School classmates with famous parents

 

At Oldway Primary School in Paignton, I had three classmates who had famous parents: Jennifer was the daughter of Myrtle Devenish [1] (above left, in later years); Geoff was the son of Arnie Kitson [2] (no image found!); and Diane was the daughter of Leslie Jackman [3] (above right, in later years).

I knew that Mrs Devenish was an actress, but didn’t know any roles she had taken, or seen any of her performances, but just being an actress was enough to be famous in my very limited world. In contrast to Myrtle, I had heard Arnie Kitson play his xylophone on radio broadcasts and he also taught Geoff the instrument – the latter making an appearance on “The Children’s Television Caravan”, a touring TV show that came to Paignton. I guess that Arnie, who came originally from Yorkshire, learned his craft in the music halls and I heard him play the xylophone on enough occasions to recognise his skill.

Leslie Jackman was a local schoolteacher who also ran Paignton Aquarium [4]. A keen naturalist, Leslie published many books about seashore life, insects, and much else and he also became a well-known natural history film-maker. He worked on the BBC “Out of Doors” TV programme where he occupied the Club Room and encouraged many children to look in pools, to make bark rubbings, or to try and find egg shells dropped from nests. Much of Leslie’s work, like that of Myrtle Devenish, came after I had left Oldway Primary School, but he was already well-known and therefore qualified as someone famous. In Walking with Gosse [5], I relate that my pressed flower collection was given second place in a competition at the school; first prize being given to Diane, as she had such an excellent mentor. Leslie (always Mr Jackman to me) certainly influenced me and I recognise his importance in my development as a natural historian.

So, three indirect contacts with fame (I only met Mrs Devenish on a couple of occasions, I never met Mr Kitson, and was yet to meet Mr Jackman). All on a rather small scale, perhaps, but nevertheless something that registered in my parochial little world.

There are those who are desperate to be nationally, or world, famous, and contemporary media can make it possible for web “influencers”, pop stars, and reality TV show participants to achieve this goal. Unfortunately, fame and recognition are rarely long-term, although there are exceptions to that general rule: A-listers are likely to stay there, but B-listers can slide to the C-list and onwards into oblivion.

In his book Fame in the 20th Century, Clive James writes [6]:

There was always fame. As long as there have been human beings, there has always been fame. It’s a human weakness.

He then goes on to describe 406 famous men and women of the century (plus 5 from earlier times) and I only had to look up one of them, the rest being familiar to me. As would be expected, most came from the world of Entertainment and the Arts; areas, together with sport, that can produce enduring fame, although famous sportspeople are usually young, as their careers taper with age. That’s not to say that some sportsmen and sportswomen do not retain their fame, as there are those who become “legends” in popular parlance. 

This leads me to wonder whether fame was important to Myrtle Devenish, Arnie Kitson and Leslie Jackman? We all appreciate recognition of our activities and we like “pats on the back”, but is the quest for fame a human weakness as Clive James suggests and does it bring any meaningful benefits apart from wealth and the best tables in restaurants? There are certainly drawbacks, as one moves further and further from what might be called normality. Many famous people feel threatened, they can fear lack of recognition, be besieged and stared at wherever they go, and may have to hide behind a mask. Who wants to be famous?

[1] https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0222318/

[2] https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/c29bb3108f3146798780d5077445a9d3

[3] https://www.jukolart.us/wildlife-filmmaking/leslie-jackman.html

[4] https://rwotton.blogspot.com/2020/12/leslie-jackmans-marine-aquaria_22.html

[5] Roger S Wotton (2020) Walking with Gosse: Natural History, Creation and Religious Conflicts. e-book.

[6] Clive James (1993) Fame in the 20th Century. London, BBC Books.

 

Leslie Jackman’s Marine Aquaria

 

Leslie Jackman was a man of many parts: teacher, broadcaster, museum officer, film-maker, and author [1]. He was a noted natural historian and an important influence on a generation of young people, of which I was one, and I had the added bonus of meeting him, as we both lived in Paignton in Torbay [2]. Although he wrote about terrestrial natural history and the life found in streams, rivers and lakes, Leslie seemed especially fascinated by the coast and by marine biology. He encouraged others to share his enthusiasm by “rock-pooling” and by looking at plants and animals in aquaria.

This is clear in the Preface of Marine Aquaria [3]:

The address given in the Preface is “The Seashore Aquarium, Paignton” and this was run by Leslie and, if my memory serves me correctly, was located adjacent to Paignton Harbour in the building shown in the image at the top of this blog post. This was a fitting site, as many specimens were brought to the aquarium by local fisherman [3].  

It is clear that Leslie pays homage to Gosse and later in the book we read:

The first great seashore observer was Gosse. He lived a hundred years ago, but his writings are classics of observational work. Gosse never lost the freshness of excitement that came from new discovery and his appetite for knowledge was insatiable. If you desire, as did Gosse’s friend Charles Kingsley in Glaucus, to walk on and in under the waves” you will have found a new and absorbing interest in your aquarium.

Gosse’s The Aquarium [4] and the handbook based on the final chapter of the earlier book and sold at a price that made it more available to a wide audience [5] contain all the information needed for aspiring aquarists.

Marine Aquaria, written more than 60 years ago, had much in common with the earlier works by Gosse and they cover the same ground. Of course, there are differences in that Leslie discusses the use of plastics and air pumps, neither being available in Gosse’s day. Intriguingly, we read in Marine Aquaria that good conditions for animals can be provided by an aeration system based on reservoirs (see below, upper) and this is almost identical to a system that Gosse rigged up in his home in Torquay [2]. Gosse’s observation tank was, however, less elaborate than that shown in The Aquarium, this being a top-of-the-range parlour model with all the plumbing hidden in the pedestal (see below, lower).

