Administrative History | Gleb Kerensky, the younger son of Alexander Kerensky and Olga Lvovna was born in St Petersburg on 7 December 1907. After the Bolshevik revolution of November 1917, he remained in Russia with his mother and older brother Oleg. After a period in the Lubianka prison in Moscow in 1918, the family were released, and returned to St Petersburg where he went to boarding school. In 1920 they escaped to Sweden through Estonia and shortly afterwards arrived in England.
He went to Oakfield school in North London, and then took a degree in Mechanical Engineering as an internal student of the University of London at Northampton Engineering College and graduated in 1927. He then began work as an engineer for the English Electric Company, later GEC, first in Birmingham, then transferred to Rugby to work on hydro-electric turbines and projects, with a period in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers during the 1939-1945 war, serving in Holland. His particular interests were in valves, especially 'straightflow' and 'butterfly' types. The features he pioneered were adopted by major valve manufacturers internationally. After he retired he worked as a consultant for the GEC Hydro-Electric Division (Australia). He maintained an interest in Russian politics and was a founding member of the British Free Russia Movement.
He married Mary Hudson in 1944 and they had a son, Stephen, and two daughters, Katherine and Elizabeth. He died in Rugby in December 1990. |