Sir Florizel Augustus Glasspole, ON, GCMG, GCVO, CD, was born in Kingston on 25 September 1909, the son of the Methodist minister the Reverend Theophilus Glasspole and Florence (JIS; NLJ). After Buff Bay Elementary School (1914–18) and Central Branch Primary, he enrolled at Wolmer’s Boys’ School in 1922 (JIS). The National Library dates the stay 1922–1926. He later recalled those years as among the best of his life: he played sport, did well in class, and left with Junior and Senior Cambridge certificates. The Guardian (19 December 2000) wrote that he “was educated at Wolmer’s high school for boys” and took part in athletics, cricket and football. More than sixty years on he chaired the school’s 250th-anniversary fundraising committee (JIS).

He wanted law; his parents could not send him to England, so he trained as an accountant. Work at Serge Island Sugar Estate in St Thomas in 1930 pushed him toward the labour movement. In 1937, with E.A. Campbell and Ernest Rae, he formed the Jamaica United Clerks Association and served as general secretary until 1948. He was a founding member of the People’s National Party in 1938. The British TUC helped him to a place at Ruskin College, Oxford; the National Library dates that scholarship to 1946.

In 1944, at the first election under universal adult suffrage, he won East Kingston and Port Royal — one of only four PNP seats. When the PNP took office in 1955 he became Minister of Labour, then Minister of Education (1957–62), returning to Education in 1972–73. JIS credits those years with Common Entrance free places, the technical high schools, CAST (now the University of Technology), and the 1970s free-education policy. He sat on the Standing Federation Committee on West Indian Federation (1953–58) and on the Independence Constitution work.

After Sir Clifford Campbell retired, Glasspole was sworn as Governor-General on 27 June 1973 — only the second Jamaican in the office. The National Library ends the term on 3 March 1991. He was asked to remain when the Jamaica Labour Party won in October 1980. He died on 25 November 2000, aged 91.

Sources

Sources: JIS, Florizel Augustus Glasspole, official GG profile; National Library of Jamaica, Sir Florizel Glasspole 1909–2000, NLJ; The Guardian, Sir Florizel Glasspole obituary, 19 December 2000.