Archives images online

by Caroline Brown

Images from pioneering work on environmental science, ecology and conservation held by the University Archive Services will soon be available online as part of the SCRAN project (Cultural Resources Access Network and Resources for Learning in Scotland).

Archive, Records Management and Museum Services has already contributed 4,000 digital images of archives, artefacts and artwork in its collections to SCRAN's award winning website. 350 more images, with accompanying explanatory text, will soon be online. Topics that are represented include new developments in rural areas, changes in land use, the environmental impact of development, and conservation issues. Many of the digitised items come from four different collections held by the archives, each representing important research in these subject areas.

The papers of Dr John Berry, an ecologist and biologist, cover the period from the 1940s to the 1970s. In the course of his work Berry gained an international reputation as an expert on freshwater fisheries, hydro-electric development, conservation and ornithology. A related collection is the McClean Hydrometric archive, an important record of the pioneering work of William Newsam McClean on the measurement of rainfall and river flow in the 1920s and 1930s, which had a significant impact on the development of hydro-electric schemes in Scotland.

Land use, the evolution of rural settlements and patterns of population are recorded in documents and plans relating to the crofting survey carried out by Professor James Caird of the University's Department of Geography in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The object of the survey was to make an unbiased, factual record of the condition of life in crofting districts in the Outer Hebrides.

Finally, Robert Smith, who was appointed to the botanical department of University College Dundee in 1896, is also represented in the archives.

Smith was a noted botanist who pioneered a systematic ecological survey of Scotland. Archives are fortunate in holding Ordnance Survey maps used by Smith as working drafts for the proposed publications of the Botanical Survey of Scotland. Smith was much admired by Patrick Geddes who was Professor of Botany during this period so it is fitting that Smith’s work should be recognised during 2004, the 150th anniversary of Geddes' birth.