Our history

The formation of the Society

The British Pharmacological Society was founded in Oxford in 1931.

Sir Henry Hallett Dale, Walter Ernest Dixon and James Andrew Gunn agreed that there should be “some kind of annual meeting of British pharmacologists" where attendees could share and discuss research, as well as matters related to teaching and publication. They wrote a letter to around 30 people who were in charge of departments for pharmacology teaching or of institutions for pharmacological research in the UK, inviting them to a dinner to discuss the proposal as well as the formation of a “Pharmacological Club”.

The dinner took place at Wadham College, Oxford on Friday 3 July 1931 (the day before of a meeting of The Physiological Society). 19 people attended and decided they would form a Society (rather than a club) and would hold one meeting a year. Dale, Dixon and Gunn were appointed as the first Committee and were asked to draft a constitution. All those who attended the dinner, as well as the seven people who had sent apologies were considered to be the Original Members of the Society. It was decided (at least initially) that women would be excluded, as would clinical pharmacologists.

The first formal meeting

The following morning on 4 July 1931, the first formal meeting of the Society was held in the University of Oxford's Department of Pharmacology. Five papers and one demonstration were presented:

1. Joshua Harold Burn: ‘Is cocaine a sympathetic stimulant?’
2. James Andrew Gunn: ‘The pharmacological action of harmine and some of its derivatives’
3. Adam Davidson Macdonald: ‘The estimation of the toxicity of local anaesthetics’
4. Edward Mellanby: 'Convulsive ergotism'
5. AC White: 'The fatty infiltration of the liver in rabbits produced by injection of large doses of pituitary extract'
6. John William Trevan: ‘Demonstration of a light frog lever suitable for class and research work’

The Original Members

It was decided that the 19 people who attended the dinner, the two additions who joined the formal meeting the following day, as well as the 17 who sent their apologies would be considered the Original Members. They were:

• Sir Henry Hallet Dale
• Walter Ernest Dixon
• James Andrew Gunn
• WA Broom
• Joshua Harold Burn
• David Campbell
• Alfred Joseph Clarke
• Walter James Dilling
• Kenneth James Franklin
• Sir John Henry Gaddum
• Philip Hamill
• Reginald St Alban Heathcote
• Trevor Braby Heaton
• Arthur St George (Hugo) Huggett
• O Inchley
• AD Macdonald
• MH Mackeith
• EBC Mayrs
• Edward Mellanby
• Nathan Mutch
• GN Myers
• Newman Neild
• WAM Smart
• Ralph Stockman
• JW Trevan
• SWF Underhill
• EB Verney
• AC White
• FR Winton

The first annual meeting in 1932 was held at University College London, where rules were approved which remained largely unchanged until 1958. Some new members, and the first two honorary members, JJ Abel and HH Meyer, were elected. Among the guests at this meeting were VE Henderson (Toronto) and LW Gunn (Cape Town). The scientific business consisted of three demonstrations and five papers.

M Tiffeneau, W Straub and W Heubner were elected to honorary membership in 1934. In 1933 and 1934 the Society was increased by several pharmacologists who left Germany to work and live in the UK. Among them were O Krayer, WS Feldberg, E Bulbring, M Vogt and P Ellinger. The Society then began to invite guests to its summer meetings, and in the years from 1935 to 1939 there were repeated visits by pharmacologists from other countries, beginning our story as a global organisation.

The Society met annually until 1939. The Society continues to host its annual meeting every December, with a growing membership which continues to build upon the work started by a small group of pharmacologists in the 1930s.

Building our membership

The BPS celebrated its 25th anniversary at the 1956 annual meeting, held in Edinburgh. By then, the membership had risen to 207, including nine honorary members. By 1966, it had more than doubled to 438 members. 

In 1967, a more liberal membership policy was introduced and as a result, the rate of growth more than doubled once again; in January, 1973, membership was over 900. To cope with the extra numbers, the Rules were changed in 1968 to add a Meetings Secretary; non-official Committee Members were also increased from a total of six to eight. 

In September 1970, a Clinical Pharmacology Section of the Society was formed, which further expanded our community and supported the holistic view of the discipline we still have today. 

In July 1974 the total membership of the Society reached 1,000. By December 1986 this number had risen to more than 2,000. In 1996 the category of Student Member was introduced, this category was subsequently split into Undergraduate and Postgraduate membership. In 2011 Undergraduate membership became free and in 2015 Associate Membership was renamed Early Career Membership.

Journals

The Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics had been founded by J.J. Abel (Baltimore) in 1909. In 1933, it was agreed that this journal should be a joint publication of the American and British Pharmacological Societies and the latter Society nominated three of the Editors from that date until 1946, when its own Journal, the British Journal of Pharmacology and Chemotherapy began, edited by H.R. Ing and published by the British Medical Association. The link with the American Pharmacological Society was renewed in 1949 when British (and Scandinavian) representatives joined the editorial board of Pharmacological Reviews which had been founded in the previous year: this arrangement remains unchanged.

In 1968 Macmillan Journals Limited undertook publication of the British Journal of Pharmacology and Chemotherapy on behalf of the Society. The Journal then changed to a new format and the abbreviated name of the British Journal of Pharmacology (BJP). From 1968 abstracts of communications and demonstrations have been pre-circulated to members and, after approval by the Society, were published in the British Journal of Pharmacology. Since 2003 basic pharmacology abstracts have been published in pA2online.

In 1974, the Society launched its second Journal, the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology (BJCP). To mark the occasion, the format and cover of the established journal was changed so that both publications could have a similar appearance. In 2013, the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET), British Pharmacological Society and John Wiley & Sons launched a new open access, peer-reviewed journal, Pharmacology Research & Perspectives (PR&P). PR&P publishes original research, reviews and perspectives in all areas of preclinical and clinical pharmacology, therapeutics, education and related research areas.

Entering the millennium

In 1994 the Society purchased a long lease on a building in Islington, London as offices and meeting rooms for the Society. In 2012, the membership voted to name the building ‘the Schild Plot’ in celebration of the achievements of HO Schild.

In 2006 the Society celebrated its 75th anniversary by holding a number of special events held throughout the UK and at the IUPHAR meeting in Beijing. There was a series of 75th Roadshows in Edinburgh, Bristol and Manchester, which brought together members and promoted our activities to the next generation of pharmacologists. In addition the British Journal of Pharmacology published a 75th anniversary special issue, edited by Editor-in-Chief Alan North and Senior Editors. We ended the 75th anniversary year by returning the Annual Meeting to Oxford, where the very first meeting of the Society was held.

In more recent years, the BPS has continued to be at the forefront of cutting-edge science, and has prioritised working closely with our fellow societies, as well as other scientific and health organisations, to advance policy and advocate for research integrity.

Archive

A grant from the W. D. M. Paton Historical Research Fund (1992) allowed the archives of the Society to be collated and bound. These records contain full documentation of every scientific and business meeting of the Society, its Clinical Section and its committee from 1931 to recent years. Associated correspondence, photographs and other memorabilia are included. The archive of the Society is on permanent loan with the Wellcome Trust and held by the Wellcome Library. Members are welcome to visit the library and view the collection.

Further reading:

• A brief history of the British Pharmacological Society by A Cuthbert
• An Early History of the British Pharmacological Society by WF Bynum