The Pitt Professorship of American History and Institutions was established at the University of Cambridge on 5 February 1944 from a sum of ã44,000 received from the Syndics of the Cambridge University Press in 1943 and augmented by a further ã5,000 in 1946. The title of the chair was changed to the Pitt Professorship of American History and Institutions in 1951.
The professorship is unusual in that tenure is for a period of one year only.