Prof Thomas Stanley Westoll, FRS

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soci ...

, FGS FLS LLD (3 July 1912 – 19 September 1995) was a British geologist, and the long-time head of the Department of Geology at

Newcastle University Newcastle University (legally the University of Newcastle upon Tyne) is a UK public university, public research university based in Newcastle upon Tyne, North East England. It has overseas campuses in Singapore and Malaysia. The university is ...

Education and career

He was born in

West Hartlepool West Hartlepool was a predecessor of Hartlepool, County Durham, England. It developed in the Victorian era and took the name from its western position in the parish of what is now known as the Headland. The former town was originally formed in ...

the son of Horace Stanley Raine Westoll. He was educated at the West Hartlepool Grammar School. He then studied Sciences on a scholarship at

Durham University , mottoeng = Her foundations are upon the holy hills (Psalm 87:1) , established = (university status) , type = Public , academic_staff = 1,830 (2020) , administrative_staff = 2,640 (2018/19) , chancellor = Sir Thomas Allen , vice_chan ...

, specialising in geology and palaeontology, graduating BSc in 1932. Continuing as a postgraduate he gained his first doctorate (PhD) in 1934 from research on Permian fishes. In 1937 he began lecturing in Geology and Mineralogy at

Aberdeen University , mottoeng = The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom , established = , type = Public research universityAncient university , endowment = £58.4 million (2021) , budget ...

, his central interest being the study of fossil fish. In 1943 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...

. His proposers were Robert MacFarlane Neill,

Thomas Phemister Prof Thomas Crawford Phemister FRSE FGS (1902–1982) was a 20th-century Scottish geologist. Life He was born in Glasgow, Scotland on 25 May 1902 the son of John Clark Phemister (b.1858) and his wife, Elizabeth Galbraith Crawford. He was the ...

Ernest Cruickshank Ernest William Henderson Cruickshank FRSE LLD (22 March 1888 – 29 December 1964) was a Scottish physician and physiologist. He was the author of several textbooks on nutrition. His book ''Food and Nutrition'' was an influential best-seller. ...

, and

James Robert Matthews James Robert Matthews FRSE FLS CBE LLD (1889–1978) was a 20th-century Scottish botanist. He was president of the British Ecological Society in 1934 and president of the Botanical Society of Edinburgh 1939 to 1942. Life He was born in the vill ...

. Aberdeen University awarded him his second doctorate (DSc). In 1948 he left Aberdeen to return to England as Professor of Geology at the University of Newcastle, staying there until his retirement in 1977. In retirement he remained as a research fellow and Chairman of Convocation. He was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of London The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

in March 1952. The citation on his application read: "''Westoll is a palaeontologist who by his description of new materials and by the introduction of new and fertile ideas into the interpretation of the structure of early fossil vertebrates has greatly increased our understanding of the problems they present. He has introduced new views about the origins of the pectoral fins of craniates and of the Tetrapod limb. He has clarified our ideas about the homologies of the dermal skull bones of vertebrates and made a new and convincing comparison between the skulls of Amphibia and Fish. He has made important contributions towards the solution of the old problems of the origin of the mammalian palate and ear. His monograph of the Haplolepidae sets a new standard for taxonomic work on fossil fish".'' He was on the council of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

and from 1972 to 1974 was President of the Geological Society of London. He died in Newcastle upon Tyne on 19 September 1995.

Family

He married twice: firstly in 1939 to Dorothy Cecil Isobel Wood, then, following divorce in 1951, in 1952 he married Barbara Swanson McAdie.

Research interests

His research interests were wide-ranging, but he is best known for his work on the

evolution of fish The evolution of fish began about 530 million years ago during the Cambrian explosion. It was during this time that the early chordates developed the skull and the vertebral column, leading to the first craniates and vertebrates. The first fish ...

. The development of the

tetrapod Tetrapods (; ) are four-limbed vertebrate animals constituting the superclass Tetrapoda (). It includes extant and extinct amphibians, sauropsids ( reptiles, including dinosaurs and therefore birds) and synapsids (pelycosaurs, extinct theraps ...

limb and issues with the

Silurian The Silurian ( ) is a geologic period and system spanning 24.6 million years from the end of the Ordovician Period, at million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Devonian Period, Mya. The Silurian is the shortest period of the Paleozo ...

Devonian The Devonian ( ) is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic era, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the Silurian, million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Carboniferous, Mya. It is named after Devon, England, whe ...

boundary were some of the topics which occupied him. Throughout a long academic career he made forceful and important contributions in these and other fields

Publications

*''Studies on Fossil Vertebrates'' (1958) *''Geology of the USSR'' (1973)

References

External links

Royal Society of Edinburgh Obituaries
1912 births 1995 deaths People from West Hartlepool Alumni of Newcastle University Academics of Newcastle University 20th-century British geologists Fellows of the Royal Society {{Geologist-stub