Sir Lewis Leigh Fermor, OBE, FRS (18 September 1880 – 24 May 1954), was a British chemist and geologist and the first president of the Indian National Science Academy and a director of the Geological Survey of India (1930-1935). His son was the writer and traveller Sir Patrick Leigh Fermor.
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Early life
Fermor was born in Peckham in south London, the eldest of six children born to Lewis Fermor and Maria (née James); his middle name was given in honour of his father's best friend. His father was a clerk at the London Joint Stock Bank (acquired by the Midland Bank in 1917); his early retirement through ill health put the family in financial difficulties, and a subsequent attempt at setting up a sign-writing business met with little success. Lewis Leigh Fermor was educated at Wilson's Grammar School in Camberwell and studied metallurgy at the Royal School of Mines, with scholarships at each, and winning the Murchison medal for geology at the latter, where he took a BSc in 1907 and DSc in 1909. He was too old to accept an exhibition that he won at London University.
Career
Fermor was initially interested in continuing a career in metallurgy but was persuaded to apply to the Geological Survey of India by his professor, John Wesley Judd. The interview was by W. T. Blanford, then retired, and he was selected despite his expertise in chemistry rather than geology. Blanford may have seen the value of his expertise for the study of crystalline archaean rocks and Fermor would indeed later work extensively on petrology. He arrived in India in 1902, having accepted a position as assistant superintendent in the Geological Survey of India. He was one of the founders of geology in India. His major interest was in Archaean geology, and in igneous and metamorphic rocks. He was curator of the geology collection at the Indian Museum from 1905 to 1907. He did important work on deposits of manganese and coal, and he was awarded a Doctorate of Science by London University in 1909. He first described the mineral Hollandite in 1906 and the mineral Fermorite, discovered in 1910, is named after him. He became a superintendent in the Geological Survey of India in 1910, and was awarded an OBE for his work for the Indian Railway Board and then the Indian Munitions Board during the First World War.