Emeritus Professor William James Moore

Colleagues will be sorry to learn of the death, on 1 July 2024, of Emeritus Professor William James Moore, formerly of the Department of Anatomy.  The following tribute has been contributed by his family.

‘Jim’ Moore, as he was known to family and friends, was born in 1932 in Aston and after growing up in Birmingham, commenced his university education in the same city as a dental student in 1950. However, after his pre-clinical year, he was attracted to studying anatomy under the then Sir Solly, and soon to be, Lord Zuckerman. As a result, he graduated from the university with two degrees: in Anatomy and Physiology in 1953 and in Dental Surgery in 1956.

He then became a research fellow in the Department of Anatomy in Birmingham where he was awarded a Nuffield Foundation Scholarship. His future was very clearly influenced by Lord Zuckerman and thus began his lifelong interest in physical anthropology. He gained his PhD as a Doctor of Philosophy in Medical Science in 1959. After getting married to Mary, he then carried out his National Service as a dental surgeon in the Royal Air Force in West Sussex, rising to the rank of Squadron Leader. His son, Richard, was born during this time in West Sussex and now lives back in the county, in Chichester and not far from where Jim and Mary lived 60 years ago.

In 1963, he returned to Birmingham as a clinical medical student, graduating in 1966 as a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Science. A daughter, Sarah, also arrived into the world, in 1964 and she went on to study medicine at the same university some 20 years or so later. From 1966 to 1970, Jim lectured in Anatomy and then in Oral Pathology in Birmingham.

Whilst a medical student at Birmingham, Jim was awarded the prize for ‘Surgical Diseases of Children’ – skills that came to the fore when he told his daughter Sarah to ‘pull yourself together, it’s only a stomach bug’ before she was whisked off to hospital for an emergency appendectomy.

1970 signaled a major change in Jim’s career as he briefly worked as a Research Associate at the Institute for Cancer Research in Philadelphia, before moving to Harrogate in North Yorkshire and commencing a Senior Lectureship in Anatomy at Leeds University.  Six years later, he was appointed to a personal chair with the title of ‘Professor of Anatomy with special reference to dentistry’. He took on the responsibility of teaching dental students with enthusiasm and commitment and is fondly remembered by many Leeds medics and dentists who remember his crystal clear expositions on the mysteries of the cranial nerves and the embryology of the head and neck.

His son remembers going into hospital in Chichester during the Covid epidemic for treatment on a kidney stone and the doctor on duty, on finding out that his patient’s father had taught him at Leeds and co-authored Dental Anatomy, insisting that he took a photograph of the author’s son on the patient trolley. His wife, Rachel, would often visit doctors’ and dentists’ houses on evening appointments as a financial adviser, and would get into conversations about Jim after spotting his textbook on their book shelves.   

In 1978, he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Science by the University of Birmingham. From 1983 to 1988, he served as the head of the Department of Anatomy at Leeds, from 1984 to 1988 as Preclinical Sub-Dean and then as Dean of Preclinical Studies, and from 1985 to 1988 as Deputy Chairman of the Board of the Faculty of Medicine. He also served as a Visitor for the General Dental Council, as an External Examiner in Anatomy at numerous other universities in this country and in Dentistry at universities in the Far East and West Indies. In his ‘spare time’, he was a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Anatomy and served on a number of committees at faculty and university level.

Aside from the aforementioned textbook, Jim’s main research interest in physical anthropology generated a long and distinguished list of publications including more than 500 papers and two research monographs. Perhaps his best known work was on the growth and development of the skull and on the secular epidemiology of dental caries.

His children have fond memories of their time growing up and going to school in Harrogate – trips to the Yorkshire Dales, dinner parties for colleagues from the university with Mary’s superb culinary skills very much to the fore, Sunday walks after a roast lunch (Fewston reservoir is a particular memory) and eating out at lots of restaurants, both in Harrogate and Leeds, some of which are still in existence.

Jim, and his wife Mary, who predeceased him, retired to East Devon in the late 1980s, where they enjoyed being near family, making new friends, ‘flat white’ coffees (a family joke), eating out and travelling around the world on holiday. During this time, Jim’s son-in-law, Chris, also a Birmingham graduate in Dentistry, recalls that his dental practice was perhaps unique in having a resident Professor of Anatomy on call to tutor his dental nurses in preparation for their exams. Chris remembers Jim as a modest, kind and exceptional teacher and can empathise with students at Leeds who, he is sure, will have very fond memories of him.

Jim was always a passionate reader of books and had a phenomenal memory for facts and figures, so much so, it seemed almost ‘photographic’ at times. He also enjoyed researching on the internet and keeping up with the progress of Aston Villa, the family’s football team. He will be deeply missed as someone who was very kind, fair and always interested in other people. And, quite simply, one of the cleverest but supremely modest people you could ever wish to meet.

He is survived by his son and daughter and their children, Richard, James, Lucy and Ellie.