John Gordon Dower (2 September 1900 – 3 October 1947) was a

civil servant The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil servants hired on professional merit rather than appointed or elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leaders ...

and

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

, who, as secretary of the Standing Committee on

National Park A national park is a nature park, natural park in use for conservation (ethic), conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state dec ...

s, produced in 1945 the first post-war official report which set out what National Parks in England and Wales should be like.

Early life

Dower was born in Ilkley, in the

West Riding of Yorkshire The West Riding of Yorkshire is one of three historic subdivisions of Yorkshire, England. From 1889 to 1974 the administrative county County of York, West Riding (the area under the control of West Riding County Council), abbreviated County ...

in September 1900. His father was a

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's b ...

lay preacher and was a director of a steel firm in

Leeds Leeds () is a city and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds district in West Yorkshire, England. It is built around the River Aire and is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines. It is also the third-largest settlement (by populati ...

. Dower was educated at a local school in Ilkley and he then studied for a degree in architecture at St John's College in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

The national parks

In 1929, Dower married Pauline Trevelyan, whose father was Charles Trevelyan; this introduced him into a campaign to protect the wild areas of Britain. Dower prepared a report in the late 1930s, but it was put to one side when the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

broke out and he was called up as a Royal Engineer. During his time in the army, Dower contracted virulent tuberculosis and was invalided out of military service. Whilst convalescing at his home in Kirkby Malham, he was asked to compile a report again into the national parks. As he was too ill to drive, Pauline took them around the country so he could make notes, even being detained by the Home Guard in Cornwall. Dower's report was completed in 1943, but it was not published until 1945. The central tenet for the creation of the national parks was: This report, and a subsequent one by Sir

Arthur Hobhouse Sir Arthur Lawrence Hobhouse (15 February 1886 – 20 January 1965) was a long-serving English local government Liberal politician, who is best remembered as the architect of the system of national parks of England and Wales. Early life Hobho ...

, laid the foundations for the

National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949 The National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which created the National Parks Commission which later became the Countryside Commission and then the Countryside Agency, which became ...

which created the National Park system. Malham Youth Hostel - geograph

Personal life

Dower was a keen rambler and fly-fishermen. he had also once been president of the Ramblers Association. He died from the effects of tuberculosis in Cambo House, near

Morpeth Morpeth may refer to: *Morpeth, New South Wales, Australia ** Electoral district of Morpeth, a former electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in New South Wales * Morpeth, Ontario, Canada * Morpeth, Northumberland, England, UK ** Morpeth (UK ...

, in October 1947. His family scattered his ashes on

Ilkley Moor Ilkley Moor is part of Rombalds Moor, the moorland between Ilkley and Keighley in West Yorkshire, England. The moor, which rises to 402 m (1,319 ft) above sea level, is well known as the inspiration for the Yorkshire "county anthem" ...

. John and Pauline Dower had a daughter, Susan, and two sons, Michael and Robert. Michael went on to be a national park officer for the

Peak District The Peak District is an upland area in England at the southern end of the Pennines. Mostly in Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southe ...

and also became the director-general of the

Countryside Commission The Countryside Commission (formally the Countryside Commission for England and Wales, then the Countryside Commission for England) was a statutory body in England and Wales, and later in England only. Its forerunner, the National Parks Commissio ...

between 1992 and 1996. In 1948, the Malham Youth Hostel, which Dower had designed, was dedicated to him by his wife and father-in-law.

References

External links

A pdf copy of Dower's report
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dower, John 1900 births 1947 deaths 20th-century British architects

Early life

The national parks

Personal life

References

Further reading

External links