23 Facts About Hugh Shearer

Hugh Lawson Shearer was a Jamaican trade unionist and politician, who served as the 3rd Prime Minister of Jamaica, from 1967 to 1972.

Hugh Shearer was Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade from 1980 to 1989, under Edward Seaga.

Hugh Shearer's father was James Shearer, a former soldier, and his mother was Esther Lindo, a dressmaker.

Hugh Shearer attended St Simon's College after winning a parish scholarship to the school and later received an honorary LLD from Howard University School of Law.

Hugh Shearer continued to get promotion after promotion within the union and acquired a Government Trade Union scholarship in 1947.

Hugh Shearer was appointed Island Supervisor of Bustamante's trade union, BITU, and shortly afterwards elected vice-president of the union.

Hugh Shearer was elected to the House of Representatives of Jamaica as member for Western Kingston in 1955, an office he retained for the next four years until he was defeated in the 1959 elections.

Hugh Shearer was a member of the Senate from 1962 to 1967, at the same time filling the role of Jamaica's chief spokesman on foreign affairs as Deputy Chief of Mission at the United Nations.

Thanks to his work with the Jamaican Worker earlier in his life, Hugh Shearer managed to stay on generally good terms with the Jamaican working class, and was generally well liked by the populace.

Hugh Shearer stood by the ban claiming that Rodney was a danger to Jamaica, citing his socialist ties, trips to Cuba and the USSR, as well as his radical Black nationalism.

Hugh Shearer was generally uncomfortable with notions of pan-Africanism or militant black nationalism.

Hugh Shearer was insecure about the stability of newly independent Jamaica in the late 1960s.

Hugh Shearer's term as prime minister was a prosperous one for Jamaica, with three new alumina refineries were built, along with three large tourist resorts.

Hugh Shearer's term was marked by a great upswing in secondary school enrolment after an intense education campaign on his part.

In 1974, Hugh Shearer was replaced as leader of the JLP by Edward Seaga, because it was said that white and light skin brown Jamaican upper class even resented the fact that the Jamaica Labour Party had a darker skin leader.

Between 1980 and 1989, during the prime ministership of Seaga, Hugh Shearer was deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs.

Hugh Shearer, while working as a journalist, married his first wife Lunette, an accounting clerk, on 7 October 1947.

Hugh Shearer was separated from his first wife, with whom he had three children, by the time he became prime minister in 1967.

Hugh Shearer married his second wife, Dr Denise Eldemire, on 28 August 1998.

Hugh Shearer is the daughter of the late Dr Herbert Eldemire, who served as Jamaica's first Health Minister from 1962 to 1972.

Hugh Shearer died at his home in Kingston on 15 July 2004, at the age of 81.

Hugh Shearer was survived by his wife, sons Corey Alexander, Howard, Lance and Donald, and daughters Hope, Hilary, Heather, Mischka Garel, and Ana Margaret Sanchez.

The $5000 bill with Hugh Shearer's portrait was put in circulation on 24 September 2009.