D. N. Dunlop

Daniel N. Dunlop

Daniel Nicol Dunlop was a Scottish entrepreneur and Theosophist who later joined Rudolf Steiner's Anthroposophical Society.

Early life and education

Daniel Nicol Dunlop was born December 28, 1868, at Kilmarnock, in the southwestern region of Scotland, in a Quaker family. He married Eleanor Fitzpatrick, and they had a son and two daughters.

Professional career

Mr. Dunlop held important posts in the British Electrical and Allied manufacturers' Association (B.E.A.M.A.). He was organizer and first chairman of the World Energy Conferences, which started in Wembley, London in 1924. The idea was to bring together scientists, engineers, politicians, and others to consider how energy could be best used within the context of the new internationalism following World War I. An executive committee had 23 members, each representing the electrical industry of a country. Germany was included. They considered such issues as interconnectivity, pricing, duties, regulations, and technical issues. The conferences have continued for over 90 years, now under the name of World Energy Council.

Theosophical Society involvement

Dunlop joined the Theosophical Society in Dublin and pioneered Summer Schools. In 1918 he proposed the idea of an annual Blavatsky Lecture series, and the Executive Committee of the Theosophical Society in England enthusiastically agreed. The first lecture was by Edward L. Gardner, and in 1920 Dunlop himself gave the third lecture on the topic "Nature Spirits and the Spirits of the Elements".

Clara Codd wrote of her experience meeting him in the library of the Theosophical Society in England:

Another famous person who often came in was Mr. Daniel Dunlop, the organizer of a world-wide Federation of Electrical Engineers. He was Irish to the core, and had once been part of the famous Theosophical Group in Dublin which had numbered among its adherents W. B. Yeats and George Russell (AE). An ardent devotee of William Q. Judge and the youngest of his forty-seven disciples, Mr. Dunlop had followed Judge when the latter broke away from the main Society and founded in America what was known as the Point Loma Theosophical Society now resident at Covina, California. He could not get along with Judge's successor, Mrs. Katherine Tingley, so he returned to our Society, though later he left us again to join the Anthroposophical Society under the leadership of Rudolf Steiner. That is quite a common practice in the Theosophical Society; so any attracted by the thought, drift in and out. A small proportion can never leave it again; for them it is life and eternity."

Rudolf Steiner and Anthroposophy

Daniel Nicol Dunlop met Rudolf Steiner in person in 1922. It was the Dutch manager Joseph van Leer who brought them together. They sat at the table together - Rudolf Steiner who spoke no English and Daniel N. Dunlop who spoke no German. Joseph van Leer stepped in as translator but what he didn't see was that Rudolf Steiner took the hand of Daniel Dunlop and held it, under the table, during the whole of the conversation. In 1934, during one of his famous summer schools, Dunlop shared the memory of this with his friend Walter Johannes Stein. He made an even more interesting statement, that Rudolf Steiner on this occasion said to him, 'We are brothers.' Eleanor Merry, also an active member of the early British Anthroposophical Society, worked intensively with Dunlop for the last 14 years of his life during which time he told her that Rudolf Steiner gave him an insight into a former life of his where he, Dunlop, had been a member of the innermost circle of the Order of the Knights Templar.

Later years

Dunlop died on May 30, 1935, in London.

Writings

Professional work

• Power resources of the world available and utilised. London : Percy Lund Humphries, 1925. The transactions of the First World Power Conference, London June 30th to July 12th 1924 - Volume I.
• Water power production, preparation of fuels, steam power production. London : Percy Lund Humphries, 1925. The transactions of the First World Power Conference, London June 30th to July 12th 1924 - Volume II.
• Internal combustion engines, gas and fuel section, power from other sources, power transmission and distribution, standardisation and research, illumination. London : Percy Lund Humphries, 1925. The transactions of the First World Power Conference, London June 30th to July 12th 1924 - Volume III.
• Power in industry and domestic use, power in electro-chemistry and electro-metallurgy, power for transport, economic aspects of power resources, education, health, publicity. London: Percy Lund Humphries, 1925. The transactions of the First World Power Conference, London June 30th to July 12th 1924 - Volume IV.
• Power resources of the world (potential and developed). London: World Power Conference, 1929. Compiled with Hugh Quigley.

Theosophical work

Dunlop edited The Irish Theosophist in Dublin, Ireland from 1892 to 1897. He also edited a Theosophical periodical called The Path [different from the New York journal of the same name] from 1910-1914, in London. After leaving the Theosophical Society, he edited Anthroposophy, from 1926-1933, in London. He wrote articles printed in The Lamp, The Occult Review, and other periodicals. The Union Index of Theosophical Periodicals list 1457 articles written by, edited by, or about Dunlop.

• The Path of Attainment. London: The Path Publishing Co., 1916. 107 pages. Foreword by George S. Arundale. "This book contains three addresses, originally delivered extemporaneously before the H.P.B. Lodge of the Theosophical Society ... [in London] in October, November, and December 1915".
• The Science of Immortality. Translated in to French, 1919.
• Nature-Spirits and the Spirits of the Elements. London, Theosophical Publishing House, 1921. 35 pages.
• British Destiny: the Principles of Progress. London: The Path Publishing Co., 1916. 113 pages.

Additional resources

• Meyer, T. H. D. N. Dunlop: A Man of Our Time: A Biography. Temple Lodge Publishing, 2014. Translated from German by Ian Bass; Afterword by Owen Barfield.