John Arnfield Heap was born in 1932 in Manchester. He was educated at Leighton Park School in Reading and the University of Edinburgh, graduating with an MA in geography. While an undergraduate, he gained his first polar experience when he led the Edinburgh University expedition to Arctic Norway in 1953.
Heap spent seven years conducting sea-ice research for the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey (later the British Antarctic Survey), and he was awarded his doctorate in 1962. After two years as a research associate at the University of Michigan, he was appointed deputy head and - in 1975 - head of the Polar Regions Section of the Foreign Office (later renamed the Foreign and Commonwealth Office), where he remained until his retirement in 1992. In 1991 he was awarded a CMG for his services in the FCO. Between 1992 and 1997, Heap served as director of the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge, and from 1997 to 1998, acted as executive director.
Published work Handbook of the Antarctic Treaty System edited by John A. Heap, Polar Publications Cambridge (1990) SPRI Library Shelf (7)341.24[1959 Antarctic Treaty][pub.1990]
From the guide to the John Heap collection, 1900-1962, (Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge)
