C. Northcote Parkinson - Early Life and Education

Early Life and Education

The youngest son of William Edward Parkinson (1871–1927), an art master at North East County School and from 1913 principal of York School of Arts and Crafts, and his wife, Rose Emily Mary Curnow (born 1877), the young Parkinson attended St. Peter's School, York, where in 1929 he won an Exhibition to study history at Emmanuel College at the University of Cambridge. He received a BA degree in 1932. As an undergraduate, Parkinson developed an interest in naval history, which he pursued when the Pellew family gave him access to family papers at the recently established National Maritime Museum. The papers formed the basis of his first book, Edward Pellew, Viscount Exmouth, Admiral of the Red. In 1934, then enrolled as a graduate student at King's College London, he wrote his Ph.D. thesis on Trade and War in the Eastern Seas, 1803-1810, which was awarded the Julian Corbett Prize in Naval History for 1935.

Read more about this topic:  C. Northcote Parkinson

Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or education:

    Probably more than youngsters at any age, early adolescents expect the adults they care about to demonstrate the virtues they want demonstrated. They also tend to expect adults they admire to be absolutely perfect. When adults disappoint them, they can be critical and intolerant.
    —The Lions Clubs International and the Quest Nation. The Surprising Years, I, ch.4 (1985)

    All my life I believed I knew something. But then one strange day came when I realized that I knew nothing, yes, I knew nothing. And so words became void of meaning ... I have arrived too late at ultimate uncertainty.
    Ezra Pound (1885–1972)

    As long as learning is connected with earning, as long as certain jobs can only be reached through exams, so long must we take this examination system seriously. If another ladder to employment was contrived, much so-called education would disappear, and no one would be a penny the stupider.
    —E.M. (Edward Morgan)