We were very sad to learn of the death of Dr Michael Le Bas, a long-serving Trustee of Blandford Town Museum and our Deputy Curator from 1999 until his death in December 2022.
Michael John le Bas was born in 1931 to British parents in Valenciennes, France. He graduated in 1952 with a BSc in Geology with Chemistry from University College London and four years later was awarded a PhD in Mineralogy and Petrology from Cambridge University. Following university, he saw military service at Limassol and Tobruk, operating army landing craft during the Suez campaign in 1956. He remained in Egypt with the Royal Navy under the protection of the United Nations to assist in raising sunken shipping and reopening the Suez Canal. In a recent oral history interview for the Museum, he described how as a young officer, he was present at the top-level negotiations between the Americans and the British, which led to the British withdrawal from Suez. He was Port Officer for military shipping at Aquaba for the withdrawal of the British garrison from Jordan in 1956-57.
Michael’s military service was followed by a distinguished academic career in geology and geological chemistry, in which he lectured at Leicester University, Oxford University and Queen’s University, Belfast. He was also an Hon. Research Fellow at the Natural History Museum London and Leicester University, and listed 166 publications on his professional CV.
After retiring to Blandford in the 1990s, Michael established himself as an authority on Blandford’s history. He served as a committee member of Blandford & District Civic Society for over 20 years, editing the society’s award-winning annual newsletter until 2011, and was the inspiration behind many of their projects and interpretation boards, including the WWII board which stands outside the Crown Hotel, and the St Leonard’s Chapel board.
As a member and curator of the Blandford Town Museum, Michael worked on many exhibitions, projects and publications and provided information to local and international researchers. Michael was appointed Deputy Curator in 1999, and took on the role of Acting Curator before the appointment of Dr Peter Andrews as the new Hon Curator. Michael’s artist brother, Philip, and wife, Pam, were also involved in the museum: Pam was the Museum’s archivist for many years, and Philip painted the backdrops to several of the exhibits in the museum.
Michael wrote two Museum booklets: The Building Stones of Blandford and the Saxon=Norman Story of Blandford. He was also a co-author of One Hundred Blandford Worthies: second edition and Blandford Inns and Hostelries. His 2009 article on the Great Fire of Blandford for Dorset Life Magazine can be found here. He was working on a further publication Blandford’s Contribution to World War Two and a presentation on this is available on the Town Council Website. In recognition of his important contribution to the local community, Michael was awarded the Freedom of the town in 2019.
Michael has been a key figure in the life of the Museum for over 20 years and he will be very much missed.