Asa Briggs - Wikipedia Asa Briggs From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to navigation Jump to search The Right Honourable The Lord Briggs Asa Briggs Born (1921-05-07)7 May 1921[1] Keighley, West Riding of Yorkshire, England Died 15 March 2016(2016-03-15) (aged 94) Lewes, East Sussex, England Nationality British Occupation Historian Spouse(s) Susan Anne Banwell (1955–2016, his death) Military career Allegiance  United Kingdom Service/branch Royal Corps of Signals Intelligence Corps Years of service 1942–1945 Rank Warrant Officer Battles/wars Second World War Asa Briggs, Baron Briggs (7 May 1921 – 15 March 2016) was an English historian. He was a leading specialist on the Victorian era, and the foremost historian of broadcasting in Britain. Briggs achieved international recognition during his long and prolific career for examining various aspects of modern British history.[2] He was made a life peer in 1976. Contents 1 Early life 2 Military service 3 Academic career 4 Personal life 5 Select bibliography 6 References 7 Further reading Early life[edit] Asa Briggs was born in Keighley, West Riding of Yorkshire in 1921 to William Briggs, an engineer, and his wife Jane.[3] He was educated at Keighley Boys' Grammar School and Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, graduating with a BA (first class) in 1941, and a BSc in Economics (first class) from the University of London External Programme, also in 1941.[4] Military service[edit] From 1942 to 1945 during the Second World War, Briggs served in the Intelligence Corps and worked at the British wartime codebreaking station, Bletchley Park. He was a member of "the Watch" in Hut 6, the section deciphering Enigma machine messages from the German Army and Luftwaffe.[5] This posting had arisen because at college Briggs had played chess with Cambridge mathematician Howard Smith (who was to become the Director General of MI5 in 1979) and Smith had written to the head of Hut 6, Gordon Welchman, who was also a Cambridge mathematician, recommending Briggs to him.[3] Academic career[edit] After the war, he was elected a Fellow of Worcester College, Oxford (1945–55), and was subsequently appointed University Reader in Recent Social and Economic History (1950–55). Whilst a young Fellow, Briggs proofread Winston Churchill's A History of the English-Speaking Peoples.[3] He was later Faculty Fellow of Nuffield College (1953–55) and a member of the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey, United States (1953–54). From 1955 until 1961 he was Professor of Modern History in Leeds University and between 1961 and 1976 he was Professor of History in Sussex University, whilst also serving as Dean of the School of Social Studies (1961–65), Pro Vice-Chancellor (1961–67) and Vice-Chancellor (1967–76). On 4 June 2008 the University of Sussex Arts A1 and A2 lecture theatres, designed by Basil Spence, were renamed in his honour. In 1976 he returned to Oxford to become Provost of Worcester College, retiring from the post in 1991. He was Chancellor of the Open University (1978–94) and in May 1979 was awarded an honorary degree as Doctor of the University. He was an Honorary Fellow of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge from 1968, Worcester College, Oxford from 1969 and St Catharine's College, Cambridge, from 1977. He held a visiting appointment at the Gannett Center for Media Studies at Columbia University in the late 1980s and again at the renamed Freedom Forum Media Studies Center at Columbia in 1995–96. Announced in the 1976 Birthday Honours,[6] he was created a life peer as Baron Briggs, of Lewes in the County of East Sussex on 19 July 1976.[7] Between 1961 and 1995, Briggs wrote a five-volume text on the history of broadcasting in the UK from 1922 to 1974 – essentially the history of the BBC, who commissioned the work.[3] Briggs' other works ranged from an account of the period that Karl Marx spent in London to the corporate history of British retailer Marks and Spencer.[3] In 1987, Lord Briggs was invited to be President of the Brontë Society, a literary society established in 1893 in Haworth, near Keighley, Yorkshire. He presided over the Society's centenary celebrations in 1993 and continued as President until he retired from the position in 1996.[8] He was also President of the William Morris Society from 1978 to 1991 and President of the Victorian Society (UK) from 1986 until his death.[9] He died at home in Lewes at the age of 94 on 15 March 2016.[10] Personal life[edit] He married Susan Anne Banwell of Keevil, Wiltshire in 1955[11] and they had two sons and two daughters. Select bibliography[edit] The History of Broadcasting in the United Kingdom, 5 volumes (Oxford University Press) The Birth of Broadcasting – 1961 The Golden Age of Wireless (1927–1939) – 1965 The War of Words (1939–1945) – 1970 Sound and Vision (1945–1955) – 1979 Competition (1955–1974) – 1995 The Age of Improvement, 1783–1867 (Harlow: Pearson, 1959, 2nd edn 2000) The Channel Islands, Occupation and Liberation 1940–1945, Batsford Books, London, ISBN 0-7134-7822-5 A Social History of England Victorian People Victorian Cities Toynbee Hall: The First Hundred Years (London: Routledge, 1984, ISBN 0-7102-0283-0) Victorian Things Marks & Spencer Ltd: A Centenary History, Marks & Spencer 1884–1984 The Franchise Affair, 1986 (with Joanna Spicer)[12] Marx in London: An Illustrated Guide A Social History of the Media, 2002 (together with Peter Burke) Secret Days: Codebreaking in Bletchley Park: A Memoir of Hut Six and the Enigma Machine (Frontline Books, ISBN 978-1-84832-615-6, May 2011) Special Relationships: People and Places, 2012 References[edit] ^ "The Rt Hon the Lord Briggs, FBA". Debretts. Archived from the original on 24 December 2013. ^ Caves, R. W. (2004). Encyclopedia of the City. Routledge. p. 55. ^ a b c d e Jones, Nigel (15 March 2016). "Asa Briggs obituary". