Jack Donaldson, Baron Donaldson of Kingsbridge

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John "Jack" George Stuart Donaldson, Baron Donaldson of Kingsbridge OBE (born  October 9, 1907 in Kingsbridge , Devon , †  March 8, 1998 in London ) was a British lieutenant colonel , economic and theater manager and politician of the Labor Party and most recently the Social Democratic Party (SDP), the 1967 Life peer due to the Life peerages Act 1958 a member of the House of Lords was and from 1976 to 1979 Minister of State for Arts ( Minister of State for the Arts ) was.

Life

Origin, World War II and theater manager

The Royal Opera House in Covent Garden , of which Donaldson was director from 1959 to 1974

Donaldson was the son of Reverend Stuart Alexander Donaldson, who several years master and temporarily Vice Chancellor of Magdalen College of the University of Oxford was. His mother, Albinia Frederica Hobart-Hampden, was the daughter of Albinia Frederica Hobart-Hampden, who was temporarily Undersecretary of State in the Ministry of India. His paternal grandfather, Sir Stuart Alexander Donaldson, was New South Wales' first Prime Minister from June 6 to August 25, 1856 . His maternal grandfather was Augustus Edward Hobart-Hampden, 6th Earl of Buckinghamshire , who served as principal of Wolverhampton Grammar School, founded in 1512, between 1820 and 1847 .

He graduated after visiting the Eton College to study at Trinity College of the University of Cambridge , which he in 1929 with a Bachelor of Arts graduated (BA). He then began his military service with the Royal Engineers and was promoted to lieutenant on May 10, 1939 . As an officer, he then took part in the Second World War. For his military services he was last promoted to lieutenant colonel and was awarded the Officer's Cross of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1943.

After the war, Donaldson settled as a farmer, first in Gloucestershire and then in Buckinghamshire . 1959 took Donaldson, the function of the Director of the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden and has held this function for fifteen years until 1974. At that time he also completed a postgraduate course at Trinity College of the University of Oxford , which he in 1960 with a Master of Arts ( MA). In addition, he was director of Sadler's Wells in Islington from 1962 to 1974 , helping to make it London's leading stage for ballet and modern dance theater .

Social commitment, member of the House of Lords and Minister of the Arts

In 1961 he also became honorary secretary of the National Association of Relief Societies for Released Prisoners and also served from 1963 to 1969 as chairman of the advisory board of HM Prison Grendon, a correctional facility for around 300 mentally ill offenders. He was also chairman of the National Association for the Care and Reintegration of Offenders between 1966 and 1974. Through these offices he particularly advocated a different view of society towards prisoners. He was also director of the British Sugar Corporation from 1966 to 1974 , the only British company producing sugar from sugar beet .

By a letters patent dated November 20, 1967, Donaldson was elevated to the nobility due to the Life Peerages Act 1958 as a life peer with the title Baron Donaldson of Kingsbridge , of Kingsbridge in the County of Buckinghamshire, and thus belonged to the House of until his death Lords as a member. He was chairman of the Consumer Council from 1968 to 1971 and chairman of the National Committee on Family Services from 1968 to 1974. In 1969 he was appointed by Prime Minister Harold Wilson to chair a committee that presented a report in 1970 on the entry age and young soldiers in the British Army . In addition, from 1972 to 1974 he was Chairman of the National Development Committee for the Hotel and Catering Industry.

After the election of the Labor Party in the general election on February 28, 1974 Baron Donaldson was Prime Minister Wilson for Parliamentary Under Secretary of State ( Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State ) in the Northern Ireland Ministry ( Northern Ireland Office appointed) and in this function one of the closest associates of Northern Ireland Minister Merlyn Rees .

In March 1976 Baron Donaldson was the 1975-1980 president of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds ( Royal Society for the Protection of Birds ), by James Callaghan , Wilson's successor as Prime Minister, Minister for the Arts ( Minister for the Arts appointed) and held that office until the end of Callaghan's term after the Labor Party was defeated in the general election on May 3, 1979 .

In 1981 he left the Labor Party and joined the Social Democratic Party (SDP) founded by former Labor politicians Roy Jenkins , David Owen , Bill Rodgers and Shirley Williams .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ London Gazette . No. 34624, HMSO, London, May 9, 1939, p. 3108 ( PDF , accessed October 16, 2013, English).
  2. ^ Norman Lebrecht: Covent Garden: The Untold Story: Dispatches from the English Culture War, 1945-2000 , 2001, pp. 239, 313, ISBN 1-55553-4-880
personal data
SURNAME Donaldson, Jack, Baron Donaldson of Kingsbridge
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Donaldson, John George Stuart, Baron Donaldson of Kingsbridge (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British officer, manager and politician
DATE OF BIRTH October 9, 1907
PLACE OF BIRTH Kingsbridge
DATE OF DEATH March 8, 1998
Place of death London