Lionel Alexander Bethune (Alastair) Pilkington. 7 January 1920—5 May 1995

Alastair Pilkington spent his whole working career in the glass industry, initiating and leading development of the revolutionary float process, which involves floating molten glass on molten tin. This novel glassmaking venture emerged in the small town of St Helens, where the Pilkington Company, founded in 1826, had the strength to see the project through to a successful conclusion, solving a huge number of complex technological problems and investing substantial funds. Almost all the glass one sees today, in myriads of applications worldwide, owes its optically perfect surfaces to the float process. Alastair interfaced so effectively with his engineering team and the Board of Directors of Pilkington Brothers that he rose to become an exemplary chairman of the company, with involvements and influence well beyond the field of glassmaking.