People of the 20th Century
JOHN D. M. ROBERTSON

Mr John D.M. Robertson of Shorelands, Kirkwall, who, with his uncle Brigadier S.P. Robertson, had built the oil business of S. and J.D. Robertson into one of the biggest private companies in Scotland, was honoured for his record of public service as he was made an OBE. in the 1978 New Years honours list.

A former pupil of Kirkwall Grammar School and a graduate of Edinburgh University, he had worked in the oil industry in London, Aden and South Wales before returning to the Kirkwall-based company his uncle founded in 1954, and which now served the oil needs of Orkney, Shetland, Caithness and Sutherland. A decade later, the company was to expand its operations as far as the Falkland Islands.

Mr Robertson, who 15 years later was to be made also a CBE, was chairman of the Orkney Savings Committee and a member of the National Savings Committee a member of the Orkney Health Board, of which he would later become chairman; an honorary sheriff; honorary consul for the Federal Republic of Germany; and Danish vice-consul. He had also been chairman of Orkney’s Children’s Panel, and was past president of the Rotary Club of Kirkwall.

John Robertson was also the author of what is regarded as the definitive history of the Kirkwall Ba’ game, Uppies and Doonies.