Lankester, Edwin (1814-74), English public health reformer and natural historian.

  • Lankester, Edwin, 1814-1874.
Date:
1842-1859
Reference:
MS.8781
  • Archives and manuscripts

About this work

Description

12 autographed letters, some not dated. Correspondents include "Dr. Angus" and "Dr. Ayers" and The Court of Examiners of the Royal College of Surgeons.

Publication/Creation

1842-1859

Physical description

1 file (12 items)

Contributors

Acquisition note

Purchased from: Mrs. Watson, Burnley, March 1945 (acc.72200), presumably once part of the Thomas Madden Stone autograph collection; Sotheby's, London, July 1931 (acc.57468); Stevens, London, July 1931 (acc.68209); Glendining, London, September 1933 (acc.67769); Provenance details not recorded (acc.67430).; Accession details not known (Wellcome Historical Medical Museum accession A.267).

Biographical note

Edwin Lankester, public health reformer and natural historian, was born in 1814 in Melton, Suffolk. He studied medicine and science from 1834-7 at UCL and due to the lack of funds, he qualified only as MRCS and Licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries (rather than getting a full degree). He got his M. D. in Heidelberg in 1839.

He was the first Secretary (from 1844) of the Ray Society, President of the Royal Microscopical Society (1859-60) and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1845. He was the secretary of a zoology and botany section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (now British Science Association) 1839-64.

He was a teacher and a popular public lecturer, contributed to numerous encyclopaedias and reference work as well as magazines and scientific journals. In 1856, as a result of his earlier contribution to tackling the cholera epidemic, he became the first Medical Officer of Health for the St. James's district, Westminster.

He married Phoebe Pope in 1845 and seven of eleven of their children survived to adulthood. He died in 1874.

Related material

At Wellcome Collection:

GC/178/E/13; MS.9096/1 and MS.9096/2; PP/HO/D/A2450; MS. 8782

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