Person
Lambert, Bruce Philip (1912 - 1990)
OBE
- Born
- 12 February 1912
Gosnells, Western Australia, Australia - Died
- 2 April 1990
Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia - Occupation
- Public servant and Surveyor
Summary
Bruce Lambert was a surveyor who as Director of the National Mapping Office for over 25 years from 1951 oversaw programs to publish topographic maps of Australia at scales of 1:250,000 and 1:100,000 as well as national geodetic and levelling surveys. This included the introduction of a number of new surveying techniques and the standardisation of map symbols and specifications. In 1961 he became secretary of the cartographic working group of the committee on Antarctic research. He was also heavily involved in the border survey between Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya from 1964 to 1972. Lambert's further international involvement included a United Nations mapping project in the Philippines and as a representative of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics at the UN cartographic office. Australia's centre of gravity, near Kulgera, Northern Territory, was named the Lambert Gravitational Centre. The Lambert Glacier in the Prince Charles mountains of Eastern Antarctica was named after him, as was a major shelf valley lying off the north-west coast of Australia.
Details
Chronology
- 1936
- Education - Qualified as a licensed surveyor
- 1936 - 1939
- Career position - Surveyor, State Electricity Commission, Victoria
- 1939 - 1945
- Career position - Served with the Royal Australian Engineers and the Royal Army Survey Corps
- 1946 - 1951
- Career position - Deputy-Director of National Mapping, Commonwealth Department of the Interior
- 1951 - 1977
- Career position - Director, National Mapping Office and Chairman, National Mapping Council
- 1954 - 1974
- Career position - Member, Australian Institute of Cartographers
- 1954 - 1974
- Career position - Fellow, Institution of Surveyors, Australia
- 1960 - 1977
- Career position - Secretary, international Working Group on Antarctic Geodesy and Cartography
- 1970
- Award - Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE)
- 1974 - 1977
- Career position - Fellow, Australian Institute of Cartographers
- 1977
- Life event - Retired
- 1977
- Award - Honorary Fellow, Australian Institute of Cartographers
- 1977
- Award - Honorary Doctor of Science (DSc), University of New South Wales
- 1979 - 1983
- Career position - Representative of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics at the UN cartographic office
- 1980 - 1981
- Career position - Consultant to United National mapping project in the Philippines
- 1988
- Award - G. P. Thompson Foundation Medal, Royal Geographical Society of Australasia
- 1988
- Award - Honorary Fellow, Institution of Surveyors, Australia
- 1988
- Award - Inaugural Gold Medal, Australian Institute of Cartographers
Related entries
Published resources
Book Sections
- Clark, Chris, 'Lambert, Bruce Philip (1912-1990), Surveyor and Public Servant' in Australian dictionary of biography, volume 18: 1981 - 1990 L-Z, Melanie Nolan, ed. (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2012), pp. 2-3. http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/lambert-bruce-phillip-14069. Details
Journal Articles
- Anon, 'AIC Gold Medal awarded to Bruce Lambert', Cartography, 17 (2) (1988), 56-8. Details
- Anon, 'Bruce Philip Lambert Honorary Fellow', Australian Surveyor, 34 (4) (1988), 423-4. Details
- Goodrick, Byrne, 'Dr. Bruce Philip Lambert, OBE', Australian Surveyor, 35 (2) (1990), 200-1. Details
- Lambert, B. P., 'The National Mapping Council of Australia forty years on', Cartography, 14 (2) (1985), 112-5. Details
Resources
- Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q24250708. Details
- 'Lambert, Bruce Philip (19120212-19900402)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-544763. Details
Helen Cohn
Last modified: 6 April 2018