A zest for action, a thirst for new ideas

He first joined Outward Bound as a student on a four-week OB course at Aberdovey in 1949. Half a century later, in December 1999, Derek Pritchard retired from his position as Executive Director of Outward Bound International Secretariat.

Derek�s remarkable career in the OB movement is unlikely to be emulated in the future. By a combination of good judgement and good fortune, he was able to influence and promote the growth of OB world-wide for over 40 years.

Derek trained as a painter at the Royal Academy in London, also serving as a commissioned officer in the Parachute Regiment.

Already a skilled mountaineer and expeditioner when he joined OB, he set about learning the other outdoor skills with alacrity. It is unusual to find one person with such a range of talents, physical, organizational and creative. He was always adept at maintaining space for private interests, something difficult for most of those employed in OB�s intensive work environment.

Derek�s first OB staff position was at Eskdale. He then became an instructor at Man o� War Bay in the Cameroons, and Executive Officer at the Citizenship and Leadership Training Centre in Northern Nigeria.

In 1962, Derek returned to Eskdale as a senior instructor. In the archive is an interesting historical record of him with his group, "starring" in the BBC TV film A Hard Course. In 1963 Derek was invited to conduct a tour through several newly independent African countries to promote OB; we noted at the time that armed insurrection broke out in several states soon after he left.

Shortly after this African safari, he was invited to become warden of the East African OB school at Loitokitok, in those days serving Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The demanding climax of the course was the ascent of Kilimanjaro, over 19,000 feet. Derek organized the well-publicized ascent of the mountain by a group of blind students.

He remained at Loitokitok through the early and sensitive years after Kenyan independence until 1968, when he came back to Britain to succeed Ian Fraser as warden of Outward Bound Devon. There he initiated pioneering courses for disabled people. Derek created a talented team of staff, many of whom still meet regularly despite the closure of the school in the mid-1970s.

Derek moved in 1973 to Minnesota, to take over as Director at the second OB school founded in the USA. Although he inherited problems at what later became the Voyageur OB School, Derek succeeded in synthesizing the distinctive aspects of British and American OB practice. He developed ground-breaking outreach and community programs.

He and his family found the people and culture of the United States highly congenial; it is no surprise that he has chosen to live in the USA after retirement.

In 1983, as Executive Director, Derek expanded the physical facilities of at OB Hong Kong. He created a wide range of programs appropriate to the special circumstances of the city, and established strong support within the community. He explored options for extending activities into Mainland China and across the South China Sea.

Derek was also able to play a key role in community organizations, and indulge his delight in sailing. Those who visited him in Hong Kong will have warm memories of exceptional hospitality and a beautiful home in a spectacular coastal setting.

In 1997, shortly after hosting the 1996 International Conference in Hong Kong, Derek accepted the post of International Secretary, at a new base in Vancouver, BC.

He was able at last to create an influential International Secretariat, introducing common basic guidelines for operational practice and safety. The Secretariat under his guidance provided substantial encouragement and assistance in the recent establishment of new schools in Eastern Europe, South America and Asia.

In many ways, Derek exemplifies the Outward Bound stereotype. He focuses with fierce commitment on the task in hand and yet forever casts ahead for new challenges. When his imagination is fired by some new project, he pursues it with single-minded commitment until he has mastered its technicalities. One is reminded of his early interest in the world of computers and the Internet, or his wholehearted devotion to sailing, both interests taken up later in his career. Yet his zest for action is matched by his thirst for new ideas and his great capacity for friendship.

One product of his OB experience has been an exceptional range of contacts and relationships. Although Derek possesses to an unusual degree the capacity to move on without too much nostalgia for the past, he has retained his contact with former colleagues. Indeed, I have a recent photograph of him this last summer on a wet July evening in Eskdale, where his instructing career began, gleefully refereeing a chaotic game of blow-football between former colleagues in a half-lit marquee in a sodden field.

One cannot seek to summarize Derek�s life and career without reference to his vivacious life partner throughout these often-tempestuous years. Pat has been a constant presence, support and foil to his mercurial personality. Only a person with an equally adventurous and independent spirit could have reconciled the tasks of bringing up a talented family, retaining a range of separate interests and still supporting Derek throughout his world-wide OB life-journey.

It can be said of Derek as of few others that he has lived his life to the full, both within and beyond his work with OB. One of the greatest strengths and assets of OB has always been its internationalism and its spread of influence world-wide across differing cultures. It was for some a matter of regret that this unequalled asset was not built upon for far too long.

Derek, both in his own career, and as International Secretary supported by his International Board, has done much to change this, and I believe this may ultimately prove his most important legacy. There is no other individual professionally involved in OB who has contributed so much over a span so long and so wide.

Roger Putnam