Charles Olden Bannister died on 22nd February, 1955, at the age of 78.
He was educated at King Edward’s Grammar School, Stourbridge, and from 1891 to 1895 was employed in the chemical laboratory of Messrs. Albright and Wilson’s phosphorus works at Oldbury. He took the three-year course in metallurgy at the Royal School of Mines from 1896, obtaining a first-class Associateship of the School in 1899 and the Bessemer Medal and Prize. He then joined the staff of the Royal School of Mines as assistant instructor in assaying, and in 1901 gained an Honours Associateship in Metallurgy; he was awarded the Edward Matthey Prize for research work in 1902, and a Carnegie Scholarship of the Iron and Steel Institute in 1903.
Professor Bannister’s long teaching career began when he took up the appointment of lecturer in metallurgy at the Sir John Cass Technical Institute in October, 1903, but he conducted researches over a wide field for many years. He was made head of the Metallurgy Department of the Sir John Cass Technical Institute in 1907, and held that position until 1919.
From 1914 to 1920 he was consulting metallurgist to Messrs. Riley and Harbord, London, and was a war-time lecturer in metallurgy at the Royal School of Mines. He was awarded the Bessemer Premium of the Society of Engineers in 1919. He left London in 1920 when he was appointed Professor of Metallurgy in the University of Liverpool. He served as Dean of the Faculty of Engineering during the two periods 1924-1928 and 1935-1938. On his retirement from the Department of Metallurgy in 1941 he was made Emeritus Professor of the University.
Professor Bannister was the author of many technical papers, including the following contributions to the Transactions of the Institution: ‘A graphic method for computation of blast furnace charges’ (vol. 13, 1903-04); ‘The assay of auriferous tin-stone’ (vol. 15, 1905-06); ‘Cupellation experiments’: Part I (jointly with W.N. Stanley), ‘The thermal properties of cupels’ (vol. 18, 1908-09) and Part II (with G. Patchin), ‘A simple method for the detection of platinum metals in cupellation beads’ (vol. 23, 1913-14); ‘ On the theory of blast-roasting of galena’ (vol. 21, 1911-12) for which he was awarded ‘The Consolidated Gold Fields of South Africa, Limited’ Gold Medal; and, with W.M. Doyle, ‘Bismuth in copper; its effects, determination, and some experiments in its gaseous elimination’ (vol. 44, 1934-35). He was also contributor of the iron and steel section of Lunge and Kean’s Technical methods of chemical analysis, and was responsible for the revision of the 6th edition of Sexton’s Elementary textbook of metallurgy and of the 4th edition of Gowland’s Metallurgy of the nan-ferrous metals (1930).
Professor Bannister was elected an Associate Member of the Institution in 1906 and was transferred to Membership in 1908. He was an original member of the Institute of Metals, for many years a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Chemistry, and a member of the Society of Chemical Industry, the Iron and Steel Institute, and the Institution of Metallurgists.
Vol. 64, Trans I.M.M. 1954-55, p. 642
