Eustace Edward Ricardo Braithwaite, publishing as E. R. Braithwaite, was a Guyanese-born British-American novelist, writer, teacher, and diplomat best known for his stories of social conditions and racial discrimination against black people. He was born on June 27, 1912, and passed away on December 12, 2016.

Braithwaite is the author of the 1959 autobiographical novel To Sir, With Love, which was made into a 1967 British drama film of the same title, starring Sidney Poitier and Lulu. The narrator of the novel is an engineer, who, to make ends meet, accepts the job of a teacher in a rough London school.

An alumnus of Queens College, Braithwaite excelled at City University of New York, after which he served in the RAF during WWII as a fighter pilot from 1941-45. He went on to receive an advanced degree in Physics from Cambridge University in 1949 and also attended the University of London. Unable to establish a career in physics, which he attributed to his status as an ethnic minority, Braithwaite turned to teaching and became a successful author.