Dr George Colin Lawder Bertram, generally known as Colin Bertram, (27 November 1911 – 2001) was a British zoologist. He was born the son of Frank Bertram (later the deputy director of Civil Aviation) and was educated at Berkhamsted and at

St John's College, Cambridge St John's College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge founded by the House of Tudor, Tudor matriarch Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is a charitable corpo ...

, where he was awarded a first in Zoology. After graduation, he joined a three-man Cambridge Expedition to Scoresby Sound, East Greenland, transported there and back by Dr

Jean-Baptiste Charcot Jean-Baptiste-Étienne-Auguste Charcot (15 July 1867 – 16 September 1936), born in Neuilly-sur-Seine, was a French scientist, medical doctor and polar scientist. His father was the neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot (1825–1893). Life Jean-Ba ...

in his ship ''Pourquoi-Pas?''. This was followed by nine months studying coral reefs in the Red Sea, prior to accepting a place as a biologist on the British Graham Land Expedition of 1934–37. On that expedition he initially carried out the task of marine biologist on the expedition ship ''Penola'' but then exchanged roles with the shore biologist. As a result, he was able to take part in the long exploratory expedition of 600 miles by dog sledge which discovered the ice-filled

George VI Sound George VI Sound or Canal Jorge VI or Canal Presidente Sarmiento or Canal Seaver or King George VI Sound or King George the Sixth Sound is a major bay/ fault depression, 300 miles (483 km) long and mainly covered by a permanent ice shelf. It ...

, separating

Alexander Island Alexander Island, which is also known as Alexander I Island, Alexander I Land, Alexander Land, Alexander I Archipelago, and Zemlja Alexandra I, is the largest island of Antarctica. It lies in the Bellingshausen Sea west of Palmer Land, Antarc ...

from the

Antarctic Peninsula The Antarctic Peninsula, known as O'Higgins Land in Chile and Tierra de San Martín in Argentina, and originally as Graham Land in the United Kingdom and the Palmer Peninsula in the United States, is the northernmost part of mainland Antarctic ...

. They also confirmed that the peninsula was not an archipelago. In 1939, he married fellow zoologist, Kate Ricardo, a specialist of East African and Palestinian fisheries (and daughter of consulting engineer Sir

Harry Ricardo Sir Harry Ralph Ricardo (26 January 1885 – 18 May 1974) was an English engineer who was one of the foremost engine designers and researchers in the early years of the development of the internal combustion engine. Among his many other works, ...

, FRS). Together, they carried out extensive fieldwork in Australia, Papua New Guinea, Sri Lanka, Belize and the Guianas, and published almost two dozen articles and books on sirenians between 1962 and 1977. They had four sons.

Scott Polar Research Institute - geograph

During the Second World War Bertram was initially based at the

Scott Polar Research Institute The Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI) is a centre for research into the polar regions and glaciology worldwide. It is a sub-department of the Department of Geography in the University of Cambridge, located on Lensfield Road in the south o ...

in Cambridge, where he worked on the development and testing of Arctic clothing and equipment for the War Office. He was involved in the invention of the string vest, which allows a thin layer of warm air to circulate next to the skin and reduces the loss of body heat. In 1940 he was posted to Palestine for three years as Chief Fisheries Officer, helping to maximise the food resources in the Gulf of Aqaba. After the war he took up a fellowship at St John's College, Cambridge and from 1949 concurrently held the part-time post of Director of the Scott Polar Research Institute. He was a strong advocate for the need to stabilise world population and was a long-term member (and for seven years

general secretary Secretary is a title often used in organizations to indicate a person having a certain amount of authority, power, or importance in the organization. Secretaries announce important events and communicate to the organization. The term is derived ...

) of the

Galton Institute The Adelphi Genetics Forum is a non-profit learned society based in the United Kingdom. Its aims are "to promote the public understanding of human heredity and to facilitate informed debate about the ethical issues raised by advances in reproductive ...

. After the passage of the British Nationality Act of 1948, Bertram authored several articles which argued that races were biologically distinct due to their evolved adaptations to different environments, and that

miscegenation Miscegenation ( ) is the interbreeding of people who are considered to be members of different races. The word, now usually considered pejorative, is derived from a combination of the Latin terms ''miscere'' ("to mix") and ''genus'' ("race") ...

should only be permitted between similar races. He died in 2001, aged 89.

Honours and awards

*1942

W. S. Bruce Medal This is a list of recipients of the W. S. Bruce Medal. Established in 1923, the medal is awarded quinquennially for notable contributions to "Zoology, Botany, Geology, Meteorology, Oceanography or Geography, where new knowledge has been gained th ...

"for valuable biological work in the Arctic and Antarctic from 1932 to 1937" *1957

Murchison Grant The Murchison Award, also referred to as the Murchison Grant, was first given by the Royal Geographical Society in 1882 for publications judged to have contributed most to geographical science in preceding recent years. Recipients Source (1882– ...

for his work at the Scott Polar Research Institute. *The

Bertram Glacier Bertram Glacier () is a glacier, long and wide at its mouth, which flows west from the Dyer Plateau of Palmer Land into George VI Sound between Wade Point and Gurney Point. It was discovered and first surveyed in 1936 by A. Stephenson, W.L.S. ...

, which flows from the

Dyer Plateau Dyer Plateau () is a broad ice-covered upland of north-central Palmer Land, bounded to the north by Fleming Glacier and Bingham Glacier, and to the south by the Gutenko Mountains. It is buttressed by Goettel Escarpment. The plateau was first exp ...

Palmer Land Palmer Land () is the portion of the Antarctic Peninsula, Antarctica that lies south of a line joining Cape Jeremy and Cape Agassiz. This application of Palmer Land is consistent with the 1964 agreement between the Advisory Committee on Antarctic N ...

into

in Antarctica, was named after him.

Works

* ''Arctic Antarctic: The Technique of Polar Travel'' (1939) * ''Adam's Brood: Hopes and Fears of a Biologist'' (1959) * ''In Search of Mermaids: The Manatees of Guyana'' (1963). * His autobiography, ''A Biologist's Story'', was privately printed in 1987.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bertram, George Colin Lawder 1911 births 2001 deaths Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge 20th-century British zoologists Place of birth missing People of the Scott Polar Research Institute Collections of the Scott Polar Research Institute