The Salopian no. 157 - Winter 2015

72
OLD SALOPIAN NEWS
Obituaries
Professor J H Appleton (SH 1933-38)
Mr J C Chavasse (SH 1938-43)
Mr R Dowty (SH 1945-50)
Mr J H C Edwards (SH 1949-54)
The Reverend R L Edwards (DB 1936-40)
Mr J Egerton-Williams (I 1929-32)
Mr R W Foster-Pegg (Rt 1933-37)
Mr J P France (Rb 1984-89)
Mr H S Gibson (R 1963-68)
Mr A J A Gillan (Rt 1938-42)
Mr N P B Green-Price (I 1941-44)
Mr W R Grey (SH 1934-38)
Mr W B Hill (SH 1946-51)
Mr D R Howl (S 1950-54)
Mr C R P Jones (S 1966-69)
Mr P J Lawn (G 1988-93)
Vice-Admiral Sir J S C Lea (Rt 1937-41)
Mr J E Levetus (Ch 1938-42)
Mr G D Lovett (I 1950-53)
Mr A Metcalfe-Brown (SH 1948-52)
Mr R J Moore (R 1947-51)
Mr B B Overy (DB 1939-43)
Dr P Owen-Lloyd (S 1944-49)
Dr A M M Plumptre (SH 1942-46)
Mr D H Roberts (Rt 1958-62)
Mr M A Schützer-Weissmann (Staff 1988-2015)
Dr V Simons (JHT 1939-43)
Mr C H Smith (Rt 1949-52)
Mr C Vaughan (S 1953-58)
Mr E J Warburton (I 1951-55)
Rev J R V Woods (R 1945-50)
Professor Jay Appleton (SH 1933-38)
Jay Appleton was born in 1919 in Headingly, Leeds. His
father was a Curate in the Church of England, who had
returned from service as an Army Chaplain in poor health,
as a result of which he was transferred to a rural parish
in Norfolk. Remote as it was, their new home presented
challenges for the family, but Jay was to learn to cope,
whatever the situation, a quality that stood him in good
stead at various times in his life. That his clergyman
parent was a more than useful amateur engineer and
inventor meant that some of the developments of the
early 20th century came to the village of Stibbard sooner
than they might have done. On journeys across England
from Norfolk to Lancashire, Jay showed an interest in his
surroundings which marked him out as the geographer he
eventually became.
A scholarship for the sons of clergy made possible Jay’s
entry to Shrewsbury as a boarder, where he joined his
cousins from Wigan. The journey to school and back was
long and arduous, but far from being put off, the young
Jay developed a life-long enthusiasm for railways. He did
well enough at Shrewsbury to win a place at Oxford, but
not before he had accomplished the remarkable feat of
teaching himself enough Greek in six weeks to enable him
to qualify for a pass in School Certificate, in those days an
essential requirement.
When war broke out, Jay was confronted by the moral
dilemma of one who wanted to fight against the enemy,
but who could see the possibility of receiving an order
that in conscience he could not carry out. Assigned to
a non-combatant unit (and therefore not armed), he
demonstrated the extraordinary courage required in Bomb
Disposal. There could hardly have been a more dangerous
posting in 1940.
In 1942, Jay met his future wife, Iris, and they were
married the following year. Leaving the Army in 1946,
he sought an outdoor life and turned his hand to fruitgrowing.
Soon, however, he was struck by the symptoms
of severe arthritis, which forced him to abandon life on the
land and return to academic life. He applied for a course
in Geology at Newcastle University, but before he could
take up the place, the course was discontinued, and he
enrolled on the Geography course. In the meantime, a
remarkable thing had occurred; the extraction of a tooth
had cured his ‘arthritis’ for good! By such an accident
of fate did the potential farmer become a distinguished
geographer.
He made such a favourable impression that he was offered
a post at the University College of Hull, where he was to
remain for thirty-five years. He was a popular lecturer and
an able administrator, acting for many years as Admissions
Officer. He was an early advocate of what has come
to be known as the Gap Year, believing as he did that
prospective students would benefit from seeing something
of the world they intended to study. His interest in
railways came into play in a report on the use of disused
lines (of which, post-Beeching, there were many). His
proposals became government policy.
In 1975 Jay published a book, ‘The Experience of
Landscape’, in which he propounded the theory that
people have an innate desire to live in an environment
where they can observe without being seen. This he
traced back to early man in the ‘hunter-gatherer’ stage. It
was at once a novel idea and an influential one, and his
subsequent writings on landscape aesthetics were widely
taken up by landscape architects.
Retiring from Hull, where he had become a Professor, he
took up writing poetry, though very late in life. He was