Tag Archives: Walter Bodmer

Sir Walter Bodmer and the Department of Genetics at Oxford University

As part of the Saving Oxford Medicine blog we will be tracing the distinguished careers of the Bodmers. Currently being catalogued, the archive of Sir Walter includes a significant number of papers relating to his time at Oxford University, both during his earlier career as Professor of Genetics from 1970-79, and later, as Principal of Hertford College from 1996. The archive also comprises the papers of Sir Walter’s wife, the economist and geneticist Lady Julia Gwynaeth Bodmer.

In our previous post we saw a picture taken of Professor Kenneth Franklin and his colleagues outside the old Physiology Laboratory in 1894. Moving forwards to a later generation of Oxford scientists we have a picture taken outside the same building on South Parks Road.

The group picture below shows Oxford’s first Professor of Genetics Sir Walter Bodmer (back row, fourth from right) and his colleagues outside the staff entrance of the Genetics Laboratory, which he headed. Julia Bodmer also worked in the laboratory, also pictured (middle row on steps, far right). The Genetics Laboratory would later become the Walter Bodmer Building, now demolished.

genetics-lab
Sir Walter Bodmer (back row, fourth from right) and his colleagues outside the staff entrance of the Genetics Laboratory

In addition to fully representing the development of Sir Walter and Lady Bodmer’s laboratory research into human tissue histocompatibility antigens, the archive also illustrates the development of genetics as an academic discipline at Oxford University. In 1969 the University made the decision to create a chair of genetics after the retirement of geneticist Edmund Brisco Ford, who held a personal chair. Likewise, the distinguished geneticist and Professor of Botany Cyril Darlington was close to retirement. (Follow the links to learn more about the archives of both men, which are available for access at the Bodleian.)

Prior to this period there had been relatively little in the way of genetics available to Oxford students and it was felt that the discipline should be established on a more permanent teaching basis. Upon arrival in Oxford it was left to Bodmer to decide what department genetics would be allied with; zoology, botany or biochemistry. As a molecular biologist increasingly moving towards biochemical work, he chose to bring this newly created sub-department of genetics within the Department of Biochemistry. In his capacity as Professor of Genetics, Bodmer and his colleagues held the responsibility of all genetics teaching at undergraduate level, from medical students to biochemists and biologists. By Sir Walter’s own description, himself and his colleagues “built up a small lively department, with interests in biochemical genetics…and human genetics”.

Sir Walter Bodmer’s Archive

Sir Walter Bodmer
Sir Walter Bodmer

In 1992, in an answer for a Daily Telegraph questionnaire, the eminent geneticist, and then Director-General of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, Sir Walter Bodmer identified his chosen last words as, ‘To my wife: please do not shred all my papers!’.

His concern to retain his papers is commendable and the resultant archive, which has just been boxlisted by archivists Tim Powell and Adrian Nardone, is huge: over 2,000 archive boxes.

As the size of the archive indicates, Sir Walter kept good records of his activities and the collection documents nearly all aspects of his career, from schooldays at Manchester in the early 1950s to his recent research at the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine.  It includes voluminous documentation of areas of research and activities with which Sir Walter is particularly associated: research and publications into HLA and immunogenetics, cancer research, his Professorship of Genetics at Oxford 1970-1979, and terms as Director of Research and Director-General of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund 1979-1996. Other major responsibilites included his presidency of HUGO – the international human genome organization, chairmanship of the Board of Trustees of the Natural History Museum and chairmanship of the National Radiological Protection Board.

Continue reading Sir Walter Bodmer’s Archive