Background
His father, who died in 1925, was a farm manager who had studied at Edinburgh University and obtained a Diploma in Agriculture.
His father, who died in 1925, was a farm manager who had studied at Edinburgh University and obtained a Diploma in Agriculture.
After spending 1926-1930 at Grey High School in Portuguese Elizabeth, Robert Story attended Rhodes University from 1931-1933 where he obtained a Bachelor of Science, after which he enrolled at Witwatersrand University from 1934-1935 where he graduated with an Master of Science And was later awarded a Doctor of Science His first appointment was to the Leeuwkuil Pasture Research Station near Vereeniging in 1936.
During World World War II he saw service in Madagascar, North Africa and Italy. At the close of the War in 1945 he was transferred to the Botanical Survey Section of the Division of Botany and stationed at Grahamstown. Here he carried out a botanical survey of the Keiskammahoek District and it was published as "Botanical Survey of South Africa Memoir Number.
27" in 1952.
In the same year he relocated to Pretoria as Officer in Charge of the Botanical Survey Section. He accompanied the Harvard-Smithsonian-Peabody expedition to Botswana and South-West Africa in 1955, revisiting the region in 1956 and 1958 and travelling through the Kaokoveld to the Kunene River. As a result of these trips he published "Some Plants Used by the Bushmen in Obtaining Food and Water" in 1958 as "Botanical Survey of South Africa Memoir Number.
30".
He was appalled at the environmental damage that was being done in the Hunter Valley near Lake George. During 1969-1970 he was posted to Patagonia on an environmental training mission, a trip which in his opinion was a waste of time. He was convinced that rampant population growth lay at the root of most environmental problems.
His specimens number some 5000, and were collected in South Africa, Namibia and Botswana.
He is commemorated in Acacia storyi Tindale and Paenula storyi Orchard. The standard author transcript Story is used to indicate this individual as the author when citing a botanical name.
He, Nancy Burbidge, Alec Baillie Costin and a few other botanists were instrumental in the 1960 founding of the National Parks Association of the Australian Capital Territory, and was one of the first Presidents of the Non Performing Asset in the 1960s, as well as being a founding member of the Kosciuszko Huts Association and its President during the years 1973-1976.