The year 2006 is the 60th birthday and the Diamond Jubilee of Thorax, and I am delighted to welcome all our readers to this special edition of the journal to celebrate our successful 60 years.

About 6 months ago I raised the issue of this jubilee at one of our regular Thursday Editorial Committee meetings, and we decided that an insight into the way Thorax has developed and changed over the past 60 years would be interesting to our readers. I therefore decided to contact all the past medical editors of Thorax, with the exception of Guy Scadding (Editor 1946–1960) who had passed away, and I asked them for a contribution—either memories of their period of editorship or mention of landmark published papers that have considerably advanced our specialty. Within 24 hours of the letters being sent to the editors, I was surprised and delighted that John Robertson (Editor 1960–1971) called me on my mobile cell phone to discuss the celebrations. I never had the privilege of meeting John as I entered respiratory medicine after he retired, but I was struck with his sincere enthusiasm for Thorax, his vision and concern for our future, and wise counsel. He then sent in his contribution for this issue very quickly and was planning to attend the reunion of Thorax Editors arranged with the annual Associate Editors’ meeting and planned for 3 November 2006. Sadly and unexpectedly, John Robertson died a few weeks later, and thus we are also publishing in this special issue an appreciation of his life written by Anthony Seaton (Editor 1977–1982). Contributions from all the other editors follow this introduction, and I know you will all enjoy reading this unique collection of articles which provide an interesting perspective on the history of our journal.

Thorax was …