Kenneth Fenton and the Hull Geological Society

by Mike Horne

There is no record in the Society's archives of Ken's election as a member of the Society, but his name appears in the attendance list for the first meeting of 1954. He must have joined at least a year before that, or have been known to the committee, because he led a field meeting to Hessle and Ferriby on May 1st. 1954, early in that years' Summer Programme. It is minuted that the committee asked Ken to assist Mr. C.W. Mason as Excursion Secretary. During the 1950's Ken also gave lectures to the Society on two occasions:-- in January 1956 he addressed the Society on "Some methods of dating used in geology and pre-history" and in December of that year on "Some aspects of Human Evolution".

There are no records in the minute book from February 1958 for three years. According to Ken the Society had virtually ceased to exist, and might never have met again if the Secretary, George De Boer, had not received a letter from the Inland Revenue requesting Income Tax on the Shillito bequest. In March 1961 an extraordinary meeting was called to reform the Society, Ken Fenton chaired that meeting and later became President. In fact Ken was an active committee member or officer of the Society from the day of that meeting until he died. His good friend Felix Whitham, who joined the Society in response to a small-ad in the local press announcing the extraordinary meeting of 1961, was elected as the new member of the committee in 1963, when Ken gave his Presidential address on "Human Evolution". Felix was later elected as Treasurer in 1965, a post which he has held ever since.

In the 1963-64 Winter Programme Ken Fenton described the peat deposit at Mappleton at the members evening and delivered another Presidential Address on "The evolution of Evolution". He led a field meeting to Whitby in July 1964 and gave a joint lecture, with Lyn Emery (another close friend of his) to the January 1965 members evening on the Jurassic plants of the Yorkshire coast (a special interest of his). In the following years Ken led many other field meetings :-

Ken was elected Vice-President of the Society in 1968 and held that post until he was elected Secretary in 1973. He was a very efficient Secretary to the Society, in fact as the years went by the need for committee meetings almost ceased - except to suggest possible speakers and localities for field trips for Ken to organise. He got off to a good start as the minutes record that the Society planned to publish "occasional reports" and that this became Humberside Geologist in 1974. That year he wrote to the city elders and press asking them to support a permanent geological display at the Museum and repeated the exercise in 1977, without success.

In the 1980's Ken was often unable to attend the lectures of the Winter Programme due to his own heavy evening teaching commitments. Even when he was not there he made sure that things were well organised and ran smoothly.

In 1983 he arranged for the Society to visit and record the famous buried cliff at Hessle Station, before it disappeared beneath roadworks. He later collected vertebrate remains from that section and sent them to the British Museum for identification and preservation. He sent a paper to the 1984 members evening about the buried cliff along with a set of slides he had taken. He led a field trip to the Gristhorpe plant beds in the July of that year.

In 1985 Ken Fenton resigned as Secretary and was elected Vice-President; the committee had secretly hoped to make Ken President in the centenary year as a tribute to all his hard work for the Society. Despite the discovery that he had a heart condition Ken attended most of the field meetings in the 1985 Summer Programme. He even led one of the field meetings to Scalby and Cloughton in June. Realising that he could not be as active due to his illness he started planning an article about the Jurassic plants that he had spent so many years studying and collecting. He was still active in the organising of the Society's activities, helping with the secretarial duties and deputising for the President, when he died.

Bibliography :

The published geological works of Kenneth Fenton B. Sc.

1969. An introduction to the geology of Holderness with special reference to the coast. East Yorkshire Field Studies 2, 1-13.

1975. Report of the field excursion to Robin Hoods Bay on 27th April 1974, Humberside Geologist 1, 7-8 (not numbered).

1977 Bridlington to Hornsea. Humberside Geologist 2, 10.

1980 In the beginnings ... Humberside Geologist 3, 2-3 (not numbered).

1980 Section of the Red Cliff North Ferriby. Humberside Geologist 3, 14-15 (not numbered).

1984 The Hessle "Buried Cliff". Humberside Geologist 4, 6-13.

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