Sir William A. (William Alexander) Craigie

Born in Dundee in 1867, he became one of the great word scholars of his time. He studied at the University of St Andrews and went on to build a distinguished career in philology and lexicography, with a special interest in Scots and early English.

He is best remembered for his major role in the Oxford English Dictionary, serving as its third editor and later co-editing the 1933 supplement with C. T. Onions. Alongside that work, he was an important scholar of Scottish language and literature, helping document and preserve Scots vocabulary with the same care he brought to English.

His career also reached beyond Britain: he later taught at the University of Chicago, where he continued his research and writing. Knighted for his contributions to scholarship, he remained a respected authority on language until his death in 1957.