Morison, Professor John Miller Woodburn

These papers mainly cover his work in Edinburgh and Egypt. They comprise a miscellaneous assortment of documents, including:

abstracts;

case notes;

lecture notes on radiology and cancer and on James Gregory (1753-1822);

report on radium, 1929;

correspondence and reports as visiting professor in Egypt, 1948-1951;

lantern slides.

J.M. Woodburn Morison was an eminent figure in the history of radiology. He was born and educated in Scotland and took his medical qualifications at the University of Glasgow. Morison first became interested in the possibilities of X rays whilst a student. He settled in the Manchester area doing general practice (until 1919) where he came into contact with Dr Holland of Liverpool. By 1914 he had been appointed Honorary Medical Officer to the Electrical Department of Ashton under Lyme Infirmary. In March 1915 the War Office asked him to organise and take charge of the Liverpool Merchants Mobile Hospital X-Ray Department in France. In April 1916 he was instructed to fulfil a similar function with the 34th (The Welsh) General Hospital in India.

His first major appointment was that of Lecturer in Radiology, Edinburgh University, and Radiologist, Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, in 1925, after which, in 1930, he was appointed Director of the Radiological Department of the Cancer Hospital, coinciding with his taking up the first chair of medical radiology to be founded at the University of London. He retired from the Hospital and the Chair in 1938. During the War he was for a time in charge of the radiological department of the Coventry and Warwickshire General Hospital. Both before and after the war he had various appointments as visiting professor in Egypt.

N.B. Dr Morison used the name Woodburn Morison, although Woodburn was not his surname, to distinguish him from several other Dr. Morisons of his time.

For obituaries see British Medical Journal and Lancet 15 Sep 1951 and British Journal of Radiology, Oct 1951.