Kilmarnock Academy - Notable Former Pupils

Notable Former Pupils

See also: Category:People educated at Kilmarnock Academy

Kilmarnock Academy is one of the few schools in the world to have educated two Nobel laureates: Alexander Fleming and John Boyd Orr.

  • Air Vice-Marshal Stuart Atha, AOC since 2011 of No. 1 Group RAF, and Station Commander from 2006-08 of RAF Coningsby
  • Craig Conway, Scotland international footballer
  • Lindsay McKenzie, actress
  • Robert Colquhoun; Scottish painter, printmaker and theatre set designer Born Kilmarnock
  • Rev James Barr, Labour MP from 1935-45 for Coatbridge, and from 1924-31 for Motherwell
  • Rev Prof Matthew Black, Professor of Divinity and Biblical Criticism from 1954-78 at the University of St Andrews
  • Robert Colquhoun, artist
  • Stewart Conn, poet and playwright
  • Robert Dunsmuir
  • George Forrest, botanist and explorer
  • Adam Ingram, SNP MSP since 2011 for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley
  • Jimmy Knapp, General Secretary from 1990-2001 of the RMT, and from 1983-90 of the National Union of Railwaymen
  • Sir James Learmonth CBE, pioneer in nerve surgery
  • Margaret McDowall, swimmer
  • William McIlvanney, author
  • Charles McLelland, Director General from 1987-2004 of the Association of British Travel Agents, Controller of BBC Radio 2 from 1976-80 (and of Radio 1 from 1976-78), and Director of Programmes from 1980-86 of BBC Radio
  • Lt-Gen Robert Menzies CB OBE, Surgeon General to the Armed Forces from 2000-02
  • William Muir, orientalist
  • Colin Rankin
  • James Stevenson, 1st Baron Stevenson, businessman and politician
  • Peter Sturrock, Conservative MP from 1885-86 for Kilmarnock Burghs
  • Murray Tosh MBE, Conservative MSP from 2003-07 for the West of Scotland
  • Hugh Watt (1848 - 1921) MP

A number of alumni are Church of Scotland ministers who have held high office or are otherwise well-known church figures:

  • Andrew McLellan CBE, Moderator of the General Assembly, 2000; (also HM Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland, 2002-09)
  • John D. Miller, Moderator of the General Assembly, 2001
  • Bill Hewitt, Moderator of the General Assembly, 2009
  • John L. Bell, contemporary hymnwriter and speaker
  • Lorna Hood (nee Mitchell), Moderator of the General Assembly, 2013

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Famous quotes containing the words notable and/or pupils:

    “Every notable advance in technique or organization has to be paid for, and in most cases the debit is more or less equivalent to the credit. Except of course when it’s more than equivalent, as it has been with universal education, for example, or wireless, or these damned aeroplanes. In which case, of course, your progress is a step backwards and downwards.”
    —Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)

    “We saw one schoolhouse in our walk, and listened to the sounds which issued from it; but it appeared like a place where the process, not of enlightening, but of obfuscating the mind was going on, and the pupils received only so much light as could penetrate the shadow of the Catholic Church.”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)