Edward Potts Cheyney, a historian of European history, was born on January 17, 1861 in Wallingford, Pennsylvania. He was first educated at country schools, then at the Penn Charter School in Philadelphia, and eventually at the University of Pennsylvania, where he graduated with a B.A. degree in 1883. After a brief sojourn in Europe, he returned to enter the University's newly founded Wharton School of Finance, from which he received a bachelor's degree in finance in 1884. In 1929 he was appointed Henry Charles Lea Professor of History and subsequently, in 1934, assumed a position as curator of the Henry Charles Lea Library at the University.
