A tribute to Prof. Keith Smith

Abstract

A male child born in Walsall, England, on January 15 1947 to a family in difficult circumstances was adopted by a miner and his wife from North Staffordshire and his name became Keith Smith. As a result, Keith grew up in the rural village of Brown Edge, close to the pottery city of Stoke-on-Trent. Following the death of his mother when he was five years old, his father re-married and Keith acquired two older step-siblings. He attended the local primary school in Brown Edge, but as one of the fortunate few from the village to pass the "eleven-plus" examination his secondary education was at Leek High School, necessitating a 7 mile each way daily bus trip to Leek. It was during his time at Leek High School that he met his future wife, Lynn, who attended the neighboring high school for girls. It was also there that his interest in science, and in chemistry in particular, was stimulated. When he left Leek High in 1965 he was awarded the Mathematics, Chemistry and University Entrance Prizes.He then attended Manchester University, where he studied Chemistry. He was awarded the A F Edwards Memorial Prize at the end of his first year and went on to achieve a BSc with First Class Honors in 1968. Following his graduation, two of the most significant events that would influence his future life occurred. In August he married Lynn and in October he began research studies under the supervision of Dr Andrew Pelter, then a young member of staff in the Chemistry Department at Manchester University.His initial research project involved continuation of recent work of the Pelter group, which depended upon reactions of acyloxyboron compounds. This was successful and his first paper, on synthesis of thioesters, was submitted just a few months after he started his studies. 1 However, around that time H C Brown's seminal work into the hydroboration reaction had demonstrated that many different organoboron compounds could be easily synthesised and the first useful synthetic reactions of such compounds were beginning to emerge. With