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 15 March 2016. ^ Bridges, Sophie. "The Papers of Asa Briggs". Janus. Retrieved 11 September 2011. ^ Asa Briggs, foreword to Gwen Watkins, Cracking the Luftwaffe Codes, 2006, Greenhill Books, p. 12, ISBN 978-1-85367-687-1 ^ "No. 46919". The London Gazette (Supplement). 4 June 1976. p. 8015. ^ "No. 46970". The London Gazette. 23 July 1976. p. 10135. ^ Lemon, Charles (1993). "A Centenary History of The Brontë Society, 1893–1993". Brontë Society Transactions. Supplement to Volume 20: 105. ^ Martin Crick, The History of the William Morris Society 1955–2005 (London, 2011); Paul Thompson, 'Asa Briggs 1921–2016', The Victorian: The Magazine of the Victorian Society, 52 (July 2016), p. 5. ^ "Asa Briggs, Lord Briggs of Lewes, passes: 07 May 1921 – 15 March 2016". University of Sussex. Retrieved 7 January 2017. ^ "Wedding photograph". Wiltshire Times. 10 September 1955. ^ Briggs, Asa; Spicer, Joanna (1986). The Franchise Affair: Creating Fortunes and Failures in Independent Television. Century. ISBN 978-0-7126-1201-2. Further reading[edit] Taylor, Miles, ed. (2014). The Age of Asa: Lord Briggs, Public Life and History in Britain since 1945. Springer. ISBN 9781137392596.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link), 12 scholarly essays about Briggs. Academic offices Preceded by Harold Clay President of the Workers' Educational Association 1958 – 1967 Succeeded by Ellen McCullough Preceded by The Lord Gardiner Chancellor of the Open University 1978–1994 Succeeded by The Baroness Boothroyd Preceded by Oliver Franks, Baron Franks Provost of Worcester College, Oxford 1976–1991 Succeeded by Richard Smethurst Authority control BIBSYS: 90112922 BNE: XX1139315 BNF: cb12020835q (data) GND: 118995766 ISNI: 0000 0001 0931 6982 LCCN: n50040878 LNB: 000088800 NDL: 00434356 NKC: jn19990001095 NLI: 000024772 NLK: KAC201770438 NLP: A3000973X NTA: 069282110 PLWABN: 9810687228205606 SELIBR: 179162 SNAC: w6z03bb8 SUDOC: 031740057 UKPARL: fEcdO33O VcBA: 495/333058 VIAF: 108638711 WorldCat Identities: lccn-n50040878 Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Asa_Briggs&oldid=996477436" Categories: 1921 births 2016 deaths Academics of the University of Leeds Alumni of University of London Worldwide Alumni of the University of London Alumni of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge British historians Chancellors of the Open University Crossbench life peers English academics Fellows of Nuffield College, Oxford Fellows of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge Fellows of St Catharine's College, Cambridge Fellows of Worcester College, Oxford Media historians Bletchley Park people People from Keighley Provosts of Worcester College, Oxford Fellows of the British Academy Hidden categories: Pages containing London Gazette template with parameter supp set to y CS1: long volume value EngvarB from August 2014 Use dmy dates from August 2014 Pages using infobox military person with embed Articles with hCards CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list CS1 maint: extra text: authors list Wikipedia articles with BIBSYS identifiers Wikipedia articles with BNE identifiers Wikipedia articles with BNF identifiers Wikipedia articles with GND identifiers Wikipedia articles with ISNI identifiers Wikipedia articles with LCCN identifiers Wikipedia articles with LNB identifiers Wikipedia articles with NDL identifiers Wikipedia articles with NKC identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLI identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLK identifiers Wikipedia articles with NLP identifiers Wikipedia articles with NTA identifiers Wikipedia articles with PLWABN identifiers Wikipedia articles with SELIBR identifiers Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers Wikipedia articles with UKPARL identifiers Wikipedia articles with VcBA identifiers Wikipedia articles with VIAF identifiers Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers Navigation menu Personal tools Not logged in Talk Contributions Create account Log in Namespaces Article Talk Variants Views Read Edit View history More Search Navigation Main page Contents Current events Random article About Wikipedia Contact us Donate Contribute Help Learn to edit Community portal Recent changes Upload file Tools What links here Related changes Upload file Special pages Permanent link Page information Cite this page Wikidata item Print/export Download as PDF Printable version Languages Afrikaans Deutsch Español Français Simple English Suomi Svenska Edit links This page was last edited on 26 December 2020, at 21:06 (UTC). 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