Lord Rector of Edinburgh University

The position of Lord Rector of Edinburgh University is elected every three years by the students at the University of Edinburgh. Seldomly referred to as Lord Rector, they are more commonly known just as the Rector, the position's place in the university was esnhrined by statute of the Westminster Parliament when they passed the Universities (Scotland) Act 1889 which provided for the election of a Rector at all of the universities in existence at the time in Scotland. To this day it is only the ancient universities of Edinburgh; Glasgow; Aberdeen; Dundee and St Andrews who elect a rector, whereas the modern universities do not.

List of Rectors

• 1859 Rt.Hon. William Gladstone
• 1865 Thomas Carlyle
• 1868 Lord Moncreiff
• 1871 Sir W.Stirling Maxwell, Bart.,
• 1874 Earl of Derby
• 1877 The Marquess of Hartington
• 1880 Earl of Roseberry
• 1883 Earl of Iddesleigh
• 1887 The Marquess of Lothian
• 1890 Rt.Hon. G.J.Goschen
• 1893 Rt.Hon. J.P.B.Robertson
• 1896 Lord Balfour of Burleigh
• 1899 The Marquess of Dufferin and Ava
• 1902 Sir Robert Bannatyne Finlay
• 1905 Rt.Hon. Richard Burdon Haldane
• 1908 Rt.Hon. George Wyndham
• 1911 The Earl of Minto
• 1914 Earl Kitchener of Khartoum
• 1917 Earl Beatty
• 1920 Rt.Hon. David Lloyd George
• 1923 Rt.Hon. Stanley Baldwin
• 1926 Rt.Hon. Sir John Gilmour
• 1929 Rt.Hon. Winston Churchill
• 1932 General Sir Ian Standish Monteith Hamilton
• 1935 Viscount Allenby
• 1936 Sir Herbert John Clifford Grierson
• 1939 Sir J. Donald Pollock
• 1945 Viscount Cunningham of Hyndhope
• 1948 Alastair Sim
• 1951 Sir Alexander Fleming
• 1954 Sir Sydney A. Smith
• 1957 James Robertson Justice
• 1960 Jo Grimond
• 1963 James Roberston Justice
• 1966 Malcolm Muggeridge
• 1969 Kenneth Allsop
• 1972 Jonathon W.G. Wills
• 1973 Gordon Brown
• 1976 Magnus Magnusson
• 1979 Very Rev. Anthony Ross
• 1982 Rt.Hon. David Steel
• 1985 A. MacPherson
• 1988 Muriel Gray
• 1991 Donnie Munro
• 1994 Malcolm Macleod
• 1997 John Colquhoun
• 2000 Robin Harper
• 2003 Tam Dalyell