Guernsey Heroes of the Royal Society
Programme of Events
The Royal Society was established in 1660 and rapidly became an international centre for gathering and disseminating ideas – about science, technology and medicine, and many other disciplines. Election as a Fellow of the Society was, and still is, a high honour, recognising outstanding scientific achievement.
The Friends of the Priaulx Library are participating in the Society’s 350th anniversary celebrations with a series of three lectures, an exhibition, and other activities, running from November 2009 to October 2010. Under the general heading Guernsey Heroes of the Royal Society, the programme focuses on the lives, research and achievements of a number of Guernseymen, and people with close Guernsey connections, who have been Fellows of the Royal Society.
Please click on the following links to see the event poster and flyer which can be printed out and displayed.
The first lecture (in fact the first event in the Society’s anniversary celebrations) was:
One shilling weekly: 350 years of The Royal Society
8.00 pm, Monday, 23 November 2009, at the Frossard Centre, Candie Gardens
Keith Moore, Chief Librarian and Archivist, The Royal Society
This first lecture outlined how Fellows of the Royal Society changed the modern world by communicating the results of observation and experiment through the organisation. Some of their projects are so familiar that they have entered the language – others are surprising and not what we would think of as science at all. Fellows’ accumulated endeavours are still preserved in their London-based historical collections of archives, books, paintings and museum objects, and these were used to explain why we are celebrating 350 years of this remarkable organisation.
Keith Moore has specialised in history of science collections for much of his career, and has written about many of them. He has been the Royal Society’s Librarian since 2005, having worked for other London-based learned societies, including the Wellcome Institute and the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.
The next event will be:
Exhibition: Guernsey Heroes of the Royal Society
1 April to 25 June 2010, at the Priaulx Library
This major exhibition will feature the work of ten outstanding Guernseymen who were Fellows of the Royal Society, as well as a number of others who had some association with the Island. It will include publications and surviving artefacts. Poster exhibitions and talks will also be offered to island schools in the summer term, and a poster exhibition will displayed in the Guille-Allès Library in May.
The second lecture is:
The Raymond Falla Memorial Lecture: Guernsey Heroes of the Royal Society
8.00 pm, Thursday, 13 May 2010 at Les Côtils Centre
Amanda Bennett, Chief Librarian, Priaulx Library, and David Le Conte, Chairman, WEA Guernsey
This illustrated talk will describe the lives and work of those Guernseymen who were Fellows of the Royal Society. They cover a broad base of subjects from astronomy to medicine, from geology to naval inventions. These are men who made names for themselves, not only within Guernsey, but in many cases both nationally and internationally, and who brought credit to their Island. Several of them, such as Warren De La Rue, Samuel Elliott Hoskins and John MacCulloch, were admired by their contemporaries and are even now recognised historically as having made significant contributions to scientific knowledge.
Amanda Bennett worked in the Guernsey Schools Library Service and the Guille-Allès Library, before becoming Chief Librarian of the Priaulx Library in 2005. Her research interests include the history of Guernsey newspapers, the subject of her dissertation for a Masters Degree in Information and Library Studies.
David Le Conte has worked at astronomical observatories in the UK and USA, in the US space programme, at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC, and in several areas of the Guernsey civil service, mainly environment and heritage. He is a Past President of La Société Guernesiaise, and a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society. His recent research interests include astronomical history and prehistory.
The final lecture in this programme is:
What’s the point of the Royal Society? A modern perspective
8.00 pm, Wednesday, 20 October 2010 at the Frossard Centre, Candie Gardens
Professor Nicholas Day, CBE, FRS
The third and final lecture will be given by the Guernsey’s only living Fellow of the Royal Society. He will describe the structure, function, and work of Britain's national academy of science in supporting scientific disciplines, applying scientific knowledge to business, promoting informed debate, and influencing public policy with evidence-based advice. Through a series of publications and workshops, often in conjunction with its international counterparts, the Society provides authoritative syntheses of the current state of knowledge for many of the pressing issues of the day, ranging from climate change to the storage of radioactive waste. These make an important contribution to the scientific basis for government action.
Professor Day is distinguished for his wide-ranging and influential work in quantitative epidemiology, especially of cancer. He was for many years Professor of Epidemiology at Cambridge, Director of the Institute of Public Health, and Director of the Medical Research Council Unit of Biostatistics. He has authored or edited eleven books, and published some 500 papers in the scientific literature. He was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2004.
For more information please contact the project leader, David Le Conte, tel 264847, or via this email link.
The Guernsey Heroes project is being carried out in association with The Royal Society, La Société Guernesiaise and WEA Guernsey, All events are free.
The Royal Society: www.royalsociety.org/local-heroes
La Société Guernesiaise: www.societe.org.gg
WEA Guernsey: www.wea.org.gg