The collection is small but includes significant records of Bates's scientific research, and of the Ratio Club. Section A, Research, comprises notebooks, and research notes and correspondence. The notebooks cover the period 1943-1971. There are four series, identified by the letters 'L', 'M', 'F' and 'B'. The 'L' series of notebooks dates from 1943 to 1949, 'F' 1944-1945 and 'M' c.1947. The series 'B' is the largest, running from 1950 to 1971. The notebooks include documentation of wartime research, and later research topics including work on EEG, hemispherectomy and Parkinson's Disease, and may also have notes and drafts for lectures, notes on patients, and personal and domestic information. The research notes and correspondence include material relating to Bates's work during the Second World War on gunnery, and post-war correspondence, most notably for the period 1945-1952.
Section B, Ratio Club, is principally the contents of Bates's box-file of Ratio Club material assembled for a possible history of the Club. It includes a chronological sequence of material relating to meetings of the Club (dates, topics, possible speakers), membership and the future direction of the Club. There is also a photograph of members of the Club and correspondence 1978 and 1984-1985 relating to its history and records. With this material is other correspondence with members of the Ratio Club - mostly dating from before its establishment or after it was discontinued. Very little of the correspondence directly concerns meetings of the Ratio Club but it does indicate the professional and personal relationships amongst members of the Club and many letters touch on areas of common scientific interest that may have been discussed at meetings of the Club.
Bates , John A V , 1918-1993 , neurophysiologist