The only monarch in British history to have seen a platinum jubilee (a celebration marking 70 years of continuous rule), Elizabeth II was never destined to be queen. Upon the sudden abdication of her uncle, Edward VII in 1936, Elizabeth’s life was turned upside down as she suddenly became the heir-apparent to the throne of Great Britain and the empire. When she took the crown in 1952 upon the death of her father, George VI, contemporaries hailed her ascension as the beginning of a New Elizabethan Age. Since then, she has presided over the decolonisation of many of Britain’s overseas territories, the formation of the Commonwealth, and while not as its Queen, served Britain through World War II.
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