Quick Facts
Biography
Stevenson Macadam FRSE FIC FCS FSSA (27 April 1829 – 24 January 1901) was a Scottish scientist, analytical chemist, lecturer, academic author and part of a small dynasty of Scottish chemical scientists including his elder half-brother William Macadam, full brother Dr. John Macadam and two sons, William Ivison Macadam and Stevenson J. C. G. Macadam and granddaughter Elison A. Macadam. He was a founding member of the Institute of Chemistry of Great Britain (now the Royal Society of Chemistry) and a founding member of the Society of Chemical Industry. He was also a President of the Royal Scottish Society of the Arts. He was a prominent lecturer in chemistry at institutions in Edinburgh, including Edinburgh University and the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and the Edinburgh veterinary colleges. He also had a large analytical chemical consulting practise. Stevenson Macadam was born at North Bank in Glasgow on 27 April 1829, one of four sons and four daughters (the eldest being a half brother). He married on 23 April 1855 in Neilston, Renfrew, Scotland Jessie Andrew Ivison
His Father
His father was William Macadam (1783-1853) and his mother was his father's second wife Helen Stevenson (1803-1857).
His father was a prominent Glasgow businessman who owned a mill and textile printing works in Kilmarnock.He and his fellow industrialists in the craft around Glasgow had developed the expertise in chemistry processes for the large scale industrial printing of fabrics for which these plants in the area became well known, both for domestic and foreign supply.
William Macadam also served as a Burgess and as a Bailie [alderman] of Glasgow.
Father's wives and their children
William’s first wife was Rachel Gentle with whom he had one son:
William Macadam', the eldest child, was the first chemical scientist in the family, and a half brother to Stevenson.
William's second wife was Helen Stevenson (1803-1857) with whom he had a further seven children:
Helen Grindlay Macadam
John Macadam (Stevenson’s eldest full brother) who later immigrated to Australia.
Stevenson Macadam, the subject of this entry, was the third son.
Margaret Macadam
Charles Thomas Macadam a younger brother became senior partner in Odams, a fertiliser company, and was to hold the Royal Warrant as Purveyor of Chemical Manures [fertiliser] to Queen Victoria.
George Robert Macadam, his youngest brother, followed his brother John and emigrated to Australia.
Mary Elison Macadam
Education
It seems likely that the various types of complex chemical processes involved in their father's factory in his calico printing and manufacturing business was what got William's sons interested in the field of chemistry, in which they were to play such a pioneering role in their later lives. Of the four sons three took to chemical science as a profession. Subsequently two more generations were involved: Stevenson's two sons William Ivison Macadam and Stevenson J. C. G. Macadam and William Ivison Macadam's daughter, Elison Macadam (later Desch). Seven in all (if one includes Charles Thomas Macadam's involvement in chemical fertilisers)l.
Stevenson studied at the Glasgow Mechanics Institution; College of Science and Arts. He received his first tuition at the Mechanics Institution under his elder brother John Macadam after whom the Macadamia nut was later named.
He received his doctorate (PhD) from Giessen University. Whilst in Germany he also spent some time working in the famous laboratory of Robert Bunsen.
John Macadam then became assistant to Dr. George Wilson, Lecturer in Chemistry at the College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine of the University of Edinburgh from 1846-47. The University of Edinburgh Medical School was then as now one of the world's preeminent medical centres of learning and from then on preeminent in the field of chemistry. Afterwards John Macadam returned to Glasgow for further medical studies(before emigrating to Australia in 1855 where he died aged 38).
Stevenson then became Dr. George Wilson’s assistant, in his brother's stead, at the University of Edinburgh and at the Royal College of Surgeons from 1847 to 1855.
Professional and academic career
In 1850 Dr. Stevenson Macadam began lecturing in the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and became a full professor (and ultimately held that position for 50 years).
In 1855 he also began lecturing in Chemistry for pharmaceutical students on his own. He did this from quarters on Princes Street, Edinburgh
In 1855, Dr. Macadam was appointed Lecturer on Chemistry at the Edinburgh University School of Medicine (College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine of the University of Edinburgh) after Dr. George Wilson was appointed Regis Professor of Technology at Edinburgh University (from 1855 until his death in 1859) although Dr. Wilson retained his rooms at Surgeons Hall. During that time Dr. Macadam conducted his large classes in Adam Square at the School of Arts, with which he had been connected for several years. His three-year course led to the qualification ChB, representing a full understanding of medical drugs and their properties. A huge number of Scotland’s medical and veterinarian elite passed through his course.
Dr. Macadam was a successful lecturer and his classes were very well attended and "were a standing memorial" to his power of teaching in the view of The Scotsman.
In 1866 a larger lecture hall and laboratory was built at Surgeons Hall and he was then again able to hold his classes there.
