2006 is the 75^th Anniversary of the founding of the British Pharmacological Society, and the 60^th Anniversary of the first issue of its Journal, BJP, the British Journal of Pharmacology. To commemorate these important anniversaries, BJP is publishing a special supplement, comprising a series of articles by distinguished scientists who have been actively involved in areas of the subject in which British pharmacologists have made a major contribution.

Starting with 35 general topics which we felt fairly represented these areas, we approached authors with a request to write contributions, and were delighted when nearly all of them accepted the task with enthusiasm. Authors were asked to adopt a readable and narrative style to show how ideas arose and evolved, without constraints – apart from length – on how they approached the task. The result is a unique and varied series of articles which encapsulates the stories of many of the major pharmacological discoveries of past half-century, which we hope will be useful and interesting to pharmacologists young and old.

This supplement has been edited by Dr Y S Bakhle, Prof C P Page and Prof H P Rang.

The BJP would like to thank all the authors who contributed to this supplement.