Basil Derek Wragge Morley (1920 – 22 January 1969) born in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

, son of a clergyman. He was most noted for his work on the study of ants. He was an independent scientific consultant, who also held posts in journalism throughout his working life. He died aged 49 as a result of numerous illnesses.

Scientific study and works

Throughout his working life, Derek Wragge Morley held positions related to his knowledge of the sciences and devoted his life's work largely to the study of

ants Ants are eusocial insects of the family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from vespoid wasp ancestors in the Cretaceous period. More than 13,800 of an estimated total of ...

, for which he is perhaps best known.

Ants and the academic

Derek Wragge Morley began his study of ants when he was 14. When he was 16, he published his first paper on ant research. A year after this, he read two papers to the International Congress for Entomology at Berlin, chairing one of the sessions.P. H. D. "Mr. Wragge Morley." Times [London, England] 23 January 1969: 10. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 18 August 2016.
/ref> He studied natural sciences at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

. For eight years, he held the Strong Fellowship for philosophical and scientific research, and from 1946 to 1949, he held the Macaulay Fellowship for Genetical Research at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh (, ; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a Public university, public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Founded by the City of Edinburgh Council, town council under th ...

. In 1948, he was an invitation lecturer at the

Institute for Social Anthropology The Institute for Social Anthropology (ISA; ) is a research institute of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (AAS) in Vienna, Austria. Tasks and Aims The Institute for Social Anthropology is an Asia-specialized research institute at the AAS. Its ...

at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

. His research included

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinians, Augustinian ...

, social behaviour of animals, and the behaviour of agricultural pests. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

he investigated insect pests for the

Ministry of Agriculture An agriculture ministry (also called an agriculture department, agriculture board, agriculture council, or agriculture agency, or ministry of rural development) is a ministry charged with agriculture. The ministry is often headed by a minister f ...

Later posts

Derek Wragge Morley also served as Scientific Editor for both

Picture Post ''Picture Post'' was a photojournalistic magazine published in the United Kingdom from 1938 to 1957. It is considered a pioneering example of photojournalism and was an immediate success, selling 1,000,000 copies a week after only two months. ...

Magazine and the

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, as well as acting as a consultant for films on scientific subjects and the application of the new sciences of his day in industry, including work on early computers. Morley's first marriage was to Irina Platonov in 1943, with whom he had two children. The couple later divorced, and he went on to marry Monica Strutt in 1952, and together they had four children. He died on 22 January 1969 at his home in

Hadleigh, Suffolk Hadleigh () is an ancient market town and civil parish in the Babergh district of Suffolk, England. The town is situated next to the River Brett, between the larger towns of Sudbury and Ipswich. It had a population of 8,253 at the 2011 censu ...

Books and films

Morley wrote several books on ants, including ''The Ant World'', first published by Pelican in 1953. He also produced a film on the subject, ''Ant Warfare''. There is a

Pathé Pathé SAS (; styled as PATHÉ!) is a French major film production and distribution company, owning a number of cinema chains through its subsidiary Pathé Cinémas and television networks across Europe. It is the name of a network of Fren ...

film of him at home in Hampstead, working on ant research. He wrote a book about computing machines, entitled "Automatic Data Processing", which was published in 1961 by

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for the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, and acted as a scientific consultant to a film about the application of computers in industry and the pros and cons of installing such systems, entitled "This Automaton Age". His book ''Ants'' (1953), written for the

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monograph series, was dedicated to his mentor,

Horace Donisthorpe Horace St. John Kelly Donisthorpe (17 March 1870 – 22 April 1951) was an eccentric British myrmecologist and coleopterist, memorable in part for his enthusiastic championing of the renaming of the genus '' Lasius'' after him as ''Donisthorp ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Morley, Derek 1920 births 1969 deaths Scientists from Cambridge Myrmecologists English entomologists English geneticists English male journalists New Naturalist writers 20th-century British zoologists