Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Robertson, Thomas Chalmers
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Description area
Dates of existence
History
T.C. Robertson was born in 1907 in Middelburg, Transvaal, where he grew up and matriculated at the Middelburg High School in 1923. He then completed two years of a law degree at the University of the Witwatersrand before entering the profession of journalism. In 1926 he was the Johannesburg correspondent of "Ons Vaderland" and the following year became editor of the "Livingstone Mail" in Northern Rhodesia and a correspondent of the "London Times". He then travelled to the Far East, working, in Ceylon and Australia. On his return in 1931 he was parliamentary correspondent of the "Cape Times" and in 1934 on the editorial staff of the "Rand Daily Mail" and "Sunday Times". He covered the 6th Imperial Press Conference in 1935 and was the author of a book on it. In 1937 he edited "Forward", a labour party newspaper.
In 1938 Robertson stood unsuccessfully as labour candidate for Fordsburg and in 1939 became parliamentary correspondent for "Rand Daily Mail" and "Sunday Times" visiting East Africa as a war correspondent. During, the war years he was director of the Union Unity Truth Service, a propaganda machine for General Smuts, supporting the war effort and editor of its journal ''Libertas". He was given occasional assignments in North Africa and reported the whole of the Madagascar Campaign. There is a small amount of material in this collection on the Union Unity Truth Service but the bulk of it is in a separate collection, A883.
In 1945 he returned to his original love, nature, and sat at the feet of Dr. Hugh Bennett, the father of soil conservation, who arranged a two year course for him in the USA. On his return General Smuts persuaded him to stand as a United Party candidate for Witbank but was unsucessful. In 1948 he became Director of the National Veld Trust and remained in this position until his retirement in 1966. He served on several committees connected with conservation and was the author of books and articles: Grond is Lewe (soil is life), 1968; Water, 1970; Big Game, 1970; South African Mosaic, 1978. This last was his major work, incorporating some extremely good illustrations. He was a speaker at many conferences and spearheaded the publicity campaign to make people aware of the environment and dangers facing it. He was truly the pioneer of South African Conservation, having a great influence on conservationists like Ian Player and James Clarke.
He received several honours, a doctorate from the University of theWitwatersand in 1979; the Decoration for Meritorious Service in 1983, was nominated for the Tyler Award and given the gold medal by the National Veldtrust in 1978.
T.C. Robertson spent his retirement years in Scottburgh, actively pursuing his conservation aims despite increasingly poor health due to diabetes. He was a man of great humanity and lover of life. He died on 11 January 1989 in Durban.