OBITUARY: SIR KINGSLEY CHARLES DUNHAM (1910–2001)

Abstract

Sir Kingsley Dunham, one of the leading figures in British Geology of the latter half of the twentieth century, died at Durham on the 5th of April, 2001. He was born at Sturminster Newton, Dorset, in 1910. His father was an estate manager and the family moved north to Brancepeth, near Durham City, while he was still young. Dunham's early education was at Brancepeth School and later at the Durham Johnston School. Strongly supported and encouraged by his parents, he obtained matriculation and entrance to Hatfield College at Durham University. A talented musician (organ and pianoforte), he was awarded a college organ scholarship and played the organ in the college chapel. He intended to read Chemistry, but came under the spell of Arthur Holmes, the then Professor of Geology, a man of great ability and now widely regarded as one of the most distinguished geologists of the twentieth century. Kingsley Dunham was captivated by the eloquence of geological processes and patterns, often at the bounds of knowledge, as taught by Holmes. He changed to the Honours Geology course and completed his first degree. After graduating, Dunham was offered a postgraduate studentship at Durham University to work under Holmes, and he chose to study the distribution of vein minerals in the Northern Pennine Orefield, a topic that he continued to research for the rest of his life. He was awarded a PhD in 1932, and a Commonwealth Fund Fellowship to work on mineralogy at Harvard University. He travelled widely in North America and completed a geological survey of the Organ Mountains with the New Mexico Bureau of Mines. Returning to Britain in 1934, Dunham obtained one of the few posts available at that time as a geologist in the Geological Survey of Great Britain. His first assignment was to map the …