Deborah Smith spent nearly forty years of her professional life teaching and engaging in climate change research in British and Spanish universities. During this time, she took part in, and led, a number of major funded projects on that theme, with particular interest in past climates and how they can inform the current debate. Although now retired, she continues her research focusing on weather records spanning the past three centuries, especially in her adopted home of the North East of England. She has become particularly interested in how the weather is described in narrative accounts, as well as its instrumental recording. She has worked closely with branches of the media and has always been committed to public awareness and participation in the climate change conversation.