| Administrative History | William Edmond Logan was born in Montréal on 20 April, 1798, the son of a Scottish emigrant baker and general merchant. The family returned to Scotland whilst Logan was young and he completed his education at Edinburgh High School, followed by one year at the University of Edinburgh. He worked for his uncle, Hart Logan, a successful businessman, in London during the 1820s and in South Wales from 1831. It was in Wales that he became interested in geology, mapping the coalfields around Swansea and playing a key role in the foundation of the Royal Institution of South Wales.
When the newly established British Geological Survey under Henry T. De la Beche (1796-1855) came to South Wales, Logan and De la Beche became friends. Logan's work was recognized as setting new standards of accuracy and was subsequently incorporated into the British survey. He was the founder and first director of the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC), 1841, and is widely regarded as Canada's first great scientist. |
| Custodial History | James Gregory (1753 - 1821) was Professor of the Practice of Physic and Institutes of Medicine in the University of Edinburgh, 1790 - 1821. His son, James Craufurd Gregory (1801 - 1832), was a medical student there, 1818 - 1823. This dissertation may have come to the Gregory family papers through their respective associations with Logan as teacher and fellow student. |