Harry Dickinson came to Edinburgh in 1966 and has made it his home ever since. Appointed initially as an Assistant Lecturer in the Department of History at the University of Edinburgh, he became Lecturer in 1968 and Reader in 1973. In 1980 he took up the Richard Lodge Chair of British History and held it until his retirement in 2006, whereupon he became Emeritus Professor and Honorary Professorial Fellow. During his long and productive career he has published with enormous regularity: his c.v. lists items for every year since 1964 and includes six singleauthored and over twenty edited volumes. He has been an effective and popular teacher at undergraduate and postgraduate levels; and he has made important contributions to the development of history in schools and universities in the UK and across the globe.

Harry's academic success is testimony, first and foremost, to his intellectual abilities and his dedicated professionalism; but it owes something, too, to the encouragement he received from key figures during his school and university years. Born in Gateshead on 9 March 1939, Harry was the only one of five surviving sisters and brothers to continue his education beyond the age of sixteen: no mean achievement for a son whose parents had both left school at twelve. Happily, a teacher at Gateshead Grammar School recognised his potential and encouraged him to apply to King's College University of Durham, where he studied history from 1957 until 1960. He recalls being greatly impressed and influenced during his undergraduate years by the scholarly qualities he saw in J. R. Jones and Professor W. L. Burn. From Jones he learned sheer efficiency in organisation and presentation, qualities which have stayed with him throughout his career. From Burn he absorbed the importance of developing a deep appreciation of a period or topic, and his interest in the early eighteenth century was fired as a result of choosing a final year Special Subject on the reigns of William III and Anne, taught by Jones.

Jones's influence did not end there. After graduation, financial constraints led Harry to take a Diploma in Education at King's College and to become a schoolteacher.