Ken Ignatius Murray, a member of the Institute of Hospital Engineering for many years who represented the UK at international conferences, delivering papers on a wide range of hospital engineering projects, has died, aged 86.
Born in August 1924, he was evacuated to Oxford during the Second World War, and attended the city’s Salesian College. Engineering ran in his family’s genes – his father, Edward, was an electrical engineer, and curator of London’s Home Office Industrial Museum, while his great grandfather had lodged a patent for improving tram rails. Following his time at the Salesian College, he undertook national service with the Army’s Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineering Corps (REME), rapidly winning promotion to sergeant, and enjoying the role of instructor. After the war he gained a BSc in Mechanical Engineering, and was subsequently awarded a research scholarship, taking a Ph.D in heat transfer in refrigeration evaporators His first job, at the War Office, saw him head up a series of laboratories dealing with weapons systems, involving considerable travel, and a good deal of secrecy. Something of an idealist, and keen to find work that would benefit mankind, he subsequently joined the Department of Health, where he became involved in the planning and management of hospitals in the UK. He was especially interested in “developing people”; he believed passionately in training and educating engineers. One of his interests was watching cardiac surgeons at work, and thence identifying and designing equipment that would help them. As his career progressed, he took an increasing interest in politics, drafting answers to MPs’ questions in the House of Commons, and working closely with the then Minister of Health, Barbara Castle, where he enjoyed influencing policy from behind the scenes. As a Department of Health representative at international hospital engineering conferences, he visited the US, Canada, Argentina, Nigeria, and many European countries. An avid traveller generally, he enjoyed many adventurous holidays with his wife, Pat, including trips to Nepal and, most recently, to Somalia, where the pair at one stage found their cruise ship in the midst of pirate country. His other spare time interests included carpentry, listening to music, ancient history and archaeology, and painting and oils, but his passion was rowing, which he took up at an early age. He also enjoyed gliding, cross-country skiing, and sailing, and, in his student days, renovating vintage cars. His brother-in-law, Christopher Begley, said: “Ken was a rare individual; he could recite poetry, identify operatic music, put names to most plants (in Latin), and recognise birdsong, and yet, at the same time, converse on highly technical scientific matters. “He was never one to boast of his achievements; instead playing them down. He was always interested in young people and their careers, and acted as a mentor to many members of the family. We are most grateful to the Murray family for allowing us to share this unique, intelligent, dignified, and unassuming, gentle man.”
