Forty years of symposia on “Advances in Corrosion Protection by Organic Coatings” and the legacy of Jack Mayne

In 1986, believing that the subject discipline needed more attention, Henry Leidheiser (Lehigh University, Pennsylvania, USA) and Martin Kendig (Leidheiser's former PhD student) organised a focussed research meeting on corrosion protection by organic coatings at the 1986 Fall meeting of The Electrochemical Society. In 1989 David Scantlebury (University of Manchester, UK) organised a further meeting in Cambridge entitled “Advances in Corrosion Protection by Organic Coatings” (ACPOC). Subsequent meetings have been held roughly quinquennially in Cambridge, Tokyo and Manchester with the latest (the 10th) held in Tokyo in 2024. This contribution takes inspiration from the outputs of Dr. J.E.O. (Jack) Mayne in Cambridge (UK) working from 1955 to 1980 who, in turn, was the inspiration for establishment and continuation of the ACPOC meeting series by Mayne's former students and colleagues. We provide an historical survey of research on corrosion protective organic coatings prior to and arising from Mayne's work and highlight key findings presented at ACPOC symposia, including the continued relevance of coating heterogeneities as initially characterised by Mayne.