Georges Pompidou

July 5, 1911 – April 2, 1974

Georges Pompidou (1911-1974) was President of France from 1969 until his death in 1974. He had previously served as Prime Minister of France from 1962 to 1968 under President Charles de Gaulle.

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Biography

Georges Pompidou was born on 5 July 1911 in Montboudif, in the Cantal department of south-central France, the grandson of farmers of modest means. After preparatory classes in Toulouse and at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, where he befriended Léopold Sédar Senghor, he attended the École Normale Supérieure and qualified with the agrégation in literature. He taught literature at the Lycée Henri-IV in Paris.

In 1953 Guy de Rothschild hired him at the Rothschild bank, which he ran as general manager from 1956 to 1962; he also managed a foundation set up by Charles de Gaulle. He sat on the new Constitutional Council from 1959, and in April 1962 de Gaulle made him prime minister, a post he held until July 1968, longer than anyone else in the Fifth Republic. During the unrest of May 1968 he sought to separate the striking workers from the students by negotiating with unions and employers at Grenelle, then led the Gaullists to a large victory in the 1968 legislative elections before resigning.

After de Gaulle resigned in 1969, Pompidou won the presidency, defeating Alain Poher with 58 percent in the second round. He continued Gaullist modernisation, backing industrial groups, the TGV high-speed train and the civil nuclear program, and his governments introduced a minimum wage and a ministry of the environment. Abroad he improved relations with the United States, kept close ties with the Soviet Union and dropped France's opposition to British entry into the European Community, which took effect in 1973.

He died in office on 2 April 1974 of Waldenström's disease. The Centre Pompidou in Paris, which he initiated, opened in 1977 and carries his name.