Ian Chesterton is a young science teacher with a little too much curiosity for his own good. His life was going along normally, with good prospects for promotion and a slight romantic interest from a co-worker, Barbara Wright, when an event happened that would change his understanding of the universe forever. He and Barbara became concerned when they spoke about one of the strangest students at Cole Hill School, Susan Foreman, and the fact that she was a genius in certain ways, and seemingly incompetent in others. They knew that she lived with her grandfather, and decided they should have a talk with him about his seeming neglect, and so followed her home. What they discovered perplexed them still more - Susan appeared to be meeting her grandfather in a police box in a junkyard!At this point, they had to know what was going on, so they forced their way past the old man and into the police box, where they discovered that it was larger on the inside than the outside. Susan now explained that she and her grandfather were, in fact, aliens from the future and that the TARDIS, as she called the police box, was actually a time machine and space craft combined into one. To prove it, they took Ian and Barbara on the first of what would become many adventures through time and space. The two made hardy time and space travellers, as it turned out, and brought a certain family atmosphere to the TARDIS as well, but both were sorry that the Doctor, as Susan's grandfather called himself, was unable to figure out how to get them back to 1960s Earth.Ian, who had always been more or less a brainy fellow, found his role rather startlingly changed on the TARDIS. To his displeasure, he found that his scientific learning was always inferior to the alien training of the Doctor. On the other hand, as a younger man in good condition, he found himself often called upon to perform physical tasks, which he discovered that he took some pleasure in being able to excel at, particularly in front of Barbara.Ian and Barbara eventually returned to their time, only a year late, in a craft designed by the Daleks. They had a difficult time explaining their absence and rebuilding their lives, and, in fact, ultimately went their separate ways. Ian became a writer and became wealthy by fictionalizing their adventures and selling the stories to a television program. He married a younger woman, had three children, and retired to Barbados in his early 60s. Show less «