Latest News About England: John Pickstone obituary

Historian who founded the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester

"Let's start with eggs." This was how the historian John Pickstone, who has died after a short illness aged 69, began his influential book Ways of Knowing (2001). In it, he advanced an influential "big picture" history of modern science, technology and medicine (HSTM), arguing they must be studied together, rather than in isolation.

John illustrated his new approach by charting science's four ways of knowing eggs. Beginning in 1700, eggs were regarded as natural history objects to be studied in museums; then as physiological and anatomical objects to be analysed into their parts with microscopes and other tools; then as embryonic chickens, to be experimented upon in laboratories; and finally, in the 20th century, as commodities to be re-engineered by technoscience. John's groundbreaking approach had an impact far beyond HSTM and the UK: in a short time, it was being debated by scholars across the humanities and social sciences and around the world.

His ideas initially ran against the fashion in HSTM, which was for specialist and local studies, and in fact John had made his name as an expert on French physiology and Manchester's medical history. But Ways of Knowing offered more than an exciting new perspective for academics considering the past and future of science, technology and medicine: its sharp, synthesising framework spoke to those anxious to make HSTM more accessible to wider publics.

These different sides of John's work, the specialist and local, and the engaging and wide-ranging, came together in his championing of the heritage of his university, his city and the north-west of England. His endeavours culminated in 2008 with the creation of the Manchester Histories festival. Now a week-long celebration of Manchester's past, it brings together professional historians, history enthusiasts, thousands of schoolchildren and Mancunians in a series of events, including a grand open day in the neo-gothic splendour of the city's town hall. It is the leading event of its kind in Britain.

The Pickstone family roots had long been in Manchester, but John was born in Burnley, Lancashire. His father had moved to a job in a textile company that by the time of John's birth, in 1944, had shifted production from lingerie to parachutes to support the war effort. John was educated at Burnley grammar school, then Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, where he studied natural sciences (especially physiology), and at Queen's University, in Kingston, Ontario.

He moved to the history and philosophy of science in 1968-69, taking a master's at University College London. This was an exciting time for graduate students in London, where they could attend lectures by luminaries such as Karl Popper and Imre Lakatos, and their debates with Thomas Kuhn. John's doctorate, from Chelsea College, London, was on early 19th-century physiology in France. He then held fellowships at the University of Minnesota and UCL, before moving in 1974 to the department of history of science and technology, headed by Donald Cardwell, at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (Umist).

The return to the north-west allowed John to work on the history of hospitals in the Manchester region, and in 1985 he published Medicine and Industrial Society. Typically, John interpreted his brief widely, producing seminal studies of public health, fevers and alternative medical systems, such as medical botany. He interpreted neglected sources in new ways and showed the importance of local contexts in shaping ideas and practices. In 1985 he moved from Umist to the Victoria University of Manchester. He soon established the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine (CHSTM), to which his entrepreneurial skills had soon added a Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine and the National Archive for the History of Computing. He directed CHSTM until 2002.

John made CHSTM and CHSTM made John. The research and teaching developed by staff at the centre reflected John's wide interests across histories of science, technology and medicine, their integrated study, and their relations to other fields and to contemporary issues. In turn, the breadth of the centre's work and people that John's remarkable skills in institution building were able to bring, gave him the community, the materials and the environment to develop his "big picture" histories. He took it as read that science, technology and medicine have been central to modern society, and he believed passionately that if we want to understand them today, history holds the key.

He was the most sociable of men. John could often be seen in conversation with friends and colleagues, and would readily engage his fellow passengers on the bus or train in discussions. All these encounters fed his intellectual curiosity, but they were always exchanges, where John would share his knowledge and enthusiasm for HSTM and Manchester, and would often be followed up by an email with a reference or a copy of one of his articles.

John enjoyed going to the Hallé, travelling and walking. He loved the varied landscapes of the Peak District, the Lake District, and historic sites of industrial and social importance. In galleries and museums, he was never off-duty. His analytical mind was always engaged and seeking new perspectives, which often meant deliberately taking a wrong turn and trespassing into closed spaces. John delighted in such purposeful, creative acts of transgression. His colleagues, friends, and scholarly and civic community are all the richer for them.

He is survived by his wife, two sons and a granddaughter.

• John Victor Pickstone, historian, born 29 May 1944; died 12 February 2014

Michael Worboys