George Beharrell
Sir (John) George Beharrell (1873-1959)
1873 Born in Almondbury son of [1]George and Elizabeth Beharrell
1879 His father died
1911 John George Beharrell 38, railway manager, lived in York with Kate Beharrell 33, George Edward Beharrell 11, Kathleen Mabel Beharrell 7[2]
WWI One of a number of North Eastern Railway managers who entered government service with Eric Geddes
Post-WWI Worked for Geddes on the control of public expenditure
1922 October. Joined Dunlop Rubber Co where Eric Geddes was chairman.
1923 November. Became Joint MD of Dunlop
1926 President of the India Rubber Manufacturers Association
1927-29 President of the SMMT
1932-3 President of the Federation of British Industries
1933-36 President of the Institute of the Rubber Industry
1935 Chairman of the 6th International Congress for Scientific Management
Sometime Chairman of Imperial Airways
1937-49 Chairman of Dunlop
1939 Chairman of Dunlop Rubber Co, chairman of Prime Minister's Advisory Panel; lived in Harpenden with his wife Kate[3]
1959 February 20th. Died aged 85 years. [4]
1959 Obituary [5]
SIR GEORGE BEHARRELL, who died at Harpenden, Hertfordshire, last Friday, February 20, was one of this country's prominent industrialists. He was an authority on transport matters, spent many years in the rubber industry and, during both world wars, occupied important posts in Government service. Sir George was eighty-five.
John George Beharrell was born at Almondbury, near Huddersfield, and began his education at King James's School, Almondbury. He left there at the age of fifteen to join the clerical department of the North Eastern Railway at York, a post which he later relinquished in order to study at Leeds University.
He subsequently returned to the North Eastern Railway Company and, by 1914, was assistant goods manager and commercial agent at York. In the following year, Sir George was appointed to the Ministry of Munitions as director of statistics and requirements and shortly afterwards went to France as assistant director-general of transportation. In the later stages of the first world war, Sir George was transferred to the Admiralty as director of statistics, his work being primarily concerned with the U-boat menace to British shipping. After the war, Sir George (who was created a knight in 1919) joined the newly-formed Ministry of Transport as director-general of finance and statistics and in 1921 served as financial adviser to the Geddes committee on national expenditure.
Sir George left the Civil Service in 1922 to join the Dunlop Rubber Company. He became managing director of the company in 1923, chairman in 1937, and from 1949 until 1957 was the company's president. During his thirty-five years of service with Dunlop, Sir George filled many public offices, including president of the India Rubber Manufacturers Association, president of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, and president of the Federation of British Industries. In 1935, he served as chairman of the Sixth International Congress for Scientific Management and, in 1938, he was appointed to the Prime Minister's Panel of Industrialists. During the second world war, Sir George was director-general of raw material controls at the Ministry of Supply.