Robert Pullar

Sir Robert Pullar FRSE (18 February 1828 – 9 September 1912) was a Scottish Liberal Party politician in the United Kingdom.

Pullar was born at Perth in February 1828, eldest of nine children of John Pullar (1803-1878), a dyer, and his wife Mary Walker.

He was educated in Perth at Stewart's Academy in Atholl Street, Greig's Academy in Stormont Street, and at Perth Academy, also doing continuation classes in French and German. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1880 and in 1905 he received an honorary D.C.L. from St Andrew's University.

He was apprenticed under his father in 1841, a junior partner in 1848 and ultimately senior partner in the local family firm of Pullars Dyeworks, a firm which also branched into dry cleaning, a technique he learned from Germany, establishing a plant in Tulloch in 1882. He was known as an extensive and generous donor to local charities and other local causes and a benevolent employer, although in the last year of his life there was a major strike in the firm when he refused to discuss wage rises. He was a J.P. for the County of Perth. He was knighted in the 1895 Birthday Honours. He travelled widely in Russia, Scandinavia, America and the Middle East.

He was elected unopposed at a by-election on 12 February 1907 as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Perth, but stood down in January 1910. At the time of his election, he was six days short of his 79th birthday, making his possibly the oldest parliamentary debut of an MP in the 20th century. He rarely spoke in debates and was criticized by local trade unions for failing to support measures to help the unemployed.

He married in 1859 Helen Mary, daughter of Charles Daniell of Wantage, Berkshire, England, by whom he had two sons. She died in 1904 and he, aged 84, in September 1912 after a seizure. He was buried at Wellshill Cemetery, Perth.