He also lectured at both Edinburgh’s veterinary colleges. First at The Dick Veterinary College, later to become The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, the Veterinary School of the University of Edinburgh, (since known for the first animal cloning: Dolly the sheep in 1996). It was founded by William Dick (veterinarian) (1793 – 1866) in 1923 and was the first veterinary school in Scotland.
Subsequently from 1873, Dr. Macadam lectured at the New Veterinary College upon its foundation by William Williams (1832-1900) in 1873. He was one of the original six staff
Dr. Macadam remained on the staff of the New Veterinary College until it moved to its newly built campus at Elm Row in 1883, when he resigned in favour of his son Professor Ivison Macadam. (Prof.William Ivison Macadam was generally known by his middle name Ivison).
On Dr. Macadam's retirement in 1900 he had completed fifty years as a lecturer, forty-five of which had been as an independent.
He also had a large analytical chemical consulting practice and was sought after for expertise in his field.
He acted as Scientific Advisor to the Northern Lighthouse Board in Scotland.
Learned societies
1854 Fellow (President 1864-5) of the Royal Scottish Society of the Arts (Queen Victoria’s consort Prince Albert, as a result of his interest in the subjects, became a regular presence while Dr Stevenson was president).
1855 Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
1877 A founder of the Institute of Chemistry of Great Britain(now the Royal Institute of Chemistry).
1881 A founder of the Society of Chemical Industry in London.
1900 Institute of Chemistry GBI Council Member
Publications
He was the author of many papers on scientific subjects such as water supply, drainage and on chemistry to the arts and manufacturing.
Among them were:
- Botany the Plant and its Food (1855)
- The Chemistry of Common Things (1866)
- Inorganic Chemistry (1866) (co-author with George Wilson)
- Practical Chemistry (1872) (reprinted 1881)
- On the Detection of Strychnine (1856)
- The Scotsman, 25 January 1901
- Published by T. Nelson and Sons, London 1866
- Published by W & R Chambers, London 1866
- There was a different and subsequent book of the same name published by his son Stevenson (J.G.C.) Macadam Jun.FIC FCS by Darien Press Edinburgh in 1895 as perhaps a Revision guide"...prepared with special reference to the requirements of the different examining boards..."
- Report of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, 26th. Meeting, Cheltenham, 1856
Personal life
Recreations
He was also active in outdoor and country sports while leading a busy professional life.
He was a keen fly fisherman for both trout and salmon. He was President of the Edinburgh Angling Club at the time of his death.
He was also a regular follower of the Dumfriesshire Otter Hounds.
He was an ardent walker and good rower.
Wife and children
He married Jessie Andrew Ivison (1834-1912) in Renfrew in 1855. They had five children:
- William Ivison Macadam, born 27 January 1856 at 11 Brandon Street in Edinburgh and died 24th June 1902, Surgeon's Hall, Nicolson Street, Edinburgh. (He married Sarah McConnichie MacDonald, 28 Mar 1879).
- Helen Ann Cochran Macadam born 23 Jan 1859 at 11 Brandon Street, Edinburgh, Midlothian. (She married Dr John St Clair Boyd of Belfast, 1 November 1887 at Duddingston Parish Church).
- Jessie Margaret Mary Macadam, born 4th May 1862 at Brighton House, 25 Brighton Place, Portobello, Midlothian, Scotland and died 20 Jan 1943, 2 Strathearn Road, Edinburgh. (She married Alexander William Gordon Price on the 5th July 1913, St Mark's Episcopal Church, Portobello).
- Stevenson John Charles George Macadam FIC FCS, born 30 January 1866 at Brighton House, 25 Brighton Place, Portobello, Midlothian, Scotland. He died 26 Jan 1939 at Kevock Tower, Lasswade, Scotland (a bachelor).
- Constance Elizabeth Louise Macadam, born 6 September 1867 at Brighton House, 25 Brighton Place, Portobello, Midlothian, Scotland and died on the 28th August 1871 at Brighton House, Portobello (at less than five years old).
One of his grandsons was Ivison Macadam
Residence, Politics, Church
He lived at Brighton House, 25 Brighton Place in Portobello, Edinburgh from 1860 onwards.The family also had a country cottage in Innerleithen.
Dr. Macadam was a member of the Liberal Party.
He was a member of The Church of Scotland and helped found and build St. James’s Church, at Rosefield Place, Portobello.
Unexpected death
While fishing on the River Tweed at Clovenfords, a stretch of water belonging to the Edinburgh Angling Club, of which he was president, he injured himself, which resulted in blood poisoning and complications and he died rather unexpectedly a week later on 24 January 1901, aged 72.
He is buried in Portobello Cemetery in eastern Edinburgh. The grave (pictured) lies midway along the original eastern path (before the eastern extension). His wife and second son lie with him. His son William Ivison Macadam and grandson Ivison Macadam lie around 20m to the south.