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John Walker (natural historian)
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John Walker (natural historian)
John Walker FRSE (1731–1803) was a Scottish minister and natural historian. He was Regius professor of natural history at the University of Edinburgh from 1779 to 1803. He was joint founder of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1783 and moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1790.
Walker was a protégé of chemist William Cullen and a colleague of Dugald Stewart, Joseph Black, and several other Edinburgh professors, who shaped the intellectual milieu of the Scottish Enlightenment. During his long career, he became a distinguished botanist, chemist, geologist, hydrologist, meteorologist, mineralogist, zoologist, and economic historian, as well as being a minister in the Church of Scotland.
Walker was one of the main scientific consultants of his day, serving as an agricultural, industrial, or mining advisor to many influential Scottish landowners, including the judge advocate Lord Kames, George III's prime minister Lord Bute, and Lord Hopetoun. Many of his students went on to become leading scientists in 19th-century Scotland, England, Ireland, and America. He was a pioneer in introducing agricultural topics into a university curriculum.
As a member of the Philosophical Society of Edinburgh when it received its royal charter, Walker automatically became a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1783, going on to serve as secretary of the Society's physical section (1789–96). He was elected as moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1790.
He was born in Canongate, Edinburgh, the eldest son of Eupham Morison and John Walker, the rector of the Canongate Grammar School. He was educated at his father's school.
He matriculated at the University of Edinburgh in 1746. Like many aspiring men in Scotland at this time, he took a divinity degree in 1749. He was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Kirkcudbright in 1754, but was not ordained into the Church of Scotland until 1758, initially being minister of Glencorse just south of Edinburgh, moving to Moffat in 1762 and to Lochmaben. He accepted the post of professor of natural history at the University of Edinburgh in the same year, and quickly found the two roles incompatible. In 1783, he returned to the church as minister of Colinton, a parish in south-west Edinburgh. Held in high esteem, he was elected moderator of the General Assembly in 1790. He lived in Colinton manse from 1783 to 1803. He became blind around 1800m but continued to preach until death.
His religious duties, though, did not stop him from pursuing scientific subjects in his spare time. While at university, he took natural philosophy courses and collected natural history specimens in and around the Lothians. During the 1750s, he continued to pursue scientific subjects by studying chemistry under Professor William Cullen and by joining Edinburgh's Philosophical Society. He distinguished himself not only by winning awards from the society, but also by publishing an article in the 1757 edition of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Under Cullen's patronage, Walker further distinguished himself as a chemist and a mineralogist, and this led him to function as a scientific advisor for Lord Bute, Lord Hopetoun, Lord Cathcart, and Judge Advocate Lord Kames.
During the 1760s, he used his aristocratic connections to tour mines throughout the Lowlands and to assemble his own sizeable mineralogical collection. By the mid-1760s, Walker was known as one of Scotland's leading lay naturalists. This motivated the Church of Scotland and the Board of Annexed Estates to send him on exploratory tours of the Highland and Hebrides in 1764 and 1771. These tours allowed him to make religious and ethnographic observations for the church and to take scientifically oriented notes on northern Scotland's minerals, plants, animals, and climate. In his 1764 tour, while on visit to the island of Jura (Deer Island), Walker may have made the first detailed description of Lyme disease. He gives a good description both of the symptoms (with "exquisite pain [in] the interior parts of the limbs") and of the tick vector itself, which he describes as a "worm" with a body which is "of a reddish colour and of a compressed shape with a row of feet on each side" that "penetrates the skin". Also during this period, he collected samples of the mineral that came to be known as strontianite from its type locality, thus setting in process the identification and analysis of the new alkaline earth strontium.
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John Walker (natural historian)
John Walker FRSE (1731–1803) was a Scottish minister and natural historian. He was Regius professor of natural history at the University of Edinburgh from 1779 to 1803. He was joint founder of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1783 and moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1790.
Walker was a protégé of chemist William Cullen and a colleague of Dugald Stewart, Joseph Black, and several other Edinburgh professors, who shaped the intellectual milieu of the Scottish Enlightenment. During his long career, he became a distinguished botanist, chemist, geologist, hydrologist, meteorologist, mineralogist, zoologist, and economic historian, as well as being a minister in the Church of Scotland.
Walker was one of the main scientific consultants of his day, serving as an agricultural, industrial, or mining advisor to many influential Scottish landowners, including the judge advocate Lord Kames, George III's prime minister Lord Bute, and Lord Hopetoun. Many of his students went on to become leading scientists in 19th-century Scotland, England, Ireland, and America. He was a pioneer in introducing agricultural topics into a university curriculum.
As a member of the Philosophical Society of Edinburgh when it received its royal charter, Walker automatically became a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1783, going on to serve as secretary of the Society's physical section (1789–96). He was elected as moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1790.
He was born in Canongate, Edinburgh, the eldest son of Eupham Morison and John Walker, the rector of the Canongate Grammar School. He was educated at his father's school.
He matriculated at the University of Edinburgh in 1746. Like many aspiring men in Scotland at this time, he took a divinity degree in 1749. He was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Kirkcudbright in 1754, but was not ordained into the Church of Scotland until 1758, initially being minister of Glencorse just south of Edinburgh, moving to Moffat in 1762 and to Lochmaben. He accepted the post of professor of natural history at the University of Edinburgh in the same year, and quickly found the two roles incompatible. In 1783, he returned to the church as minister of Colinton, a parish in south-west Edinburgh. Held in high esteem, he was elected moderator of the General Assembly in 1790. He lived in Colinton manse from 1783 to 1803. He became blind around 1800m but continued to preach until death.
His religious duties, though, did not stop him from pursuing scientific subjects in his spare time. While at university, he took natural philosophy courses and collected natural history specimens in and around the Lothians. During the 1750s, he continued to pursue scientific subjects by studying chemistry under Professor William Cullen and by joining Edinburgh's Philosophical Society. He distinguished himself not only by winning awards from the society, but also by publishing an article in the 1757 edition of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Under Cullen's patronage, Walker further distinguished himself as a chemist and a mineralogist, and this led him to function as a scientific advisor for Lord Bute, Lord Hopetoun, Lord Cathcart, and Judge Advocate Lord Kames.
During the 1760s, he used his aristocratic connections to tour mines throughout the Lowlands and to assemble his own sizeable mineralogical collection. By the mid-1760s, Walker was known as one of Scotland's leading lay naturalists. This motivated the Church of Scotland and the Board of Annexed Estates to send him on exploratory tours of the Highland and Hebrides in 1764 and 1771. These tours allowed him to make religious and ethnographic observations for the church and to take scientifically oriented notes on northern Scotland's minerals, plants, animals, and climate. In his 1764 tour, while on visit to the island of Jura (Deer Island), Walker may have made the first detailed description of Lyme disease. He gives a good description both of the symptoms (with "exquisite pain [in] the interior parts of the limbs") and of the tick vector itself, which he describes as a "worm" with a body which is "of a reddish colour and of a compressed shape with a row of feet on each side" that "penetrates the skin". Also during this period, he collected samples of the mineral that came to be known as strontianite from its type locality, thus setting in process the identification and analysis of the new alkaline earth strontium.
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