Tribute
Snowdon In a tribute to the late Derek Winston Snowdon (PJ, 1 May, p555),
GEORGE SPRAY writes:
I was saddened to learn of the death of Derek Snowdon,
yet pleased to read the fulsome tribute paid to him by Betty Jackson.
My perspective of him when I was a student was different to hers, but
the description she gave of the man was instantly recognisable. Belatedly,
I would like to add a few words of appreciation for this Sunderland pharmacognosist.
I cannot remember any student having had a bad word for him, which in
itself is a fairly rigorous test. His lectures were always well-prepared,
well-delivered
and, due to his dead-pan humour, memorable and on occasions, hilarious. So I
can still remember the lecture he gave on Rauwolfia, and the way he pretended
to have trouble pronouncing ajmalinine, ajmalicine and the rest of the alkaloids.
In another lecture he produced a block of opium, which he ceremonially weighed,
before passing it round for examination. It came back to him somewhat lighter,
which caused him to give his famous forlorn, deep sigh, and head shake, Oliver
Hardy style. He used an expression “bond-spotters”, reserved for
students determined to find fault with any molecular structure he had drawn. “I
am well aware,” he would say in defence, “that carbon is neither
trivalent nor pentavalent, so please concentrate on the pharmacognosy.”
Practical classes, when we were trying to draw what was down a microscope, would
bring out his best performances. He would look over my shoulder at my ignoble
efforts, and give his sigh, slowly close his eyes, and depart with a couple of
quiet tuts, and the head shake.
I got to know him better on outings with the rambling club, which was a pharmacognosy
department institution. There was hardly a subject on which he could not give
an informed opinion or advice. When a topic arose where he felt he did not have
a lot of information, his deep attention and questions were flattering. There
would always be small groups debating as we walked, and he would quietly ask
an incisive question, and alter the whole course of the discussion.
In any description of him or his activities (pharmacognosist, lecturer, botanist,
photographer or wit) one just cannot escape using the word “good”.
I am glad that I met him, and I certainly will not forget him, and the same must
be true for most of his ex-students.
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