Anna MacGillivray Macleod (1917-2004)

Anna MacGillivray Macleod (15 May 1917 – 13 August 2004) was a Scottish academic, a dedicated teacher and the first female Professor of Brewing and Biochemistry in the world at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh.

Family
Born in Kirkhill, she was the daughter of the Rev. Alasdair MacGillivray Macleod and Margaret Ingram Sangster, M.A. Her heritage is from the Isle of Lewis, where her grandfather, Rev. George Macleod was the Minister of Garrabost and where her father was born. She was second cousin to the politician and former Chancellor of the Exchequer the Right Hon.Iain Norman Macleod. Her family belongs to the branch of Macleods of Pabbay and Uig.

As her father died at an early age, Anna was left to look after her widowed mother. Her two brothers were both Doctors of medicine - her elder brother was Dr. John George Macleod, who was the editor of Davidson's Textbook of Medicine and the author of Clinical Examination, and her younger brother was Dr. Alasdair MacGillivray Macleod, a general practitioner in Linlithgow.

Education & profession
Anna Macleod was educated at Invergordon Academy and Edinburgh Ladies' College, and graduated from Edinburgh University with a BSc in Botany. She joined the faculty of Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, in 1945, where she remained until her retirement in 1977. She returned in 1951 to Edinburgh University to study for a PhD. In the late 1960s she was awarded a Doctor of Science, also from Edinburgh University, for a thesis on the germination of barley.

In 1961 together with Leslie Samuel Cobley she co-edited Contemporary Botanical Thought, published by Oliver and Boyd. She edited the Journal of the Institute of Brewing from 1964 to 1976, and she was the first female President of the Institute of Brewing from 1970 to 1972. In 1975 she was appointed Professor of Brewing at Heriot-Watt University. In 1976 one of the greatest honours in the Brewing industry was bestowed on her - the Horace Brown medal. She retired in 1977, but continued as professor emeritus. In 1993, Heriot-Watt University awarded her an honorary Doctorate of Science for her discovery of Gibberellic Acid, which was an advantage for the Maltsters as it shortened the malting process. At that occasion, the Dean of the Faculty of Science, Professor Philip G. Harper, mentioned that Anna Macleod’s association with the brewing industry puts her in the same fraternity as other scientists, such as James Watt (power), Louis Pasteur (Pasteurisation), Peter Greiss (colour chemistry), Lovibond (colour physics), Grosser (statistics) and the Royal Society medallist, Horace Brown, the distinguished biologist and brewer. He said that she was recognised nationally and internationally with distinction as a university teacher, scholar, scientist, technologist and as a brewer. One of her PhD. students, Geoff Palmer, first worked with her especially on the research of Barley and they published numerous papers together. He then became her successor at the Heriot-Watt.

Anna Macleod died at St.Raphaels, Edinburgh on 13 August 2004.

Heriot-Watt University's Brewing and Distilling department, as it is now called, started the Anna Macleod Scholarship with a financial gift she had bequeathed to that University in her will.