Patrick Gibson, Baron Gibson

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Richard Patrick Tallentyre Gibson, Baron Gibson (born February 5, 1916 in Kensington , London , † April 20, 2004 in Lye Green , East Sussex ) was a British business manager , entrepreneur and publisher , who served as chairman of the British Arts Council ( Arts Council of Great Britain ) had significant influence on cultural life between 1972 and 1977 and was then chairman of the National Trust from 1977 to 1986 and in 1975 when Life Peer became a member of the House of Lords under the Life Peerages Act 1958 .

Life

Gibson, the son of a stockbroker , completed after the visit of Eton College studying at Magdalen College of Oxford University and then took his father working as a stockbroker on. As part of an officer training course in the Royal Corps of Signals , he was promoted to lieutenant on July 12, 1939 . At the beginning of World War II he joined in 1939 his military service in the Middlesex Yeomanry and took while in this unit African campaign of fighting against Italy in North Africa in part. In 1941 he was taken prisoner of war , which he spent in a prisoner of war camp in Parma .

After the armistice of Cassibile September 3, 1943 he was released from captivity and undertook with his fellow prisoners and lifelong friends Edward Tomkins , who later became ambassador in the Netherlands and in France was, and Nigel Strutt , a later High Sheriff of Essex , a Escape through Italy, which aroused his interest in the country. After six weeks, the three reached the Sangro River in Abruzzo , where they - Tomkins now wounded - encountered British troops. After a stay in hospital Gibson returned to England, where he asked to be transferred to the Italian branch of the Special Operations Executive (SOE ). He was then transferred to Italy in order to support the Resistancea there in their partisan war against the German Wehrmacht .

Journalist and manager

He then worked between 1945 and 1946 in the Political Intelligence Department of the Foreign Office , where he met Dione Pearson, whom he married on July 14, 1945. His wife was a granddaughter of Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray , who for the Liberal Party the constituency Colchester in the House of Commons had represented and established a family group with extensive economic interests, comprised the oil, banking and publishing company. The publishing company included Westminster Press , a group of provincial newspapers for which Gibson began working as a trainee journalist in 1947. Soon after, he was promoted to editor-in-chief in 1948 and held this position until 1978.

Over time, he became a member of the boards of the Financial Times , The Economist, and the holding company S. Pearson and Son . In 1967 he became chairman of the board of directors of Longman Pearson , the company's book publisher, and served until 1979. At the same time he was from 1969 to 1975 deputy chairman of the media group Pearson.

Chairman of the British Arts Council

As the successor to Arnold Goodman, Baron Goodman , he took over the role of chairman of the British Arts Council ( Arts Council of Great Britain ) in 1972 and in this position had a decisive influence on the cultural life of Great Britain until his replacement by Kenneth Robinson in 1977. His tenure was marked by a period of rapidly rising inflation and the budgetary crisis of the government formed by the Labor Party under Prime Minister Harold Wilson in 1974, which cut the arts council's grant after many years of previous growth.

At the same time, costs were charged for elite thinking and there was criticism of politics, which - some believed - was based on an overly narrow and traditional view of the arts. Gibson tried to defend himself as chairman during this difficult time and he managed to withstand pressure from the Treasury ( HM Treasury ) to combine the Royal Opera House with the English National Opera (ENO).

House of Lords

By a letters patent dated January 31, 1975 Gibson was raised as a life peer with the title Baron Gibson , of Penn's Rocks in the County of East Sussex, to the nobility and was a member of the House of Lords until his death.

In 1975 Gibson became chairman of the board of the Financial Times and finally served from 1978 to 1983 as chairman of the board of the Pearson media group, which had emerged from S. Pearson and Son. He was previously executive vice chairman of the Pearson media group from 1975 to 1978.

Gibson also served as chairman of the advisory board of the Victoria and Albert Museum , director of the Royal Opera House, trustee of Glyndebourne Festival Opera , member of the executive committee of The Art Fund and advisor to the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.

Chairman of the National Trust

In 1977 he also became chairman of the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, a not-for-profit organization that oversees historic preservation and conservation properties in England , Wales and Northern Ireland . He had been a member of the National Trust's executive committee since 1963 and was also a member of a commission set up in 1968 under the chairmanship of Henry Benson , which produced a far-reaching and highly influential report on the management, organization and responsibilities of the National Trust. In 1980 the University of Reading awarded him an honorary doctorate in literature .

During his tenure as chairman of the National Trust, which lasted until 1986, the number of members grew and in 1980 reached the million mark. In addition, numerous important objects such as Kedleston Hall , Belton House , Fountains Abbey , Canons Ashby and the famous Pennine Way were acquired by Kinder Scout .

Due to the criticism of a group of members for the granting of the extension of a land use by the communication center of the Ministry of Defense in the Chiltern Hills , there was also a vote of no confidence in him during an extraordinary general assembly in 1983, which, however, was rejected by a large majority. However, he then ordered that the Advisory Board of the National Truste should in future be involved in all decisions relating to the use of inalienable land.

In 1992, Keele University awarded him another honorary doctorate in literature.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ London Gazette . No. 34644, HMSO, London, July 11, 1939, p. 4761 ( PDF , accessed November 7, 2013, English).
  2. ↑ London Gazette . No. 46484, HMSO, London, February 4, 1975, p. 1565 ( PDF , accessed November 7, 2013, English).
personal data
SURNAME Gibson, Patrick, Baron Gibson
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gibson, Richard Patrick Tallentyre, Baron Gibson (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British politician, publisher and manager
DATE OF BIRTH February 5, 1916
PLACE OF BIRTH Kensington
DATE OF DEATH April 20, 2004
Place of death Lye Green , East Sussex