John Young

John Young FRSE (1835–1902) was a British Regius Professor of Natural History at Glasgow University and Keeper of the Hunterian Museum from 1866 to 1902.

Life He was born in Edinburgh on 17 November 1835. He was educated at the High School on Calton Hill. He then studied medicine at Edinburgh University, gaining his doctorate (MD) in 1857.

Young worked as a medical doctor after qualifying at the University of Edinburgh in 1857. He then worked in the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and Edinburgh Royal Asylum. In 1863 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh his proposer being Alexander Keith Johnston.

His background was a fortuitous as the retiring Regius Chair of Natural History in Glasgow was becoming vacant and the last person, Henry Darwin Rogers, who had died, was a geologist. Young had a medical and geological background which he used to teach students Zoology and Geology. Young was interested in coins and was widely read. He published work on palaeontology.

Young organised for the museum to move to Gilmorehill in 1870. Among their contemporaries, Mr Young was referred to as "The Good", and Professor Young as "The Bad".

Publications A History of the Glasgow Geological Society 1858-1908 Catalogue of Pictures, Sculptures and Other Works of Art in the University of Glasgow, 1880