Sir Edward Walter Parkes DL FREng (19 May 1926 – 25 September 2019) was Vice-Chancellor of City University London from 1974 to 1978 and of the University of Leeds from 1983 to 1991.
Life
Parkes was born in 1926.
Parkes attended King Edward's School, Birmingham, and St John's College, Cambridge, where he obtained a first class degree in mechanical engineering.
Other posts included Head of the Department of Engineering at Leicester University in the 1960s and Chairman of the UK University Grants Committee in the early 1980s. From 1989 to 1991 he was Chairman of the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals. He was also appointed a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering in 1982.
Edward and Margaret Parkes commissioned Leicester based architect James Gowan to design them a holiday home on land they had bought above St David's Cathedral in Wales. The resulting Round House was listed after it was completed in 1967.
Parkes was knighted in 1983. There is a portrait in oils by Michael Noakes at City University. Parkes died in September 2019 at the age of 93.
Private life
He married the educationalist Margaret Parr (1925-2007) and they had two children. Lady Parkes CBE died in 2007 having changed the UK's educational system to include Design and Technology.
References
- ^ "List of Fellows". Archived from the original on 8 June 2016. Retrieved 23 October 2014.
- ^ Matthew, H. C. G.; Harrison, B.; Goldman, L., eds. (23 September 2004). "The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. ref:odnb/99042. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/99042. Retrieved 21 February 2023. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- Burke's Peerage, accessed 24 July 2009
- ^ The Times 30 August 2007 Margaret Parkes.
- The London Gazette 22 April 1983 page 5510
- BBC Your Paintings Sir Edward Parkes (image and details)
- "Who's Who: Parkes, Sir Edward (Walter)". Archived from the original on 30 June 2020. Retrieved 29 June 2020.
| Academic offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded bySir James Sharp Tait | Vice-Chancellor, City University, London 1974–1978 |
Succeeded byProfessor Raoul N. Franklin |
| Preceded byWilliam Walsh (acting) | Vice-Chancellor, University of Leeds 1983–1991 |
Succeeded byAlan Wilson |
 | This biography article of a United Kingdom academic is a stub. You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it. |
- 1926 births
- 2019 deaths
- Academics of the University of Leicester
- Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge
- Deputy lieutenants of West Yorkshire
- English mechanical engineers
- Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering
- Knights Bachelor
- People educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham
- Presidents of City, University of London
- Vice-chancellors of the University of Leeds
- British academic biography stubs