South African zoologist. Austin Roberts was born in Pretoria to Archdeacon Alfred Roberts and the botanical illustrator Marianne Roberts (nee Fannin), only a few blocks from the site of the Transvaal Museum, where he was to make his career. He received only one year of formal education, the rest of his schooling taking place in the church schools run by his father in Lydenburg and Potchefstroom, a fact that haunted him when he was trying to establish himself in the hierarchy of academically trained scientists.
His greatest influence in these early years was the amateur ornithologist Thomas Ayres, who lived in a cabin in Potchefstroom and made his living by collecting and selling natural history specimens to museums. Ayres taught Roberts and his older brother, Noel, how to prepare and accurately record their specimens. Roberts made his first collections, especially of butterflies, at the farm Kilgobbin, near the Dargle, which was owned by two of his maternal uncles.
He began his working life in 1901 with the Standard Bank, but soon afterwards joined the Civil Service. He was a founding member of the South African Ornithological Society and published his first paper, "A Visit to a Breeding Colony of Ibis aethopioca", in the inaugural issue of its journal in 1904. A veteran of the Bambata Rebellion in 1906, he later served in East Africa and Palestine during the First World War. In 1908 he resigned from his job to accompany the hunter-naturalist Frederick Vaughan Kirby on an expedition to Boror in Mozambique, and for six months collected birds and small mammals, which he donated to the Transvaal Museum. This led to his being offered the newly-established post of Curator of Higher Vertebrates at the Transvaal Museum by its first Director, Dr J.W.B. Gunning. During the long career that followed, he devoted himself to taxonomic research and carried out fieldwork across South Africa and in adjoining territories. He collected approximately 30,000 birds and 13,000 mammal specimens for the museum. A single paper published in 1929, "New Forms of African Mammals", described 45 new species and subspecies. His books Birds of Southern Africa (1940) and Mammals of South Africa (published posthumously) are standard references on the region's fauna.
As an authority on the fauna, Roberts played an important role in suppressing an outbreak of bubonic plague at Bothaville in the winter of 1920. After personally investigating the cause, which he traced to indigenous gerbils on the veld, he launched a public information campaign, publishing illustrated articles in Farmer's Weekly and attracting large audiences to his public lectures in strategic areas.
He was a founder member of the Wild Life Society of South Africa and served terms as President of the South African Biological Society and of the Council of the South African Museum Association. His honours include a research grant from the Carnegie Foundation, medals from the South African Biological Society and the South African Association for the Advancement of Science, and an honorary doctorate from Pretoria University. Killed in an automobile accident while travelling in the former Transkei, he is commemorated in the Austin Roberts Bird Sanctuary and in the Austin Roberts Wing of the Transvaal Museum in his native city.
