A HISTORY OF THE RGS IN ITS PEOPLE T H E S C H O O L RO U T E TO A M E D I C A L C A R E E R
BY DAVID GOLDWATER (51-62)
R J Scothorne
T
he man who must be credited with guiding so many RGS students to their medical careers is undoubtedly George Pallister, whose name shines brightly throughout these pages. When he first came to the RGS in 1926, in his own words, ‘I had a single pupil in the Upper Sixth and three in the Lower Sixth’. All four pupils were taught together, something which continued for more then fifteen years until the early 1940s. R J Scothorne (30-37), Professor of Anatomy at the Newcastle Medical School, visited the School after 23 years: ‘I asked him how he was and how things were going in the Medical Sixth: a brief clearing of the throat, a tentative raising of the eyebrows, a pause: “Oh! much as usual, much as usual!”’ To misquote Churchill on Attlee, George Pallister was a modest man, who had nothing to be modest about. R J Scothorne again: ‘We were hungry to learn, and the traditional sequence of frog, dogfish and
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rabbit—nowadays regarded by some as rather old-fashioned Biology—seemed to us, under the skilful, kindly guidance of G.P., pure delight’. George taught Botany and Zoology leading up to the Higher School Certificate and encouraged many of the boys to carry out field work in the Summer Term and visits to Plessey Woods and the Marine Laboratory at Cullercoats were regular destinations. Again, in George’s own words: ‘We were equipped with vascula and small glass corked specimen tubes for insects and other small animals. We took the electric train from Jesmond Station … and alighted at Cullercoats. We went straight to the beach and made for the rock pools, turning over innumerable stones and noted “zonation” in seaweeds and molluscs. Other expeditions included the roadside verges around Wylam near the Tyne, Seaton Sluice sand dunes and Finchale Abbey woods. As I had not had any training in identifying animals, insects, crustacea, Charles Nathaniel ‘Nattie’ Armstrong
Henry Harvey Evers
molluscs etc., I attended several courses run by Armstrong—later King’s—College (now Newcastle University), often on Saturdays or in the holidays, finding them most interesting and useful’. Thus began the medical careers of numerous RGS students during George’s 40 years at the School. With R F I Bunn (2533), Michael Roberts (25-31 & 34-41) and T T Anderson (24-60), George was one of the pioneers of School camping, characteristically content with the role of assistant until he was prevailed upon to take charge of the Whitsuntide Camp at Rothbury in 1934. On the outbreak of war, the School was evacuated to Penrith and it was largely the camping staff who manned the School hostels that came into being. As with so many dedicated RGS teachers, George Pallister could fill an entire issue. Some may find it surprising that a ‘Cambridge First’ should spend the whole of his teaching life at the School (1926-66). George died aged 88 in 1991.
