Michael T Tracy

An Exceptional Assembly of the Buist and Goodsir Families of Fife Michael T Tracy

On Monday, 4 March 1839 in the library of the University of St. Andrews at St. Andrews, Fife, there occurred a unique meeting of the Literary and Philosophical Society of St. Andrews in which members of the Buist and Goodsir families were in attendance. The members of the Buist family whose interests included geology and mineralogy met members of the Goodsir family who were distinguished surgeons of Anstruther and Largo and whose interests embraced anatomy, zoology, natural and human history. The two prominent Fife families where linked by the marriage of George Buist (1750-1797) a tenant farmer of Orkie, Kettle Parish, Fife and Christian Ballingall (1756-1834) a daughter of Christian Goodsir (1717-1760) whose brother Dr. John Goodsir (b 1719) was a prominent surgeon of Largo Parish, Fife. It was an extraordinary gathering of Fife intellectuals all in one room and never occurred again in their lifetimes. This is an account of the early origins of the Literary and Philosophical Society of St. Andrews in 1838 and of that remarkable meeting in 1839.