Robin Harland

Robert Wallace (“Robin”) Harland was born just a short walk from the Queens University Belfast, an institution that was to play a central part in his life. Educated at Fane Street Public Elementary School and Methodist College Belfast, he then undertook undergraduate medical studies at Queens University. After completing house officer posts at Belfast’s Royal Victoria Hospital, he worked as a locum GP in Durham before returning to Belfast, to the Royal Maternity Hospital, in 1950, where he met and wooed his future wife, May. An invitation to return to Durham as a full time GP partner in late 1950 led to a 20 year career in a dispensing practice, disrupted only by three years of military service as regimental medical officer to the Royal Tank Regiment in Germany.

It was during his time as a GP in Durham that Robin first developed an interest in student health and sports medicine, teaching health education and first aid to student teachers at the …