Steve Jones Interviewed by Paul Merchant: Full Transcript of The
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NATIONAL LIFE STORIES ‘Science and Religion: Exploring the Spectrum’ Life Story Interviews Steve Jones Interviewed by Paul Merchant C1672/12 This transcript is copyright of the British Library Board. Please refer to the Oral History curators at the British Library prior to any publication or broadcast from this document. Oral History The British Library 96 Euston Road NW1 2DB 020 7412 7404 [email protected] IMPORTANT Access to this interview and transcript is for private research only. Please refer to the Oral History curators at the British Library prior to any publication or broadcast from this document. Oral History The British Library 96 Euston Road London NW1 2DB 020 7412 7404 [email protected] Every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of this transcript, however no transcript is an exact translation of the spoken word, and this document is intended to be a guide to the original recording, not replace it. Should you find any errors please inform the Oral History curators ([email protected]) The British Library National Life Stories Interview Summary Sheet Title Page Ref no: C1672/12/001-006 Collection title: ‘Science and Religion: Exploring the Spectrum’ Life Story Interviews Interviewee’s surname: Jones Title: Interviewee’s forename: Steve Sex: Male Occupation: Date and place of birth: 24th March 1944 Aberystwyth, Wales Mother’s occupation: Father’s occupation: Scientist Dates of recording, Compact flash cards used, tracks (from – to): 14/10/2015 (track 1-3), 15/10/2015 (track 4- 5); 01/12/2015 (track 6) Location of interview: Name of interviewer: Paul Merchant Type of recorder: Marantz PMD661on compact flash Recording format : audio file 6 WAV 24 bit 48 kHz 2-channel Total no. of tracks 6 Mono or stereo: Stereo Total Duration: 06:50:24 Additional material: Copyright/Clearance: Track 6 between 12:59-13:42 closed for 40 years until 2 December 2055; the rest of the interview is open Interviewer’s comments: Steve Jones Page 1 C1672/12 Track 1 [Track 1] Could you start then by telling me when and where you were born? I was born in Aberystwyth in west Wales on the twenty-fourth of March, 1944, at the very moment when the Great Escapers were escaping from Stalag Luft V. And as much as you can about the life of your father? My father was a scientist, and actually in the end I think a rather competent one. He came from an environment, a small village called New Quay, on the coast of what was then Cardiganshire, which was filled with retired sea captains. And his own father, my grandfather, had been a sea captain for many years, he was a tanker captain for Shell, although he retired early and wasted the last forty years of his life playing bowls. And so that was that year, which I was very fond of, we spent a lot of time there, I got very interested in things marine. He then, my father then did his degree in chemistry at the university, what’s now the University of Aberystwyth, it was then the University of Wales and Aberystwyth, and which was then a really very distinguished chemistry department, now of course ruthlessly closed down during the days of Mrs Thatcher. He was interested in surface chemistry, which is really quite a technical field. Mrs Thatcher herself actually worked in that area, amazingly – not that she ever achieved anything. And he got a job for Lever Brothers, the soap manufacturers, initially as a rather junior member of their research staff, but he rose to be head of their research division in his later years and was much involved in new detergents, including the stuff which was once sold as Jif and is now sold as Cif, which is a thixotropic scrubbing agent. Some people remember when you used to get cleaning fluids for your kitchen and so on, you had to shake it up, because all it consisted of was a sort of abrasive in a liquid and you spread the abrasive through the liquid, it was all very primitive. He had the idea of turning it into a gel, which was chemically quite difficult to do. So you had, the abrasive was throughout the whole liquid. So that was his life, which was in what I think of as real science, in other words, anything but biology. And he was quite a hard-line scientist actually, he was very much wrapped up in his work and defined his life really. But quite surprisingly, in fact oddly enough, somebody sent me a picture of his retirement party just a few weeks ago, he retired rather early, I think he must have been about sixty. I think he found the high pressure, the head of a big technical research department too much, and once he retired he promptly returned to the village in Wales and spent the rest, over twenty years, doing nothing. [02:58] Did he tell you about his childhood? Not very much, he was a rather reserved character, I would say. My mother was much more open. It clearly was a very happy childhood. There was a slightly strange event which I never quite fathomed out, where he fell out finally and terminally with his younger brother, and they had been quite close as far as I could see, and they had a terrible row about something and didn’t speak, never saw each other for forty years. But it was a childhood… New Quay is actually the place where Dylan Thomas set Under Milk Wood. Laugharne claims to Steve Jones Page 2 C1672/12 Track 1 be – in south Wales – claims to be the location. That’s where Dylan Thomas wrote Under Milk Wood, but if you look at the geography of Bugger All or Llareggub, the village, it’s clearly New Quay. And really, it was an uncannily close portrait, I mean there was a blind sailor, and there was a blind sailor. There was a pub, The Black Lion, where my dad used to drink moderately, unlike his son, and knew Dylan Thomas slightly and regarded him as a terrible snob. So it was that kind of environment, it was a very Welsh and Welsh speaking environment, which is really pretty cut off from what you might call the civilised world. And I think for a young boy with an interest in sailing, it would have been heavenly. Thank you. [04:19] Could you do something similar for the life of your mother? Well, my ma came from slightly further north in Wales, in a village with the English name of Bow Street, which is near Aberystwyth. And her parents were, my maternal grandfather, used to somewhat strike terror into my soul. He too was a very capable guy. He was the headmaster of a large grammar school in Aberystwyth and had been the headmaster of a grammar school in Pontycymer in south Wales. He was very religious, as indeed were my father’s parents. At least they did what people in Welsh villages then did, they always went to chapel, everybody went to chapel, I did myself. But my grandfather, David Owen Jones… that’s my paternal grandfather, John James Morgan, my mother’s father, was deeply religious, deeply interested in religion. Welsh was absolutely his first language, he didn’t like to speak English at all, although he spoke it perfectly and was a highly educated man. I found him rather overwhelming but I greatly admired him, and his wife, my grandmother, was a most charming and delightful woman. And he had had nine children altogether, so it was a very busy kind of household. And again, because my parents didn’t have much money when I was born, we spent a lot of time living there. And again, I remember that as being fairly idyllic. [05:49] Again, did your mother tell you about her childhood? Give a sense of her early life? Well, yes. I think it was a rather oppressive childhood because they lived on a farm, true of many Welsh families. The Morgans had been established in that area for many, many years, probably many centuries, and the families owned farms, two farms – quite big farms actually - where the children used to play, and they had to work too. And I think, unlike my dad, my ma found it rather oppressive. It was a very closed environment. Girls were not expected to do much. And my perception is that she found herself rather trapped. Could you tell me about her education, because she herself… As far as I’ve been able to fathom it, it was slightly odd, she went to the grammar school in Aberystwyth, which was problematic, of course, with her father being the headmaster, I think that was part of the problem. She had an identical twin. It’s rather odd that I’m a geneticist. And I think she graduated with whatever they called it Steve Jones Page 3 C1672/12 Track 1 then, the equivalent to A levels. But, you know, only a tiny proportion of people went to university in those days and it was very small when I went too, and she didn’t go to university. She did, very oddly, some kind of diploma in dairying, because that’s what people did, you know. But she never did much with it and then she met my father and the rest is history. So she didn’t go to university? No. Again, you’ve got to remember, I mean leaping forward a little bit, I mean when I went to Edinburgh, 1962, it was still only five or six per cent of the population who went, and my brother didn’t.