Identity area
Reference code
Title
Date(s)
- 1949 - 1994 (Creation)
Level of description
Extent and medium
1 box, 4cm
Context area
Name of creator
Biographical history
Born China 1924; died 1995
Although born in China, David Irvine returned to the Shetland Islands as a baby and was educated in Lerwick. He served in the RAF during the Second World War and in 1947 entered St Andrews University to read botany, staying on to take a PhD on the ecology of a single rock pool. During this period he became a founder member of the British Phycological (the scientific study of algae) Society. In 1954 he was appointed a Demonstrator in Agricultural Botany at the University of Cambridge where he stayed until 1958. He then spent 2 years as a research assistant at the University of Illinois contributing to the ‘Index Nominum Algarum’, an index of the published names of algae. In 1961 he returned to Britain as senior lecturer in the Department of Biology and Geology at the Polytechnic of North London where he stayed until his retirement in 1984. Although dedicating most of his academic life to the study of seaweeds in the north eastern Atlantic, David Irvine was an accomplished field biologist and natural historian with a wide range of interests. He led a number of field trips to study seaweeds and marine algae around Lundy Island, Sullom Voe and the Faroes. An avid collector, he bequeathed his herbarium and reprint collection to the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
Source: obituary, The Phycologist 1996 http://www.brphycsoc.org/documents/phycologist/The%20Phycologist%20No.%2044%20August%201996.pdf
Repository
Archival history
David Irvine's Collecting books were part of a consignment of herbarium material sent by his wife Linda from the Botany Department of the Natural History Museum, London to RBGE in July 1994. The herbarium specimens have been incorporated into the herbarium collection and the Collecting books were passed to the herbarium in December 2014, from there they were passed to the RBGE Archives in January 2015.
Immediate source of acquisition or transfer
RBGE Herbarium
Content and structure area
Scope and content
3 small notebooks numbered 1-3, and a letter
1:"Herb. Irvine 1"
Collecting Book 1 - Nos 1-862 1949-1965; incl. St Andrews, Bangor, Anglesey, Isle of Man, Eden Estuary, Aberystwyth, Merioneth, Pembrokeshire, Capri (Italy), Brittany (France), Galway, Mayo, Manitoba (Canada), Cape Cod (Massachusetts), Orkney and Voe (Shetland)
2:"Herb.Irvine 2"
Collecting Book 2 - Nos 863-1847 1964-1968; incl. Anglesey, Pembrokeshire, Portsmouth, Dover-Folkestone, Cramond Island, Dunbar, North Berwick, Scilly, Devon and Paignton
3:"Herb.Irvine 3"
Collecting Book 3 - Nos 1848-1940 (Misc Order) 1963-1969 inc. Firth of Forth?
4:letter from Linda M. Irvine which accompanied herbarium consignment, filed in RBGE Archives Accessions folder under RBGEEA2015/23
Appraisal, destruction and scheduling
Accruals
Four further boxes of collected correspondence, reprints and typescript manuscripts including items relating to biological surveying in Shetland, the Faroe Islands and Lundy amongst other places were transferred to the Library post 2015 - these have been added to the Library collection in 2021 (FNYU1), and are located in Case 16: (right click, open link in new tab) https://rbge.koha-ptfs.co.uk/cgi-bin/koha/opac-detail.pl?biblionumber=110900
2 further boxes added to this (from Herbarium) in November 2023.
System of arrangement
Conditions of access and use area
Conditions governing access
Collection is open to researchers by appointment, see (right click, open link in new tab:) https://www.rbge.org.uk/science-and-conservation/library-and-archives/visiting-the-library/
Conditions governing reproduction
Permission required from RBGE
Language of material
- English
Script of material
Language and script notes
Physical characteristics and technical requirements
good
Finding aids
Allied materials area
Existence and location of originals
Existence and location of copies
Related units of description
Herbarium specimens will be stored in RBGE Herbarium
Notes area
Note
RBGEA2015/23
Alternative identifier(s)
Access points
Subject access points
Place access points
Name access points
Genre access points
Description control area
Description identifier
Institution identifier
Rules and/or conventions used
Status
Level of detail
Dates of creation revision deletion
Language(s)
Script(s)
Sources
Archivist's note
description compiled by L.P.