ABSTRACT
William Alan (Max) Cole retired as Professor and Head of the Department of Economic History at University College Swansea in 1986, and now lives in Somerset. He was born in Buckinghamshire in 1926 to parents who were both Quakers “by convincement;” his father was proprietor of a small family grocery, and his mother was daughter of a south London baker and confectioner. After schooling at The Friends School, Sibford and Leighton Park, Reading, he arrived at Peterhouse, Cambridge, in 1943. Owing to wartime and post-war National Service, he did not complete his undergraduate work until 1950, and then remained at Cambridge for a Ph.D. in History (1955). He was Research Officer in the Department of Applied Economics, Cambridge, 1955-9, taught at Bristol, 1959-66, and became Professor of Economic History at Swansea in 1966. The interview took place on 17th April, 1998, at what is now (since 1995) The University of Wales Swansea. The interviewer was A. J. H. ( J) L, who writes:
After Max had been appointed Professor, I was his first appointment, taking up my job in Autumn 1967. I remained at Swansea until my own retirement in 2003, apart from two semesters with Larry Neal at Champaign-Urbana (1979 and 1988). I look on the years when Max was my “boss” as happy and productive, and we turned out some good students, including Professor Richard Griffiths (Rijksuniversiteit Leiden), Dr Peter Wardley (University of the West of England, Bristol), and Dr Katherine Watson (University of Birmingham). The Department was particularly interested in the history and process of economic development. Max’s political philosophy was very different to my own – by ethos and ethnicity I’m basically a Manchester School Free Trader – but these political differences were mutually acknowledged and tolerated. We were always on friendly terms.
