Nicholson were both founder members of the Simon Population Trust (f.1957), but had already been in correspondence on matters relating to population and eugenics.
Education
Sedbergh School, Cumbria
1920s Read history at Hertford College, Oxford
Career
1926 Birds In England
1927 How Birds Live
1931 (As assistant editor of the Weekend Review) wrote supplement A National Plan For Britain
1932 Created the British Trust for Ornithology
1937 Songs Of Wild Birds (with gramophone records). Produced with Ludwig Koch
1938 Helped found the Edward Grey Institute of Field Ornithology
1938-1941 Handbook Of British Birds (helped H F Witherby)
1940 Joined the civil servicr, heading the allocation of tonnage division at the Ministry of War Transport
1945 Given a post in the deputy prime minister's office, which led to him chairing the committee for the 1951 Festival of Britain
1947-48 With Julian Huxley (the then director general of the United Nations scientific and education organisation Unesco) involved in forming the Scientific International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) now the World Conservation Union
1949 Setting up of the Nature Conservancy
1952 Contracted polio whilst leader of the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation survey team in Baluchistan
1952-1966 Director-general of the Nature Conservancy
1958 Instrumental in setting up the Council For Nature
1959 Helped found the Conservation Corps (the British Trust for Conservation Volunteers) and to develop the Wildlife Trusts Movement
1961 With Peter Scott and others, helped create the World Wildlife Fund
1963-74 Convenor for conservation of the International Biological Programme
1967 The System
1970 The Environmental Revolution
1977 Initiated what is now the Trust for Urban Ecology
1977-1994 The Birds of the Western Palearctic
1980-1985 President of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds
1985-1993 Trustee of Earthwatch Europe
1994 Created The New Renaissance Group
Also founder member and chairman of Common Ground International, Head of the world conservation section of the International Biological Programme.
Had three sons: Piers, Tom (by first wife Mary Crawford) and David (by second wife Toni)
Related material
Related material held by the Archives and Manuscripts Department:
Additional material on Blacker and the Simon Population Trust may be found in the Eugenics Society archives (SA/EUG) and among the papers of CP Blacker (PP/CPB). Sources Leaflet no. 8 'Birth Control' lists further collections containing material of interest concerning population questions.
Related material held elsewhere:
Royal Geographical Society
Ornithological papers relating to British Giuana expeditions, 1929-1987
Reference : AR 13U
Papers relating to various expeditions, 1928-1963
Linnean Society of London
Correspondence and files relating to World Wildlife Fund, 1960-1993
Aberdeen University, Special Libraries and Archives
Papers relating to International Biological Programme, 1961-1977
Rice University: Woodson Research Center
Correspondence (90 items) with Sir Julian Huxley, 1927-1971
Reference : Julian S Huxley papers
University of East Anglia Library
Correspondence (59 items) with JC Pritchard, c1931-1880
Reference : PP/4/1/16
Cambridge University Library, Department of Manuscripts and University Archives
Correspondence with Sir Peter Markham Scott, 1948-1990
Languages
Permanent link
Identifiers
Accession number
- 438
- 462
- 696