Frank Bechhofer

Bechhofer was born in Nuremberg on 10 October 1935. He left Germany at the age of three, coming to the United Kingdom in 1939, and his parents settled in Nottingham. He attended Nottingham Grammar School. According to interview notes from 2001, he spent time in the Royal Artillery in the BAOR, from 1954 to 1956. He went to Queens' College, Cambridge in 1956, having been admitted to read mathematics. Doubting his own ability, he chose engineering instead. He spent time as a student on drama, in the long vacation running a theatre company, which became an abiding interest. As a graduate student in the Department of Engineering, he had a scholarship from Queens' in 1960, and then a further grant from the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. Under the influence of Stuart Chase, he took an innovative business management course set up by Frederick John Willett (1922–1993). It included a history course by Geoffrey Best and a law course by Bill Wedderburn. He was awarded a master's degree in 1962. At this point Bechhofer made the decision to leave engineering. ==Academic==

At Willett's suggestion, Bechhofer began a doctorate at Cambridge, making a false start on the steel industry, and constructing a survey of engineering graduates. He took early retirement in 1997 and became professor emeritus, to write. In 2008 he was elected to the Royal Society of Edinburgh. ==Works==

• (as editor) Population Growth and the Brain Drain, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 1969, ISBN 978-0-85224-066-3 • (with Lindsay Paterson) Principles of Research Design in the Social Sciences, 2000 • (with Lindsay Paterson and David McCrone) Living in Scotland: Social and Economic Change since 1980, 2004 • (with David McCrone) National Identity, Nationalism and Constitutional Change, 2009 • (with David McCrone) Understanding National Identity, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2015, ISBN 978-1-107-10038-1 ==Family==

Bechhofer married in 1960 the child psychologist Jean Conochie, daughter of W. K. Conochie of Lerwick. She became Head of Child Clinical Psychology Services at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children, Edinburgh. They were both involved in running Edinburgh Folk Club, to 1994. ==Further reading==