Derek Legge, who celebrated his 95th birthday at the end of last month, is one of the most dedicated and influential of the largely unsung heroes of the adult education movement in Britain. As modesty is one of the many qualities with which his friends and colleagues credit him, he is certain to shrink from the description, but there is little doubt that his work in advancing the cause of adult education as a subject of serious academic study was not only groundbreaking but also critical in the intellectual development of those he taught. His students, drawn from across the world and including in their number a prime minister, education ministers and a director of the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning, recall him as a "great" and inspirational teacher, a committed internationalist and a tolerant and encouraging mentor. Their success in taking the case for adult learning back to their countries, their communities, colleges and adult education centres, is, says the unassuming man who wears the mantle of "Western Europe's first lecturer in adult education", the true legacy of his work as founding head of Manchester University's Department of Adult Education.