Professor Lyons was born in Revere, Massachusetts in 1924, and attended Tufts College. He served in the US Army from 1943-1945 on the European front in the final months of the Second World War.

Eugene Lyons returned to Tufts after the war and after graduating went on to earn a degree in Political Science from the Graduate Institute in 1949. He joined the United Nations International Refugee Organization in Geneva in 1948, while at the Institute, and worked there until 1952. From 1952-1956 he worked at the United Nations Korean Reconstruction Agency in New York.

After obtaining a PhD from Columbia University in 1958, he spent the remainder of his professional life in academia, primarily at Dartmouth College, where he was Professor of Government and Orvil Dryfoos Professor of Public Affairs until his retirement in 1994. He held numerous posts at Dartmouth, including Director of the College’s Public Affairs Center and Associate Dean for the Social Sciences. He also held positions as lecturer in American foreign policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (“UNESCO”) and visiting professor at the University of Paris, Sorbonne. A respected authority on international organisations and their role in shaping American foreign policy, Professor Lyons co-founded and directed the Academic Council of the United Nations System, served on the Council of Foreign Relations and the US National Commission for UNESCO, and was a delegate to the UNESCO General Conference. He is author and co-author of numerous books and other publications.

Eugene Martins remained active in retirement. He held the title of Professor Emeritus at Dartmouth, taught in the College’s ILEAD program, wrote articles and edited publications, and was a Senior Fellow at the Dickey Center, and Director of the Center’s United Nations Institute.