I am very sorry to have to report the death in Brazil of Norman Pegden on
7 July, after several months' very painful and distressing illness.

Born in England in 1934, Norman trained originally as an artist and then
as an art teacher. He first joined the staff of the the newly built
Herbert Art Gallery, Coventry, but soon moved to become Director of the
Bradford Museums and Art Gallery, Yorkshire, while still in his early
thirties.

It was the success of his work there, particularly with international
contemporary art and community relations work, that brought Norman to the
notice of the then ICOM Director-General, Hugues de Varine, during the
1969 Museums Association annual conference.  As a result ICOM appointed
Norman as deputy to Hugues' in the ICOM Secretariat, taking up the
appointment at the beginning of 1970.  His contract was initially for three
years, but was later extended, so that he worked for ICOM until the end of
the 1974 General Conference in Copenhagen.

Within ICOM he shared very closely with Hugues much of the work on the
extensive reforms of ICOM policies and operations during that critical
period in ICOM's history, which included major reforms in the definition
of a museum, in ICOM's membership, structure and policy. During these
few years ICOM changed from a delegate body of just a few hundred
nominated representatives of national museums, ministries and
associations, into an membership organisation open to every member of the
museum profession.

ICOM also became far more international in its operations and the period
also saw such other reforms as the establishment of the ICOM Training Unit
and the ICOM Basic Syllabus. Through all this Hugues was closely supported
by Norman, who amongst other things saw to the effective running of the
Secretariat during Hugues many operational and consultative missions.

On leaving the Secretariat in 1974, Norman went back to England, this time
to the newly established Leicestershire Museums, Arts and Records Service
as Assistant Director, Arts, (later Arts & History).  There he contributed
to major expansion, reforms and improvements, particularly the
re-construction of the New Walk Museum's art galleries, the creation and
running of the Leicester Arts Council and Festival, and later the planning
for the Snibston Discovery Park.  He also became very active in ICOM at
the member level, especially with the establishment and development of
the International Committee for Museum Security (ICMS) and in particular
its advisory publications and standards.

He took early retirement from Leicestershire in the 1987 and moved to
Brazil, where he and Cristina Mendez, (also an ICMS member) married.



Patrick Boylan
(Director, Leicestershire Museums & Galleries, 1972 - 1990)

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