Abstract
ABSTRACTJames Croll left school at the age of 13 years, yet while a janitor in Glasgow he published a landmark paper on astronomically-related climate change, claimed as ‘the most important discovery in paleoclimatology’, and which brought him to the attention of Charles Darwin, William Thomson and John Tyndall, amongst others. By 1867 he was persuaded to become Secretary and Accountant of the newly established Geological Survey of Scotland in Edinburgh, and a year after the appearance of his keynote volume Climate and time in 1875, he was lauded with an honorary doctorate from Scotland's oldest university, Fellowship of the Royal Society of London and Honorary Membership of the New York Academy of Sciences. Using a range of archival and published sources, this paper explores aspects of his ‘journey’ and the background to the award of these major accolades. It also discusses why he never became a Fellow of his national academy, the Royal Society of Edinburgh. In the world of 19th-Century science, Croll was not unusual in being both an autodidact and of humble origins, nor was he lacking in support for his endeavours. It is possible that a combination of Croll's modesty and innovative genius fostered advancement, though this did not hinder a willingness to engage in vigorous argument.
Highlights
13 years, yet he was to publish a landmark paper in the August 1864 issue of a major scientific journal, the Philosophical Magazine.2 His article, ‘On the physical cause of the change of climate during geological epochs’,3 brought his intellectual powers to a national and international audience and was described by obituarists as ‘a remarkable paper’,4 and as the ‘paper which laid the foundation of his scientific reputation’.5 Croll’s (1875a) tome, Climate and time in their geological relations6 was to consolidate his ideas and to have a widespread influence upon climate theory
Using a range of archival and published sources, this paper explores aspects of the educational journey and background to the award of these major accolades and enquires as to why he never became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, his national academy
Croll’s ‘Autobiographical sketch’14 preceded a ‘Memoir’ about him, which was assembled by James Campbell Irons,15 a solicitor friend to James Croll
Summary
Croll’s ‘Autobiographical sketch’ preceded a ‘Memoir’ about him, which was assembled by James Campbell Irons, a solicitor friend to James Croll. In a letter written 26 May 1865, the year following Croll’s ‘remarkable paper’ in the Philosophical Magazine, Andrew Crombie Ramsay (1814–1891) of the Geological Survey and President of the Geological Society of London wrote to James David Forbes (1809–1868), physicist, glaciologist and Principal of the United College, University of St Andrews (Fig. 2): 43Croll (1867a, b); and see F. It might be noted that Archibald Geikie, Croll’s boss at the Geological Survey and conjointly Murchison Professor of Geology and Mineralogy at the University of Edinburgh, received an LL.D. from St Andrews in 1872 when 37 years old (having been proposed by Heddle).. Whitney’s artist and suffragist daughter-in-law, Anna Josepha Newcomb (1871–1957), was the child of astronomer Simon Newcomb who tangled with Croll during the ‘Croll–Newcomb controversy’ (see section 4). 70Cf. Piskorska (2016)
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