- Edward R. Pease
Edward Reynolds Pease (
23 December 1857 -5 January 1955 ) was an English writer and a founding member of theFabian Society .Pease, the sixth of fifteen children, was born near
Bristol , the son of devoutQuaker s, Thomas Pease (1816-1884) and Susanna Ann Fry (1829-1917) sister ofEdward Fry , the judge. He was educated at home until he was sixteen, and soon after moved toLondon where he soon became a successful stock-broker. In the early 1880s Pease became friends withFrank Podmore and husband and wife Edith Nesbit andHubert Bland . In 1884, the group founded the Fabian Society.In 1886, the death of a wealthy relative meant Pease received a sizeable legacy allowing him to give up work at the London Stock Exchange and devote time to his
socialist interests. In 1886, he moved toNewcastle-upon-Tyne , began working as a cabinet-maker and formed a branch of theNational Labour Federation . However, his attempts to convert the working class tosocialism were unsuccessful so he returned to London. He travelled to America withSidney Webb in 1888, and on his return married Marjory Davidson, a young Scottish schoolteacher.In 1890 Pease was appointed secretary of the Fabian Society. As well as managing the society's administration, he edited "Fabian News" and wrote ten pamphlets, including tracts on liquor licensing (1899) and "The History of the Fabian Society" (1916).
With Sidney and
Beatrice Webb , Pease was a trustee in the fund used to found theLondon School of Economics (LSE) in 1895.Pease was also a member of the
Independent Labour Party and in February 1900 he represented the Fabian Society at the meeting where it was decided to establish "a distinct Labour group in Parliament", forming theLabour Representation Committee (LRC - the forerunner to the Labour Party) to which Pease was elected, serving on the Party's executive committee for 14 years.Pease married Mary (Marjory) Gammell Davidson (1861-1950). They had two children:
Michael S. Pease , the geneticist, and Nicholas Arthington Pease.With his wife Marjory, Pease established the East
Surrey Labour Party and both served on the local council. Their home atLimpsfield , The Pendicle, Pastens Road, became known as 'Dostoevsky Corner', because he housed so many Russian refugees who had been forced to leave their country because of their socialist beliefs.External links
* [http://library-2.lse.ac.uk/archives/handlists/Pease/m.html biographical record] at British Library of Political & Economic Science
*
** [http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/3/7/1/13715/13715-h/13715-h.htm "The History of the Fabian Society"] by Edward R. Pease
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