Three Geology teachers, three Mr Reids

In a recent blog post, Metageologist asked people to remember their most important geology teachers. Here are three of mine, all of whom shared the same surname.

I was educated in one of only half a dozen or so schools in Northern Ireland that taught geology to A Level standard. The geology teachers at the Royal School Armagh were the Vice Principal, Mr Darby Reid (nickname: “Darby”) and his son, Mr Michael Reid (nickname: “Wee Mick”).

Michael Reid was the person who really inspired me to get into geology. He had only recently graduated himself and was therefore probably less than 10 years older than us. He shared his enthusiasm for geology by sending us out to the frozen outdoor swimming pool to practice our hammer skills on the ice, showing us the key skill of licking rocks, taking us for field trips to the Mourne Mountains (I got soaked more than once doing a river section), and sharing exciting new developments in geology (this was the mid-late 70s when plate tectonics was new).

Darby Reid was one of the more senior teachers in the school, in fact he had taught my Dad in the 1950s. He had a reputation for being a strict disciplinarian (as befits a Vice Principal) and was incredibly well organised (he hand-drew all the timetables for the school), but he had an obvious passionĀ  for geology. He very obviously relaxed when teaching geology and his afternoon field trips to Carboniferous limestone quarry at Navan Fort were a highlight. He also gave us a walking tour round the geology of buildings in Armagh, highlighting in particular the local breccia that became highly polished when used as doorsteps.

The school was fortunate to have inherited the Earl of Caledon’s* geology collection which filled two display cabinets in Mr Reid’s classroom. There was even a sample of uraninite (which would really give the H&S people canaries today!). The store-room next door had been converted into a rock lab, with a rock cutting and polishing machine that A Level students were permitted to use. I can still smell the unique aroma of slicing through Silurian turbidites.

This was a fantastic learning environment, and I know that three pupils from my year (out of around 50) went on to graduate with geology degrees and become professional geologists. That is a real testimony to the Reid family enthusiasm and passion for the subject.

I did my first degree at Queen’s University Belfast in the early 1980s, and one of the lecturers there was a sedimentologist called Mr Robin Reid (no relation to the previous two Reids). Mr Reid had been an RAF pilot during the War and had studied geology afterwards as a War Degree. He was emphatically called Mr Reid because of a poor decision over his Ph.D – apparently, and unknown to him, someone had submitted a Ph.D. thesis on exactly the same topic as Mr Reid only a week or so before he submitted his, and therefore he was denied the award of his degree.

My best memory of Robin Reid was the third year field trip to the Cotswolds and Weymouth. While the students took the ferry and a train to Cheltenham, and were then on a coach for the rest of the trip, Mr Reid rode his old Triumph motorbike. And yes, he did wear a white silk scarf, all very RAF. He introduced us to the joys of the Inferior and Greater Oolite, the Jurassic Coast and, crucially, real ale. I still get excited seeing oolites in the field.

I’d be interested to hear from anyone else who remembers these teachers. There are many more who I could mention (Arthur Whiteman from Aberdeen being one), but that’s for another day.

* One of the Earls of Caledon was a Fellow of the Geological Society (FGS).

5 thoughts on “Three Geology teachers, three Mr Reids

  1. I remember that trip with great fondness especially with Robin following our coach on his triumph with his goggles and thick riding gloves.

  2. Do you remember James Buchannan, William Lowry, Francis Crozier etc? We started off with Dave Sanderson at Appleby, then met with Robin for the journey to Cheltham and then Weymouth.
    I have still got an ammonite from that trip which my little girl wants to take to school to show her teacher but I cannot remember its proper name. It has been a long time!!

    regards

    Phil

  3. Hi John,
    I also remember Darby Reid, a strict disciplinarian, as you say. In our final year at RSA he was acting headmaster and he scolded me severely for taking a Wednesday afternoon off to go up to Belfast to watch a Northern Ireland football match. He was also a very talented artist- my mother has a number of his paintings of Armagh

  4. Hi John and Philip,
    I am a geologist at Queen’s, I came after your time there as I took Mr Reid’s position. I have a PhD student studying palaeopathologies in dinosaurs, and in his literature review has not cited Robin, so I was searching for his seminal article on this and found your posts. Great stuff as I have many anecdotes of Robin: his gifts to me on leaving – a length of chain, his typed copy of Eskimo Nell, his Orangeman’s umbrella with contained swordstick (now in the Ulster Museum), his fossil fish and Icthyosaur and more. I occupied his room, and the stain on the floor where his Christmas pudding had resided for 17 years could never be removed. I also took over his England fieldclass, and could not compete with a motorbike, but did go in our 1970s racing green Triumph 1500, which broke down on the ferry. Climbing up the cliff at Cloghfin Port with him, I saw why his stapling his split trousers had not been a good idea, for both of us.

  5. Hi John,
    I was taught by a Robin Reid at Queens during the late 80s/ early 90s. He was a palaeontologist as I knew him. He was very fond of Chzech Bud and Creme de Menthe, which we drank in ample amounts in Queens common room. He was ex RAF and a real, if not somewhat eccentric gentleman. I believe he moved from Belfast to the Isle of Wight on retirement because of its fossil content. He may be the same individual you are referring to, but the timeline on your blog may post date his retirement date which I would have been in the 1990s, early 2000s at the latest, I take it he has passed away by now but I don’t know for sure. I came across your site trying to check this out.
    All the best
    Martin Murray
    Martin.murray@btinternet.com

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