SIR JOHN HAY ATHOLE MACDONALD, G.C.B.
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By Robert J. Smith, C.B.E., C.A.
BY THE death of Sir J. H. A. Macdonald, full of years and loaded with honours, the automobile world has lost its most outstanding figure and the eciuntry one of its most distinguished sons. In every department of public life, in every sphere of sport and recreation, in science, especially applied. science, in art, and in literature he found scope for his varied and versatile interests and capabilities.
It is surprising that, even in four score and two years, he found time for such a multiplicity of in terests, for, in every one, his watchwordwas " thorough " and, in every one of his multitudinous interests, he made himself master of detail. Whether it was law, politics, science, national defence, or mechanical road transport, the subject engaging his attention for the time being was mastered and dealt with as if it was his only concern. We are too near him yet to determine how much the nation owes him for the indomitable energy and ceaseless advocacy he ,devoted to the causes he had ateheart.
Our space is insufficient to sketch his career, or even to tabulate the many offices he has filled and the numerous distinctions he has had conferred upon him. Let these suffice :---Born in Edinburgh in 1836, educated there and ateBasle; called to the Bar in 1859; a Q.O. in 1880; Solicitor-General for Scotland 1876 to 1580; Lord Advocate 1885-1888; Member of Parliament of Edinburgh and St. Andrews Universi ties 1885-1888; Lord Justice Clerk of Scotland and President of the Second Division of the Court of Session from 1888 to 1916. He led his company in the Queen's Edinburgh Volunteers past Queen Victoria in 1859 and rose in that service to the Brigadier-Generalship of the Forth Infantry Brigade ; was Colonel of the Motor Volunteer Corps, an ens* of the Royal Company of Archers—the Sovereign's Bodyguard for Scotland—a Fellow of the Royal Society, a Member of the Institute of Eleetrieal Engineers and in succession a Companion, a Knight Commander and a Knight Grand Cross of the Most Noble Order of the Bath.
In the matter of power traction on the roads, Sir John Macdonald has taken a pre-eminent place. In the early days of the " horseless carriage ' few men perceived, as he did, its infinite possibilities in every respect. His bold prophecies at that time often called forth the ridicule of his friends, and nothing delighted him more, in later times, than to recall to these scoffers their previous unbelief or to welcome them as regular and devoted users of a motor vehicle.
Locomotion, especially road locomotion, had been a hobby, even an obsession from his boyhood. His toys, to be worthy of the name, bad to run on wheels and, in rnaturer years, his coach and four werepas conspicuous on the roads near his country house as his "cart" and pair, driven by himself, were in the
streets of Edinburgh. Early, efforts towards the use of steam coaches secured his interest and sympathy,
as much from the possibilities he foresaw as from the opposition they met from vested and competing interests, and it is not surprising that the early efforts to apply the internal-combustion engine to road transport found in him a ready and an eager disciple. His foresight and imagination—qualities that have distinguished him all through life—at once suggested to him the possibilities of the new form of road locomotion and from the outset he threw himself into it heart and soul.
He had, in these early ctays, many discouraging and diseomfiting experiences, but his confidence was
never shaken. If his was a voice crying in the wilderness, he continued to cry. No movement has ever 0391
had a more resolute or a more convincing exponent. By speech and by pen, he has never ceased to extol the possibilities of the motor vehicle for all forms of road transport. There is no man to whom automobilism owes more.
Sir John, very early in the history of the motor movement, foresaw its possibilities in the matter of
commercial, transport and he has all along been a regular reader of and a contributor to The Commercial Motor..
The present writer recalls one of his earliest speeches on the future of commercial traffic, delivered to a gathering of sporting and pleasure ear owners at a time when commercial ears were little more than thought of and as his remarks are not only interesting, in view of their remarkable realization in later years, but apposite to the legislative proposals of the present day, we make no apology in quoting them in full :— " I have never looked," he said, " upon this question of power traction upon the public roads as being only an important question as regards _the sport of autonaobilism ; I look upon it as being of enormous value towards the development of the trade and com merce and agriculture of the country. I do not think that many have much conception of the enormous effect it will have upon the wealth and prosperity of the country ; upon the development for all time of the road as an interesting place ; upon the country inn upon the people who minister to the •eountrt inn wall their hens and eggs and butter and cheese and milk, and that there should be once more a real lively, traffic upon our roads..
"The big farmer who is not near the railway will be able to send his produce to market some 40 or 60 miles by means of motors without the intervention of the middleman ; and the farmer who lives near a railway will be able to snap his fingers at the railway companies with their exorbitant and extravagant rates and long delays. In this way motor transport will be of the greatest benefit to the community com mercially and in every way. I wish people would begin to realize—and I think they are beginning to do so—that as great a revolution as, if not a greater revolution than, any that has taken place since the introduction of railways is in progress."
From then—now 15 years ago—onwards Sir John Macdonald has enthusiastically and consistently advocated commercial motor transport, and it was his great pride to prove, by statistics of traffic compiled from his own observation, the comparative growth, year by year, of the use of the power wagon.
As president. during its whole existence—from 1899 onwards—of the Royal Scottish Automobile Club, he has been a tower of strength to the progress of the motor movement north of the Tweed, and it is difficult to say which was the greater, his pride in that position or the pride of the club in their president. Public life appealed to Sir John Macdonald only from the consideration of its usefulness to the com
munity, and he cared not for approbation or how much or how strongly he was exiticised, so Jong as he was satisfied his policy and his action were right.
He was a Scotsman to the finger tips, embodying in himself all that is best in the national characteristics, broad and generous in his views and kindly and considerate in his personal relationships.
Sir John Macdonald leaves 'behind him a worthy record of nobility of purpose and useful endeavour, and has so endeared and indebted himself to the automobile community as will keep his memory ever green.