Papers of Walter Garstang

Description

Comprises two accessions:


1) A red loose leaf file containing manuscript notes towards occasional lectures, c.1917. by Walter Garstang. Signed 'Walter Garstang University' at the front. Includes a note by D. Garstang, one of his daughters.


2) A collection of poetry and prose works by Garstang including a play and lectures. The collection includes a programme for the production 'The Student's Opera'. This was adapted by Garstang from John Gay's 'The Beggar's Opera'. 'The Student's Opera' was performed for the jubilee of the Yorkshire College of Science and Coming of Age of the University, 1924.


Reprints of poems include 'A vacation ramble', 'To H.R.H. Princess Mary', 'To Sir J. T-W.', 'Friendship. (To T.H.R.) and 'A Smokeless City'. Also contains obituaries of Garstang and lists of publications. There are five negatives of Garstang and a painting of a marine creature.


Prose works include 'On the Development of Botrylloides, and its bearings on some Morphological Problems' written with Garstang's daughter, Sylvia. They also include 'The Buckland Lectures, First Series for 1929', 'The Theory of Recapitulation' 1922 and 'The Impoverishment of the Sea' 1900. There are lists of Garstang's publications.


There is a folder labelled 'Planctosphaera' containing correspondence, biological drawings, manuscript and typescript notes.


The collection also includes obituaries for Garstang and a manuscript copy of a lecture given after his death.

Biography or history

Walter Garstang (1868-1949) was born in Blackburn, Lancashire. In 1884 Garstang was awarded a scholarship to Jesus College, Oxford, where he joined the School of Zoology. He worked at the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom in Plymouth from 1888-1891 and again for a short period in 1892. Garstang was elected a Fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford, in 1894. A Professor of Zoology at Leeds from 1907-1933, the Garstang Building a the University is named after him. Garstang is known for his hypothesis of a route of evolution from echinoderms to chordates. His suggested that individual life stages of species could evolve into separate organisms.


Garstang was a keen poet and a collection of his poems 'Larval Forms and Other Zoological Verses' was published posthumously in 1951. Many of Garstang's poems express scientific ideas, but some are written about nature in general and other subjects.

Provenance

The second accession was donated by B. Fairley in 2018.

Access and usage

Reproduction

Access

Access to this material is unrestricted.

Material in this collection is in copyright. Photocopies or digital images can only be supplied by the Library for research or private study within the terms of copyright legislation. It is the responsibility of the researcher to obtain the copyright holder's permission to reproduce for any other purpose. Guidance is available on tracing copyright status and ownership.

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