Life Stories
Judith (Judy) Palmer
Judith (Judy) Palmer (Emeritus Fellow) died on 15 April 2025 aged 84.
Born in February 1941 to Frank and Nancy Jordan in Bulawayo, in what was then Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Judy spent her childhood and school years in Bulawayo before attending University College of Rhodesia and Nyasaland in Salisbury (now Harare, Zimbabwe) where she earned a BSc in Zoology and Chemistry in 1962. It was there that she met a fellow student and Englishman Robin Palmer. The couple married in January 1964 at the Cathedral of St Mary and All Saints in Salisbury.
Judy and Robin were expelled from Rhodesia in 1965—soon after the Unilateral Declaration of independence by Ian Smith and they moved to London. In London, Robin completed his PhD at the University of London, and Judy worked as an entomologist in Harpenden at the renowned Rothamsted Experimental Station.
Shortly after the birth of her first daughter Jocelyn in London in March 1969, the couple moved to Malawi—where Judy lectured in zoology and gave birth to her second daughter Joanna in 1971. In 1971, with two young daughters, Judy and Robin moved to Zambia. It was in Zambia that Judy trained as a librarian and information scientist, working in the University Library and then at the British Council.
Judy and family returned to the UK in 1977, where Judy first worked in the Cairns Library in Oxford, as an Assistant Librarian where she worked to catalogue into a newly automated system.
In 1982 she returned to Rothamsted—firstly as Head of Library and Information Services, and then Information Manager and Executive Assistant to the Director of Research. During this time, Judy travelled widely to other global libraries in agricultural research stations—reporting on Beijing, Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, and Alexandria, Egypt (1988–1991). Whilst working full-time at Rothamsted, Judy also completed her PhD from Sheffield University in Information Behaviour—a step which shaped her later career.
In 1993, Judy moved back to Oxford and became Director of Health Care Libraries in Oxford University, being jointly responsible for the University of Oxford and Anglia and Oxford region. In this role, she delivered library and information services to the Faculty of Clinical Medicine and libraries in the ‘Health Libraries and Information network’ of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Northampton and Oxfordshire.
This period was also an important time for the newly emerging evidence-based medicine (EBM) movement. At the time, Professor Muir Gray was the Regional Director of Public Health and a strong advocate of information and technologies for doctors—championing a new approach to library services. Working closely with Muir, Judy worked to translate these ideas into practice. This small beginning became part of a national NHS ‘knowledge management’ movement in which Judy played a key role. She brought together partnerships with a range of bodies, including the Centre of Evidence Based Medicine, McMaster University, the Cochrane Collaboration and Critical Appraisal Skills Programme. Judy’s impact on this movement and the overall profession of librarianship cannot be underestimated.
Judy’s family life changed when she and Robin Palmer divorced in 1994. The two maintained a friendship over the years. Judy later met Robin Brown, a psychoanalytic counsellor, with whom she had a long relationship until her death.
In 2000 Judy was appointed as Professorial Fellow of Keble College, the University of Oxford and had the rather wonderful title of Keeper of Scientific Books at the Radcliffe Science Library from 2000 to 2008. She also served as College Fellow Librarian between 2006 and 2007 when she retired. Judy made a major contribution to the work of the Library and the University more broadly in her time as responsible for science libraries. The first major renovation of the library was towards the end of her time in the Bodleian, and it has been incorporated within the latest renovation.
Judy’s colleagues spoke about her as a consummate professional—showing dedication alongside warmth, intelligence, kindness and insight. But she could be straightforward and blunt too!
Having retired in 2008, Judy became an Emeritus Fellow of Keble College.
In later life Judy had studied for another undergraduate degree—this time in psychology from the Open University. This was a something she had wanted to do—but had not been available as a subject to study as a young student.
As she came towards the later years in her career, Judy had decided to follow her interests in counselling and psychotherapy. She trained as a counsellor at Wantage and became a UKRC Registered Independent counsellor and a member of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. After her retirement from Keble, she worked as a counsellor in private practice and with GPs, as well as working at Grendon Prison as a counsellor to staff for many years, and then for some time at the charity Refugee Resource.
In her 70s Judy decided to stop working but continued to work as a volunteer for Refugee Resource in Oxford and then at the Phoenix Prison Trust—both charities that meant a great deal to her.
Outside of work, Judy was a keen walker, a member of the Ramblers and Oxford Fieldpaths Society and she walked regularly with her friends and family—up to the time of her death. Meditation, Pilates and yoga were important parts of Judy’s life too.
Judy lived her life with care, compassion, humour, energy, intellect and a great deal of style. She was living her life fully right up to her sudden and unexpected death. She was a strong, loving foundation to her daughters, and is much missed by them, their families and her grandchildren.
The world has lost an intelligent, forward thinking, multi-talented, compassionate woman who loved and was loved in return by her family, her friends, and all the communities lucky enough to include her.
Kindly provided by her daughter, Jocelyn Palmer