neuroscientist, active 1970s-1980s Ray Cooper is a retired British neuroscientist. Between 1971 and 1988, he served as Scientific Director of the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. His research at the Burden covered a variety of neuroscientific topics, including electroencephalography, brain injury, slow cortical potentials, and visual processing. He also wrote a history of the Burden’s first fifty years with his colleague Jonathan Bird, which was published in 1989.

(1920-1987), neuropsychiatrist Henry James (Harry) Crow was educated at Aberdeen University following a successful career in the Royal Air Force as a navigator, a role for which he received the Distinguished Flying Cross. After qualifying in medicine, Crow took up a post as neurosurgical houseman at the Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, where he developed a lifelong interest in neuropsychiatric research. In 1956, he became a consultant at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. He later became the Burden’s Clinical Director, a post which he retained until his retirement. Crow’s clinical practice and research focused on the treatment of epilepsy and anxiety conditions. He also played a key role in developing the Burden’s EEG department alongside neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). He was a founding member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, becoming a Fellow in 1971 and later Chairman of the South Western Division. Crow died on 10 May 1987.

(1930-1991), psychophysiologist Cheyne McCallum was born in Gosport in 1930. He was educated in Fareham, before undertaking National Service in the Army Intelligence Corps. After a brief period in the Civil Service, he enrolled as a mature student in psychology at Bristol University, before pursuing a Ph.D. at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, under neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). In 1965, McCallum was offered a research post at the Burden, where he worked for the rest of his life. McCallum’s research at the Burden focused on slow cortical potentials (slow changes in the electrical activity of the brain, as identified by EEG recordings, in response to external stimuli), particularly the effect of increased mental workload on individuals in charge of complex systems, such as pilots and air traffic controllers. This work also led to his close collaboration with Walter on Contingent Negative Variation (CNV, or ‘expectancy wave’) in the 1960s. McCallum was married twice and had two children. He died following a short illness on 19 November 1991.

(1910-1977), neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (also known as Grey Walter) was born in Kansas City, Missouri, on 19 February 1910 to journalist parents Karl Wilhelm Walter (1880-1965) and Minerva (Margaret) Lucrezia Hardy (1879-1953). The Walter family moved from the United States to Britain in 1915, where William remained for the rest of his life. He was educated at Westminster School (1922-1928), before taking the Natural Science Tripos at King’s College, Cambridge (1928-1931). He went on to pursue postgraduate research on nerve physiology and conditioned reflexes, gaining his MA in 1935. After completing his MA, Walter was invited to work at the Central Pathological Laboratory of the Maudsley Hospital, London, under neuropsychiatrist Frederick Lucien Golla (1877-1968). Since the late 1920s, Golla had become increasingly interested in the clinical applications of the burgeoning field of electroencephalography (EEG), the measurement of the electrical activity of the brain via electrodes placed on the scalp. Noting his skill in technical matters, Golla encouraged Walter to develop increasingly sophisticated EEG devices, and supported his application for a Rockefeller Travelling Fellowship to visit the Jena laboratory of German physiologist Hans Berger (1873-1941), widely credited as the founder of electroencephalography. Walter went on to achieve several key ‘firsts’ in electroencephalography, including the first detection of a cerebral tumour using the technique in 1936. Between 1936 and 1939, Walter expanded his research programme and took readings from hundreds of patients, focusing particularly on the electrical patterns of epilepsy. In 1939, Golla was invited to become director of the new Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders, and invited Walter to become director of the Institute’s Physiology Department. At the Burden, Walter further developed his EEG apparatus, developing the automatic frequency analyser and the toposcope in 1943 and 1950 respectively. His research programme also became increasingly ambitious, with investigations into the cerebral effects of stroboscopic light beginning in 1947 and, later, the discovery of ‘contingent negative variation’ (CNV, or the ‘expectancy wave’) in the 1960s. Walter also played a key role in the professionalization of electroencephalography during this period, co-founding the journal Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology and organising meetings of the EEG Society (1943-1989). Outside of his clinical work, Walter became a key figure in early British cybernetics, the study of feedback, control, and communication systems in humans and machines that synthesised approaches from engineering, biology, and mathematics. He co-founded the Ratio Club, an informal dining and discussion group which provided a key social outlet for cybernetic enthusiasts, which met between 1949 and 1955. He also built several cybernetic devices in his spare time, the most famous of which were his robotic tortoises, or Machina Speculatrix, designed to function as simple models of the adaptable human brain. These received national attention when they were exhibited on television in 1950 and at the Festival of Britain in 1951. He also became a prolific public intellectual, writing 170 scientific publications, serving as an expert witness in court courses, appearing frequently on the BBC, and writing an immensely popular non-specialist text on his neuroscientific work, The Living Brain (1953). His work also gained a surprising popularity among counter-cultural artists during the 1950s and 1960s, including Beat writers William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, who saw Walter’s research as part of a broader investigation of human consciousness. Walter was married twice, first to Katharine Monica Ratcliffe in 1934 and then to Vivian Joan Dovey (1915-1980) in 1947, with whom he had one son, Timothy Walter (1949-1976). Walter and Dovey separated in 1960 and divorced in 1973. After their separation, Walter lived with Lorraine Josephine Aldridge (née Donn) until 1972. In 1970, Walter suffered severe brain damage following a road accident, forcing him to retire from full-time research work. He died of a heart attack in 1977.

electrical engineer, active 1940s-1960s W.J. (‘Bunny’) Warren was an electrical engineer at the Burden Neurological Institute, Bristol, an independent research unit specialising in the investigation and treatment of neurological, psychological, and psychiatric disorders. Warren was a key player in the Burden’s research programme during the 1950s, building an advanced 2-channel electroencephalograph (EEG, a device designed to measure the electrical activity of the brain) with colleague Harold Shipton (1920-2007) in 1957. Warren also played an important role in mid-twentieth-century British cybernetics through his collaborations with neurophysiologist William Grey Walter (1910-1977). Warren built improved prototypes of Walter’s famous robot tortoises, or Machina Speculatrix, which later went on display at the Festival of Britain in 1951. Their partnership continued in 1953, when Warren constructed CORA (Conditioned Reflex Analogue), an early experiment in artificial intelligence which attempted to replicate classical conditioning in humans and animals, from Walter’s designs.