Sir John Fleetwood Baker

Sir John Fleetwood Baker (1901-1985), Baron Baker, structural engineer, was born at Liscard, Cheshire, on 19 March 1901, and educated at Rossall School, Lancashire, 1915-1920, and Clare College, Cambridge, 1920-1923. He became an assistant lecturer at University College, Cardiff, in 1926, and in 1930 was appointed technical officer to the Steel Structures Research Committee, set up by the steel industry. Baker became Professor of Civil Engineering at Bristol in 1933, and Professor of Mechanical Sciences and head of the Engineering Department at Cambridge in 1943, retiring in 1968. He was knighted in 1961, and made a life peer in 1977. He died in Cambridge on 9 September 1985.