Arnold Jan d'Ailly
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Arnold Jan d'Ailly | |
|---|---|
.jpg) | |
| Mayor of Amsterdam | |
| In office 23 September 1946 – 1 January 1957 | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 6 February 1902 |
| Died | 24 November 1967 (aged 65) |
| Party | Labour Party |
Arnold Jan d'Ailly was mayor of Amsterdam between 1946 and 1956.[1]
Arnold Jan d'Ailly was born in Franeker and grew up in Doesburg, Gelderland as the son of a general practitioner.[1] After completing his Gymnasium Alfa exam,[2] d'Ailly studied law at the University of Amsterdam, completing his doctorate in 1926. He subsequently became a lawyer and court clerk at the Amsterdam courthouse.[2][3] In October 1929 d'Ailly traded his job in law for a range of jobs in the financial sector, so he could earn money to support his father in law, whose business had gone bankrupt following the Wall Street crash of 1929.[2] As third secretary of the Amsterdam stock exchange, he rose the corporate ranks.[2] In his private life, he married Anna Fritz in 1930 and had five children, one of which died at childbirth.[2]
In 1940, d'Ailly was promoted to director of the KAS-Vereeniging bank. He was notably cautious during the German occupation of the Netherlands between 1940 and 1945 and refused to let the KAS-Vereeniging join the Nationaal Steunfonds until 1944, despite being prompted several times and being one of only two Dutch banks to not join the Nationaal Steunfonds.[2] After 1944, he assisted in financing the 1944 railway strike that intended to break down German logistics during operation Market garden.[2]
Labour party membership
Arnold Jan d'Ailly had never publicly shown an interest in politics, until he joined the recently founded Labour Party in 1946.[2] After the war d'Ailly was considered but passed for the position of minister of finance in the Schermerhorn–Drees cabinet, and continued serving in finance where he climbed the ranks to become board member of the Central Bank of the Netherlands, as well as head of the Herstelbank, a financial institute tasked with managing funds for the wartime recovery.[2] At this point in time, d'Ailly enjoyed a position of status amongst Amsterdam socialites.[2]
