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Thomas Douglas (1830-1920) was a British mining engineer, Colliery Agent and eventual President of the North of England Institute of Mining and Mechanical Engineers.

Early Life
Urpeth Colliery saw the beginnings of Douglas's mining career. Between the years 1844 and 1848 Douglas served as an apprentice at Urpeth under the guidance of prominent industrialist Edward Fenwick Boyd. After his training, Douglas served as a colliery Agent for J.W Pease and Partners in the Durham Coalfield. Douglas became Agent to multiple collieries, amongst which included Bowden Close, Sunniside, Esh and Roddymoor Colliery, which was also known as Pease's West Colliery.

Career
Douglas became member of the Council in 1862, before being elected vice-president of NEIMME in 1881.

Douglas was elected president of the Institute in December 1894, succeeding retiring president Addison Langhorne Steavenson. Douglas had been connected to the Institute since its formation in 1852 and in his inaugural address in 1894, he was informed that he was one of only four remaining original members of the Institute. On his election Douglas states he had 'considerable hesitation in accepting the office, not from any want of desire, but anxiety that everything should be done for the interests of the Institute', his declining health was also his cause for concern in accepting the post. In 1895 he returned to his previous role as vice-president of the Institute.

Douglas also represented the Institute as Governor of Armstrong College. Armstrong College was the renamed College of Physical Science that was founded in 1871.

Alongside Douglas's own successes', he equally enabled the success of others. Philip Kirkup became a prominent mining figure through Douglas's training. Kirkup was apprenticed to Douglas to learn the career of a Colliery Agent. Kirkup notes in an Annual General Meeting at the NEIMME on August 7th 1920, that Douglas was an 'indefatigable worker, and by example and precept sought to inculcate the same principles into the young men around him'. He continued that he had 'a tactful, kind, and genial personality' which was useful in dealing with disputes concerning 'wages and other difficulties which arose from time to time between the workmen and employers in the Durham Coalfield'.

Legacy
Douglas died in 1920 at the age of 91. Following his death, many mining engineers came forward to declare how admired he was due to his 68 year attachment to the NEIMME and being an original, and the longest surviving, member of the Institute.

Category:1830 births Category:1920 deaths Category:Mining in Tyne and Wear Category:18th-century English people Category:19th-century English people Category:British mining engineers Category:English mechanical engineers Category:History of mining