Newsnight's history man honoured

Greg Neale - hard at work

Greg Neale, Newsnight's "resident historian", has been honoured for his work - he has been elected a Centenary Fellow of the Historical Association.

Greg is one of 25 figures to be honoured by the association, which was set up in 1906 to further the study, teaching and public enjoyment of history. He received his award at a ceremony at the Banqueting House in Whitehall (Friday 19 May).

Other centenary fellows include Lady Antonia Fraser, author of numerous historical biographies; Prof Sir Ian Kershaw, the award-winning biographer of Hitler; and the Labour MP Gordon Marsden, a campaigner for history education.

The president of the Historical Association, Prof Barry Coward, said the fellowships - the first ever awarded by the HA - were in recognition of "outstanding services to history".

Greg was appointed editor of BBC History Magazine when it was launched in 2000 by BBC Worldwide, the corporation's commercial arm.

The magazine quickly established itself as Britain's best-selling title in the genre; a success recognised when Greg won two "editor of the year" awards from the British Society of Magazine Editors.

I'm enormously flattered to receive this award, which reflects the hard work of my colleagues on BBC History Magazine and Newsnight Greg Neale, BBC Newsnight Big Read-all-about-it vote

Greg began freelancing for Newsnight in January last year, and has also worked for BBC4's The World. Before joining the corporation, he worked as a reporter and correspondent for Fleet Street newspapers including The Times, The Guardian, The Observer, and the Sunday Telegraph.

He studied history at Birkbeck College, London, and Pembroke College, Oxford.

As Newsnight's resident historian, he has reported on the background to numerous news and current affairs stories - from the origins of British liberalism at the time of the Lib-Dem leadership election, to a cultural history of chewing gum!

He was also responsible, with producer Aditya Chakrabortty, for developing Newsnight's current series of films on the most memorable newspaper front pages of the last hundred years, the "Big Read-All-About-It".

"I'm enormously flattered to receive this award, which reflects the hard work of my colleagues on BBC History Magazine, as well as the incredibly talented - and extremely patient - producers and editors of Newsnight, who've helped me make the transition to television," Greg said.