Sir Daniel Macaulay Stevenson, Bt
Chancellor of the University of Glasgow
In office
1934–1944
Personal details
Born1 August 1851
Glasgow, Scotland
Died11 July 1944(1944-07-11) (aged 92)
ProfessionPolitician and businessman

Sir Daniel Macaulay Stevenson, 1st Baronet (1 August 1851 – 11 July 1944), was a Scottish politician, businessman and philanthropist, and former Chancellor of the University of Glasgow. His brother was Robert Macaulay Stevenson, a painter associated with the Glasgow Boys.[1]

Biography

Born in Glasgow in 1851, Stevenson made his fortune in the shipbroking and coal exportation industries before being elected to the City Council as a Liberal in 1882. Whilst on the Council, he was responsible for the Sunday-opening of the City's museums and galleries in 1898, the establishment of free branch libraries in 1899 and the introduction of a municipal telephone service in 1900. He was elected Lord Provost of Glasgow from 1911 until 1914, at which point he was awarded an honorary LL.D. by the University of Glasgow, and was created a Baronet, of Cleveden, Kelvinside, in the County of the City of Glasgow.[2] He unsuccessfully contested the Partick seat at the 1922 General Election. He received the Freedom of the City in 1929.

Stevenson devoted much of his time to charitable work, particularly improving international cohesion between young people following the Great War. He inaugurated the Stevenson Lectureship in Citizenship was in 1921, and the Stevenson Chair of Italian and the Stevenson Chair of Spanish (now the Stevenson Chair in Hispanic Studies) in 1924, and in 1942 presented two gifts of £60,000 (more than £1.7m today) to the Engineering Department, and to the University for exchange scholarships with European universities.

In 1936, Stevenson funded and established the Scottish Ambulance Unit led by Fernanda Jacobsen, which provided humanitarian assistance in Madrid during the Spanish Civil War.[3]

In 1934, Stevenson was elected Chancellor of the University, a post he held until his death. Following his death, the trustees of his estate donated significant sums to assist the construction of a physical recreation building at the University in 1960, now named the Stevenson Building,[4] and for the establishment of the Stevenson Chair of French Language and Literature in 1966.

References

  1. ^ Stevenson, Jean Macaulay. "Robert Macauley Stevenson, Painter and Watercolourist" (PDF). East Dunbartonshire Council. Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 March 2016. Retrieved 18 August 2010.
  2. ^ "No. 28854". The London Gazette. 31 July 1914. p. 5963.
  3. ^ "Records of the Scottish Ambulance Unit in Spain, humanitarian and aid unit, 1936-c1939, Scotland". University of Glasgow Archive Services. Retrieved 14 August 2018 – via Jisc.
  4. ^ "£250,000 physical education building-Scotland gets its first metric pool". The Guardian. 9 January 1961. p. 8. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
Academic offices Preceded bySir Donald MacAlister Chancellor of the University of Glasgow 1934 to 1944 Succeeded byThe Lord Boyd-Orr Baronetage of the United Kingdom New creation Baronet(of Clevedon) 1914–1944 Extinct
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