Alexander Mackie

Born in 1855, Alexander Mackie was a Scottish schoolmaster and author whose life was closely tied to education in Aberdeen. He studied at Aberdeen Grammar School and King's College, Aberdeen, and after turning away from a career in the church, he devoted himself to teaching and writing.

Mackie became principal of Albyn Place School for Girls, a school so strongly associated with him that it was widely known as "Mackie's." He was remembered as an able teacher of English and as an important supporter of higher education for women at a time when that cause still needed determined advocates.

Alongside his school work, he wrote on literature and place, producing books such as Scotticisms, Nature Knowledge in Modern Poetry, and Aberdeenshire. After his death in 1915, a memorial volume, Prose and Verse, gathered samples of his writing and reflected the respect he had earned as both an educator and a man of letters.