Obituary: Robert Donaldson, National Library of Scotland legend

Robert Donaldson, Keeper of Printed Books, National Library of Scotland. Born: December 13 1926 in Edinburgh. Died: January 11 2021 in Edinburgh, aged 94

Robert Donaldson

Robert Donaldson was Edinburgh born and bred with deep family roots in the city to which he was devoted throughout his long life. He was born in the Royal Edinburgh Maternity Hospital in 1926, only child of William Donaldson and Euphemia Bailie McDonald Mackay. Both parents were engaged in the printing trade, a stone’s throw from where Walter Chepman and Androw Myllar, the first Scottish printers, plied their trade in the Cowgate in the early 16th century, a link which Robert would continue with distinction in his own professional career through his researches in the field of early Scottish printing.

His father died young, leaving his widowed mother to provide for his education, but with the aid of George Heriot’s School’s Foundationer scheme for the provision of free education for boys who had lost their fathers, Robert, aged nine, began his education there in 1936. In 1944, his final year, he distinguished himself in winning the Annual Medals for History and German; and he secured a scholarship to study History at the University of Edinburgh.

After graduating with Honours in 1948, Robert was appointed to a post in Edinburgh University Library. Although employed full-time, he began postgraduate studies in the field of medieval history and was awarded his PhD in 1955. While working in the University Library, he met his future wife, Elizabeth Macpherson, who had recently joined the staff, and they were married on September 14 1957. Their son Keith was born in 1958 and their daughter Jan in 1961.

In 1959 the young family had to make a move when Robert took up a post in Glasgow University Library, specialising in early books. The same year, he was appointed Editor of The Bibliotheck, a journal of Scottish bibliographical notes and queries, published in Glasgow from 1956 by the Library Association’s Scottish Group of the University, College and Research Section, continuing as Editor until 1970.

In mid-1962 Robert returned to Edinburgh to join the curatorial staff of the Department of Printed Books in the National Library of Scotland. He devoted the next 27 years of his professional life to the National Library, first as Assistant Keeper and then as Deputy Keeper to J H Loudon. In 1975 Robert was appointed Keeper of Printed Books and led the British Antiquarian Division until he retired in December 1989.

During this time he played a crucial part in expanding the Library's national role, managing the accessioning of major rare book collections – such as the Blairs College Library and Newhailes House Library – that were at risk of dispersal, and making a major contribution to devising the standard rules governing the automated co-operative cataloguing of antiquarian books in Scottish libraries.

In 1988, shortly before retirement, he oversaw the transfer of the vast Crawford (Bibliotheca Lindesiana) Collections from John Rylands University Library, Manchester. Outside the Library he gave valuable service as President of Edinburgh Bibliographical Society, 1977-1980, and as Chair of the Library Association Rare Books Group, 1983-1986, during which time the Group published the first edition of its Directory of Rare Books and Special Collections in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. It is a tribute to the high regard in which he was held that the Librarian, Professor EFD Roberts, who was himself already gravely ill at home, insisted on coming in to the Library – as it turned out, for the last time – so that he could speak at his retirement reception.

Robert was profoundly conscientious in his dedication to the National Library and the readers it served. It was common to see him leaving the Library in the evenings carrying not one, but two briefcases with papers for scrutiny at home. He was highly respected within the Library and among the wider community of research librarians for his deep knowledge of rare book librarianship and scholarship and for his intellectual integrity, unfailing courtesy and professional commitment. He always asked more of himself than he ever did of others; and without ever having opened a management manual, instinctively knew how to work collegially with others. He was an endlessly patient colleague, always quick to see another’s point of view and never overbearing in defence of his own, and with a dry, subtly impish, sense of humour.

On occasions he could demonstrate a level of tenacity in investigation that could exasperate less punctilious colleagues but he was usually proved correct. A previous Librarian had said curators should be "merchants of accuracy” and Robert was the exemplification of accuracy in everything he touched; his notes in a very precise, clearly legible hand are testament to his meticulous approach.

In his retirement, Robert continued to enjoy family life and pursue his wide personal interests, above all his passion for classical music. A brief flirtation with Ivor Novello musicals around 1940 led directly to a passion for Richard Wagner and subsequently broader tastes. From its first year, 1947, he attended concerts at the Edinburgh Festival and many more Usher Hall concerts over the years. His collection of classical LPs eventually numbered over a thousand.

Robert cared for his wife at home for a number of years before she entered St Raphael’s care home in 2017. After age took its toll, he spent his last year in the care of Marian House, where he died on January 11. He is survived by wife Liz, son Keith and his wife Clare, daughter Jan and her husband Michael, granddaughters Ailsa and Isla, and great-grandchildren Anice and Duncan.

ANN MATHESON& BRIAN HILLYARD

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