The Pitt Professorship of American History and Institutions was established at the University of Cambridge on 5 February 1944 from a sum of £44,000 received from the Syndics of the Cambridge University Press in 1943 and augmented by a further £5,000 in 1946. The title of the chair was changed to the Pitt Professorship of American History and Institutions in 1951.^[1]

The professorship is unusual in that tenure is for a period of one year only.^[1]

• 1945–46 Dexter Perkins
• 1946–47 No election
• 1947–48 Henry Steele Commager
• 1948–49 Roy Franklin Nichols
• 1949–50 Walt Whitman Rostow
• 1950–51 John Donald Hicks
• 1951–53 Ralph Henry Gabriel
• 1952–53 Avery Odelle Craven
• 1953–54 Corwin D. Edwards
• 1954–55 John Bartlet Brebner
• 1955–56 William Thomas Easterbrook
• 1956–57 Edward Chase Kirkland
• 1957–58 Paul Abraham Freund
• 1958–59 Richard Hofstadter
• 1959–60 Eugene Victor Rostow
• 1960–61 Clinton Lawrence Rossiter
• 1961–62 Richard Palmer Blackmur
• 1962–63 John Hope Franklin
• 1963–64 John Morton Blum
• 1964–65 Daniel Joseph Boorstin
• 1965–66 Thomas Childs Cochran
• 1966–67 Peter Michael Blau
• 1967–68 James Willard Hurst
• 1968–69 William Clement Eaton
• 1969–70 Henry David
• 1970–71 Walter Galenson
• 1971–72 Henry Farnham May
• 1972–73 Morris Janowitz
• 1973–74 Eric Louis McKitrick
• 1974–75 Archibald Cox
• 1975–76 Robert William Fogel
• 1976–77 Eugene Dominic Genovese
• 1977–78 Paul Allan David
• 1978–79 Stephan Thernstrom
• 1979–80 Eliot Freidson
• 1980–81 Eric Foner
• 1981–82 Douglass Cecil North
• 1982–83 Gordon Stewart Wood
• 1983–84 Judith N. Shklar
• 1984–85 Robert Huddleston Wiebe
• 1985–86 Peter Temin
• 1986–87 Bernard Bailyn
• 1987–88 Daniel Bell
• 1988–89 Warren Forbes Kimball
• 1989–90 Nathan Rosenberg
• 1990–91 Timothy Hall Breen
• 1991–92 Vacant
• 1992–93 Carol Gilligan
• 1993–94 Michael Fitzgibbon Holt
• 1994–95 Peter Gavin Wright
• 1995–96 Dan Thomas Carter
• 1996–97 John Shelton Reed
• 1997–98 Sylvia R. Frey
• 1998–99 Stanley Engerman
• 1999–2000 James Tyler Petterson
• 2000–01 Randall Collins
• 2001–02 James L. Roark
• 2002–03 Timothy W Guinnane
• 2003–04 Daniel T. Rodgers
• 2004–05 Michael Mann
• 2005–06 Mary Beth Norton
• 2006–07 Michael D. Bordo
• 2007–08 J Mills Thornton
• 2008–09 James T. Kloppenberg
• 2009–10 Nancy A. Hewitt
• 2010–11 Gary Libecap
• 2011–12 Alan Brinkley
• 2012–13 Jeffrey C. Alexander
• 2013–14 David Blight
• 2014–15 Barry Eichengreen
• 2015–16 Margaret Jacobs
• 2016–17 Loïc Wacquant
• 2017–18 Ira Katznelson
• 2018–19 Naomi Lamoreaux