Great, Great Grandfather James M. Geikie (1839-1915)

Geikie, James Murdoch (1839-1915) by Gordon L. Herries
sources from Oxford University Press 2004.
(edited by Shenton Geikie)

Geikie, James Murdoch (1839-1915), geologist was born on 23 August 1839 in a house between Bristo Street and George Square in Edinburgh, the third son and third of eight children of James Stuart Geikie and his wife, Isabella Thom, the daughter of a Dunbar sea captain. He disliked the name Murdoch and dropped it as a child. His father was evidently in the perfume trade, but the family preferred to have him remembered as an amateur musician and music critic for 'The Scotsman'. His uncle was the artist Walter Geikie and his eldest brother was the geologist Sir Archibald Geikie. He was educated at the Edinburgh high school (1850-53) and as a schoolboy he joined in the geological rambles of his brother Archibald and John Young, the future professor of natural history at Glasgow University. In August 1850 he conducted some strangers to the summit of Arthur's Seat without realizing they were Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, and four of the royal children. In 1854 he was apprenticed to the printer and publisher Thomas Constable, but disliked both the work and the indoor confinement. He renounced his apprenticeship in 1858 and resolved to follow his eldest brother into the ranks of the geological survey. While awaiting a vacancy he enrolled in the natural history class at Edinburgh University under George James Allman.

In October 1861, James joined the local branch of the geological survey as assistant geologist. He was promoted geologist in 1867, when the branch was reorganized as the geological survey of Scotland with Archibald Geikie as its director, and he was promoted district surveyor in 1869. With the survey he was in his element. He loved both the outdoor life and the companionship of genial and talented colleagues. He was a hardy, enthusiastic, and capable field geologist, the superficial deposits being his chief interest. For the survey he mapped in Fife and the Lothians, in the southern uplands, and in the Ayrshire and Lanarkshire coalfields, while from 1875 until 1882 his station was at Perth. It was in 1875, on 8 July, that he married Mary Simson, daughter of John Somerville Johnston of Crailing Hall, Jedburgh. They later had four sons and a daughter. While at the survey James achieved an international reputation as a student of the Quaternary and his book The Great Ice Age (1874; later editions in 1877 and 1894) became a classic, not least because of his advocacy of the reality of interglacial periods. Among his other texts, Outlines of Geology (1886) and Structural and Field Geology for Students (1905) both appeared in several editions.

In 1882 Archibald Geikie was appointed director-general of the geological survey and moved to London, leaving vacant the directorship of the Scottish survey and the Murchison chair of geology at Edinburgh University, which he had held concurrently with his survey post. James was his brother's obvious successor in both posts, but Archibald announced first that for the moment he would himself retain control of the Scottish survey and second that he would not sanction the holding of the Murchison chair by any survey geologist. Forced to choose between the survey and the chair, James Geikie chose the latter. It was a decision which he regretted for some years, although within the university he proved an effective teacher in both the classroom and the field and he was dean of the faculty of science from 1894 until 1913. He resigned his chair in June 1914.

A hearty, plain-spoken man, James lacked his brother's wide-ranging talents but was by far the more popular of the two. He was elected FRS (Fellow of the Royal Society) in 1875 and was much involved in the affairs of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (president 1913-15) and was the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, of which he was a co-founder and president in 1904-10. He travelled widely in Europe and he visited North America twice. James died suddenly in Edinburgh from a heart attack on 1 March 1915.