So, what was the audience for the books by Henry Gosse and Leslie Jackman? Judging by the Preface of Marine Aquaria, the audience was male, but this was, of course, just a form of expression of the times and Leslie promoted an interest in natural history in boys, girls, men and women. Interestingly, women played an important part in the development of collecting on the shore - Anna Atkins with her cyanotypes of algae [6], Anne Pratt with her seashore guide [7], and Margaret Gatty with her work on seaweeds [8]. Torbay, and the adjacent coastline, was something of a mecca for the popular appreciation of life on the shore for both men and women, the latter having to pay special attention to the clothes that they wore [9]. In addition to Gosse, Amelia Griffiths was resident in the town, making important contributions to the study of algae [8], and, as Leslie Jackman mentions, Charles Kingsley also visited Torbay in the 1850s and in Glaucus heaps praise on Henry Gosse. The two became close friends [2].

What has happened to our interest in life on the shore and in marine biology since the publication of Leslie Jackman’s book? There was clearly little difference between its content, and advice, to that which had been published a hundred years before. Many of us still enjoy looking in rock pools and there are many aquarists, although few collect animals from the shore for their aquaria. We can SCUBA dive, or snorkel, if we want to see marine organisms in their natural environment, and we can visit huge aquaria that are now part of the entertainment industry, with tanks so large that they approximate to natural habitat (although the animals and plants that they contain are selected by the aquarium managers). Both have an educational value, but there is no longer an appetite for making one’s own aquarium to allow close observation. We now have numerous videoclips for that and there are also wonderfully-shot TV programmes that we can enjoy in the comfort of our living rooms, but how real is it to us? 

Something is missing from the thrill that Henry Gosse and Leslie Jackman encouraged – something that is life-enhancing, as any first-hand study of the natural world will be. I collected plants and animals and had aquarium tanks at school [2] and even kept some animals in bowls at home. I am very grateful that I knew Leslie Jackman – and I feel that I know Henry Gosse – and I am also grateful to have been brought up in Torbay and collected on the shores that inspired them. They inspired me, too.

[1] http://www.rwotton.blogspot.com 21st January 2013

[2] Roger S Wotton (2020) Walking with Gosse. e-book, available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc.. 

[3] L. A. J. Jackman (1957) Marine Aquaria. London, Cassell and Company

[4] P. H. Gosse (1854) The aquarium: an unveiling of the wonders of the deep sea. London, John Van Voorst. 

[5] P. H. Gosse (1855) A handbook to the marine aquarium: containing practical instructions for constructing, stocking, and maintaining a tank, and for collecting plants and animals. London, John Van Voorst.

[6] http://www.rwotton.blogspot.com 20th April 2016

[7] http://www.rwotton.blogspot.com 16th October 2017 

[8] http://www.rwotton.blogspot.com 30th December 2013 

[9] http://www.rwotton.blogspot.com 6th January 2014

 

 

In praise of Leslie Jackman

Philip Henry Gosse was not the only nationally famous Natural Historian to spend much of his life in Torbay. In recent times, this accolade must also be given to Leslie Jackman, who died in December 2011 aged 91. He had much in common with Henry Gosse and Mr Jackman was a hero of mine when I was growing up, as he not only ran the Paignton Aquarium but was also a pioneer of Natural History broadcasting and filming. We are fortunate in having a record of some of his achievements in a video interview recorded in 2006: 

http://www.wildfilmhistory.org/oh/10/Leslie+Jackman.html

Originally a teacher, Mr Jackman (I will always use that form of address, as I was at school with his daughter Diane) had an enthusiasm for looking at living things and wanted to tell others about what he saw. Film and television became excellent media for doing this and he presented a Club Room section of the BBC TV programme “Out of Doors”. Here, Mr Jackman would show different kinds of fungi, snakes, or other interesting wildlife and there were always children present as an audience, so his teaching skills came to the fore. The Club Room was an extension of the Nature Table we had in schools at the time, but none of our teachers, however good they were, could be as expert or as engaging. I watched the programme avidly on our single-channel TV and was also given the accompanying “Out of Doors” book as a present, in which Mr Jackman described, among other things, how to make bark rubbings or casts of wild animal footprints.

It was probably as a cameraman that Mr Jackman made his greatest contributions. Filming covered a wide range of topics but he always had a fondness for the sea shore, just like Henry Gosse. Whereas Henry had the ability of an artist to convey impressions of what he saw, Mr Jackman used film, all shot using what would now be regarded as a primitive camera, as there was no playback and one could only see the results when film came back from the processing laboratories. There were shots in the field and also many sequences filmed in a shed at the bottom of his garden in Paignton and I was fortunate to help with one of them. It must have taken many, many hours to complete filming for a complete programme and it could only be done by someone with a passion for the subject.

There were also books, and a quick search on Amazon shows just how many there were – mostly aimed at the young and at amateurs, both of which formed Mr Jackman’s key audience. Many that read the books and saw his work on “Out of Doors”, films for the BBC “Look” series and other Nature documentaries were influenced by him in developing a fascination for the natural world. As he says in the interview, it was his wish to get people to appreciate what was all around them. He was such a nice man and not one for the cult of celebrity that seems to infect the media today. That provides another parallel to Henry Gosse, and I think it is fitting to celebrate both men’s careers and achievements side by side.

In the video interview, Mr Jackman describes how his break into filming and broadcasting came with a mention of cuttlefish feeding, which he had seen in his large aquarium tank in Paignton. How ironic that the last practical class that I taught at UCL was a dissection of the cuttlefish, complete with a description of the feeding mechanism and the use of the tentacles. That somehow seems fitting to me.