Both Sides of The Coin: The Story of The Central Bank of Barbados 1972-2017

20 a number of benefits. The appointment could be terminated by three months’ notice in writing or the payment of a sum of money on either side. Two weeks later Blackman, by return mail, accepted the appointment and vowed to do his best to justify the confidence the prime minister had placed in him. Courtney Newlands Blackman, who was born in 1933, won a Barbados Exhibition at Harrison College in 1952, enabling him to study Modern History at the then University College of the West Indies at Mona, Jamaica. He graduated with an honours degree in 1956 and for the next two years worked with ALCAN Jamaica Limited, first as administrative trainee and later as personnel officer. Between 1958 and 1963, Dr. Blackman taught at Kingston College in Jamaica, the Sekondi Secondary School in Ghana 14 and Harrison College. Returning to academia, he then gained a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree from Inter-American University in Puerto Rico. Assuming that money and banking offered strong job opportunities, in 1969 he obtained a doctorate in Money, Banking and International Business from Columbia University, New York. 15 Thereafter, Blackman worked for a while as an associate economist and assistant secretary with the Irving Trust Company in New York before joining the staff of Hofstra University, Long Island, in 1971. In 1972, when he was recruited for the post of governor of the Central Bank, Blackman was associate professor of management at Hofstra and a private consultant in management and economic development. The appointment of Blackman was a very bold move by Barrow. The new governor, at 39 years old, was the youngest in the world and had no experience in central banking, managing a large staff or even chairing a board meeting. The appointment was also historic since it was the first time that a central bank in the Anglophone Caribbean had been managed Dr. (later Sir) Courtney Blackman.