Barbara Wright

Barbara Wright, later Barbara Chesterton, was one of the earliest companions to travel with the Doctor. Before meeting the First Doctor, Barbara was a history teacher at Coal Hill School in 1960s London.

Early life
In her teens, Barbara dated a boy who carried a knife. Her mother called these "her rebellious years". Barbara had an aunt named Cecilia. They met every year in London on 23 November, her aunt's birthday. (ST: 1963)

In 1954, she was a student teacher in Cricklewood, living in a rented room. (PDA: The Witch Hunters)

Travels with the Doctor
Barbara became involved in the First Doctor's life through his granddaughter, Susan. Barbara taught history at Coal Hill School in Shoreditch, London, where Ian Chesterton taught science. (DW: An Unearthly Child) She had a particular interest in the Aztecs. (DW: The Aztecs) The odd gaps in Susan's knowledge and her knowledge of things she could not know intrigued Barbara. Ian and she followed Susan to 76 Totter's Lane, where they found the Doctor's TARDIS and the First Doctor, who abducted them after they had forced their way into the TARDIS.

Barbara was as sceptical as Ian was about the TARDIS at first, but accepted the validity of the Doctor's statements sooner than Ian did. Barbara was practical and realistic. Once she realised Susan and the Doctor had told the truth about the TARDIS, she accepted it fully. (DW: An Unearthly Child)

Barbara was an instinctive person. Her combination of practicality and intuition made her the ideal mediator, not only for the alien worlds and times they visited, but also in the TARDIS. Many arguments between the Doctor and Ian were smoothed over by Barbara's intervention. Her intuition didn't fail her when the travellers arrived on Skaro; she felt uncomfortable and wanted to return to the safety of the TARDIS. When the Daleks captured her, her fears were justified. (DW: The Daleks)

After the TARDIS sustained heavy damage from a fault, (DW: The Edge of Destruction) it landed on the Plain of Pamir in 1289. There, she met Marco Polo, who took the TARDIS along with its keys on his caravan across Cathay, to hand it to Kublai Khan as part of a bargain for his return to Venice. Along the way, the Mongol warlord Tegana, also part of Polo's caravan, tried to take the TARDIS for Nogai as part of his plan to assassinate Kublai. In the chaos of Tegana and Polo's duel in Peking, the Doctor and his companions escaped in his repaired TARDIS. (DW: Marco Polo)

Barbara's strong beliefs and acceptance of truth made her a formidable character. If she believed in something, she stood up for it. When the travellers arrived in Mexico during the time of Aztecs, her interest in history allowed her to see the good and the evil in the Aztec society and her belief they could be a truly good people made her determined to change the course of history when the Conquistadors arrived. She wished to preserve all that was good and honourable from their society, whilst driving out the horrors and ignorance of human sacrifice. Even though the Doctor stated this as an impossibility, she still endeavoured to try, angering the Doctor. Barbara was disappointed to learn that history could not be changed, but she had the strength of character to live with this. (DW: The Aztecs)

Passionate about history, Barbara could see both sides to a story. When the travellers arrived in revolutionary France, she befriended Léon Colbert. When he died, she was distraught and defended his treachery. (DW: The Reign of Terror)

On 22nd century Earth, the travellers found the Daleks had invaded and occupied the planet. Barbara helped a small resistance group in their plotting and with Jenny took Dortmun through London. With the Daleks defeated, Susan left their company. (DW: The Dalek Invasion of Earth)

When they arrived on the planet Dido, they met an inhabitant there named Vicki. Vicki was initially unable to closely bond with Barbara, who had killed Vicki's pet sand beast Sandy, thinking it to be dangerous. After Barbara offered an apology, the two got on well and Vicki joined them on their travels. (DW: The Rescue)

Perhaps owing in part to Barbara missing Susan, she and Vicki became confidantes. Despite how well Barbara and Vicki got along, Barbara seemed unamused when Vicki said that she must be "about five hundred and fifty years old", as she came from 1963. (DW: The Rescue)

The strength of character Barbara showed when accepting the fate of the Aztecs allowed her to persevere through the discomforts she faced on their travels. While on Vortis, Barbara survived working for the Zarbi, (DW: The Web Planet) and although she was captured by a Saracen band led by El Akir, she had the strength of mind to survive this as well. (DW: The Crusade)

Barbara's knowledge of history prepared the travellers for the hardships they would encounter when they landed in Rome. She warned Ian, once they had been captured to be sold as slaves, just how badly Roman slaves were treated. (DW: The Romans) Here she gained her most treasured keepsake from her travels - the gold bracelet she had been given by Nero. (DW: The Romans, The Chase) She was the first to realise that she and Ian might be able to return home in the Dalek time machine. Determined to get home, she was willing to risk her life in the Dalek ship. On returning home, Barbara and Ian were thrilled to have safely arrived. Once they had left the Dalek ship, and it had self-destructed, the two friends realised that they had some explaining to do, as they had arrived home in 1965 — two years after they had left. (DW: The Chase)

Life after the Doctor
Barbara and Ian claimed to have been missionaries in Africa to account for the time gap. She began a career as a university lecturer, specialising in Aztec history (MA: Who Killed Kennedy). Barbara and Ian married (SJA: Death of the Doctor) and had a child, John Alydon Ganatas Chesterton, who grew up to be a famous musician under the name Johnny Chess (NA: Timewyrm: Revelation, PDA: Byzantium!). According to a rumour Sarah Jane Smith shared with Clyde and Rani, Barbara and Ian had become professors at Cambridge by at least the 2010s and had not aged since the 1960s (SJA: Death of the Doctor). However, other sources suggest this was just a rumour. (BE: Untitled, BFA: The Five Companions, VHS: The Crusade (Video links))

Personality
Barbara was keen to see the good in all things. She was frequently protected by Ian. (DW: The Keys of Marinus) She believed in the innate goodness of people and saw that sometimes there was more to a situation than met the eye. (DW: The Romans)

Barbara was also capable of great endurance and feats of bravery. She killed Sandy with a flare gun in shock, after which she was keen to make it up with Vicki. (DW: The Rescue) While a prisoner, Barbara looked after her fellow captives at risk to herself. (DW: The Romans) Barbara would take her aggression out on the Daleks. In her second encounter with them, Barbara drove a truck through a roadblock of Daleks, crushing at least one of them. (DW: The Dalek Invasion of Earth) The next time she met the Daleks, Barbara was eager to violently attack them as soon as the Doctor gained the weaponry they needed. (DW: The Chase)

Behind the scenes

 * The roles of Ian and Barbara as, respectively, science and history teachers were part of the series' original plan to alternate between science-fiction and historical stories. In an original format document, Barbara's age is listed as twenty-three, but it was decided to cast a slightly older actress in the role instead.
 * Barbara Wright has the distinction of being the first regular Doctor Who character to appear on screen.
 * She is the first character to meet a Dalek on screen.
 * Russell T Davies has stated that he sees Tenth Doctor companion Donna Noble as how Barbara would be presented today. (REF: The Writer's Tale)
 * Before her travels in the TARDIS, Barbara's homework assignments for her students required them to study the causes and effects of the French Revolution.

 Barbara Wright