Geoffrey Crowther, Baron Crowther

Geoffrey Crowther, Baron Crowther (born May 13, 1907 in Headingley , Leeds , † February 5, 1972 in London ) was a British economist , journalist , educator and businessman. From 1938 to 1956 he was editor of The Economist magazine .

Early years and education

After finishing school, Geoffrey Crowther received a scholarship to Clare College , Cambridge in 1928 to study modern languages. Later he changed the subject, studied economics with an excellent degree. In 1928 he was elected President of the Cambridge Union Societey .

His later colleague Donald Tyerman said of Crowther that his “self-perception and self-confidence were not asserted but taken for granted. But men who did well in life after Cambridge were desperate to see how certain it was that he would succeed no matter what he did ”.

In 1929 Crowther received a Harkness Fellowship and spent a year at Yale . There he met his wife Peggy and, now officially employed by Columbia University , spent a year on Wall Street . From 1931 he worked in a London commercial bank and, on the recommendation of John Maynard Keynes, became a banking advisor to the Irish government.

The Economist

In 1932 Geoffrey married Crowther and in the same year, also on the recommendation of Keynes, worked for the Economist . In 1935 he became head of department and in 1938, at the age of 31, he became editor, succeeding Walter Layton . Under his aegis, the weekly magazine quintupled its circulation and became one of the most influential in the world.

Crowther has promoted the careers of numerous well-known journalists and authors, including Roland Bird , Donald Tyerman, Barbara Ward , Isaac Deutscher , John Midgely, Norman Macrae , Margaret Cruikshank, Helen Hill Miller, Marjorie Deane, Nancy Balfour, Donald McLachlan, Keith Kyle , Andrew Boyd and George Steiner . He particularly supported the careers of women, which was exceptional at the time. After more than 17 years, he resigned from his post. Since 1947 he was also director of the Economist Newspaper Ltd. and after resigning as a publisher, he became its manager. In 1963 he followed Layton as chairman of the board.

Other offices and activities

During the Second World War , Crowther worked in the supply and information ministries and finally in the production ministry. In 1956 he was appointed chairman of the Central Advisory Council for Education , an advisory board for education; the panel wrote The Crowther Report - Fifteen to Eighteen , which ultimately resulted in 1972 when the compulsory school age was raised to 16 years. In 1971 he published another Crowther Report , the Report of the Committee on Consumer Credit , the recommendations of which resulted in the Consumer Credit Act 1974 , which reformed the legal regulations on consumer credit . Until his death in 1972 he was chairman of the Royal Commission on the Constitution .

For several years, Crowther served on the board of directors of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research and helped make the institution survive the war years. He served on the Council of the Royal Institute of International Affairs and served on the editorial board of International Affairs for some time after 1944 . In the 1940s, he was also editor of the journal Transatlantic provided by the Penguin Books was published and was a regular participant in the radio program The Brains Trust on BBC . He was also a member of the board of directors of the London School of Economics and was named founding chancellor of the Open University in 1969. During his life he held up to 40 offices.

Geoffrey Crowther died of a heart attack at Heathrow Airport .

Awards and honors

In 1952 Crowther was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and in 1953 to the American Philosophical Society , in 1957 he was beaten to a Knight Bachelor and in 1968 he was promoted to life peer . He was also awarded seven honorary doctorates in the course of his life.

Fonts

• An Introduction to The Study of Prices , 2nd Edition with W. Layton, 1935
• Economics for Democrats , 1939
• An Outline of Money , 1941

Individual evidence

1. ^ Ruth Dudley Edwards: The Pursuit of Reason . Hamish Hamilton, 1993, ISBN 978-0-87584-608-8 . P. 697
2. ↑ Text in the original: “ Crowther's self-awareness and self-confidence were not so much asserted as taken for granted. But men who did well enough in life after Cambridge were in despair when they saw how sure it seemed that he would succeed in whatever he chose to do. ”
3. ↑ ^{a b} Roland Bird: "Crowther, Geoffrey, Baron Crowther (1907–1972)" in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
4. ^ Ruth Dudley Edwards: The Pursuit of Reason . Hamish Hamilton, 1993, ISBN 978-0-87584-608-8 . P. 741
5. ^ Ruth Dudley Edwards: The Pursuit of Reason . Hamish Hamilton, 1993, ISBN 978-0-87584-608-8 . P. 469
6. ^ Geoffrey Crowther: The Crowther Report - Fifteen to Eighteen . HMSO 1959.
7. ↑ Richard Stone - Autobiography ( Memento of October 27, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
8. ↑ The Anglo-American Establishment 1949 at http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/
9. ^ Ruth Dudley Edwards: The Pursuit of Reason . Hamish Hamilton, 1993, ISBN 978-0-87584-608-8 . P. 758
10. ^ Ruth Dudley Edwards: The Pursuit of Reason . Hamish Hamilton, 1993, ISBN 978-0-87584-608-8 . P. 867
11. ^ Member History: Geoffrey Crowther. American Philosophical Society, accessed July 2, 2018 . 
12. ↑ The London Gazette v. July 23, 1957
13. ↑ The London Gazette v. June 28, 1968