Who was the chair of Castres from Feb 1953 to Mar 1971?
Castres Castres ( ; Castras in the Languedocian dialect of Occitan ) is a commune , and arrondissement capital in the Tarn department and Occitanie region in southern France . It lies in the former French province of Languedoc . Castres is ( after Toulouse , Tarbes and Albi ) the fourth-largest industrial centre of the predominantly rural Midi-Pyrénées région and the largest in that part of Languedoc lying between Toulouse and Montpellier . Castres is noted for being the birthplace of the famous socialist leader Jean Jaurès and home to the important Goya Museum of Spanish painting . Demography . In 1831 , the population of Castres was 12,032 , making it the largest town of the department of Tarn . One of the few industrial towns in the region of Albigeois , the population of the commune proper grew to 19,483 in 1901 , and 34,126 by 1954 ( 44,161 inhabitants in the metropolitan area ) . However , with the decline of its industries , population growth diminished . Albi surpassed Castres as the most populous metropolitan area of Tarn . The population of Castres reached its peak in 1975 , after that it has been decreasing slowly . Geography . Castres is located at an altitude of above sea level . It is located south-southeast of Albi , the préfecture ( capital ) of Tarn , and east of Toulouse , the capital of Midi-Pyrénées . Castres is intersected from north to south by the Agout and Durenque rivers . The Thoré forms most of the communes south-eastern border , then flows into the Agout , which forms part of its western border . Administration . Between 1790 and 1797 Castres was the prefecture of Tarn . Since 2001 , the mayor of Castres has been Pascal Bugis ( right , member of UMP ) , who defeated the then socialist mayor in the 2001 election after a campaign focused on the bad records of the socialist mayor on fighting crime , and the high level of insecurity in the town . Castres has teamed up with the nearby town of Mazamet ( southeast of Castres ) and the independent suburbs and villages in between to create the Greater Castres-Mazamet Council ( Communauté dagglomération de Castres-Mazamet ) , which was established in January 2000 ( succeeding a previous district which had been created in 1993 with fewer powers than the current council ) . The Greater Castres-Mazamet Council groups 16 independent communes ( including Castres and Mazamet ) , with a total population of 79,988 inhabitants ( at the 1999 census ) , 54% of these living in the commune of Castres proper , 13% in the commune of Mazamet , and the rest in the communes in between . The Greater Castres-Mazamet Council was created in order to better coordinate transport , infrastructure , housing , and economic policies between the communes of the area . The current president of the Greater Castres-Mazamet Council is Jacques Limouzy ( Gaullist , member of UMP ) , former mayor of Castres before 1995 , who became president in 2001 . History . The name of the town comes from Latin castrum , and means fortified place . Castres grew up round the Benedictine abbey of Saint Benoît , which is believed to have been founded in AD 647 , possibly on the site of an old Roman fort ( castrum ) . Castres became an important stop on the international pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostela in Spain because its abbey-church , built in the 9th century , was keeping the relics of Saint Vincent , the renowned martyr of Spain . It was a place of some importance as early as the 12th century , and ranked as the second town of the Albigeois behind Albi . Despite the decline of its abbey , which in 1074 came under the authority of Saint Victor abbey in Marseille , Castres was granted a liberal charter in the 12th century by the famous Trencavel family , viscounts of Albi . Resulting from the charter , Castres was ruled by a college of consuls . During the Albigensian Crusade it surrendered of its own accord to Simon de Montfort , and thus entered into the kingdom of France in 1229 . In 1317 , Pope John XXII established the bishopric of Castres . In 1356 , the town of Castres was raised to a countship by King John II of France . However , the town greatly suffered from the Black Plague in 1347-1348 , then from the Black Prince of England and the Free Companies ( bands of lawless mercenaries ) who laid waste the country during the Hundred Years War . Consequently , by the late 14th century Castres entered a period of sharp decline . In 1375 , there were only 4,000 inhabitants left in town , only half the figure from a century before . Following the confiscation of the possessions of Jacques dArmagnac , duke of Nemours , to which the countship of Castres had passed , it was bestowed in 1476 by King Louis XI on Boffille de Juge ( Boffillo del Giudice ) , an Italian nobleman and adventurer serving as a diplomat for Louis XI , but the appointment led to so much disagreement ( family feud between Boffille de Juge , his only daughter , and his brother-in-law ) that the countship was united to the crown by King Francis I in 1519 . Around 1560 , the majority of the population of Castres converted to Protestantism . In the wars of the latter part of the 16th century the inhabitants sided with the Protestant party , fortified the town , and established an independent republic . Castres was one of the largest Protestant strongholds in southern France , along with Montauban and La Rochelle . Henry of Navarre , leader of the Protestant party , who later became King Henry IV of France , stayed in Castres in 1585 . The Protestants of Castres were brought to terms , however , by King Louis XIII in 1629 , and Richelieu came himself to Castres to have its fortifications dismantled . Nonetheless , after these religious wars , the town , now in peace , enjoyed a period of rapid expansion . Business and traditional commercial activities revived , in particular fur and leather-dressing , tanning , and above all wool trade . Culture flourished anew , with the founding of the Academy of Castres in 1648 . Castres was turned by the Catholic Church into an active center of Counter-Reformation , with the establishments of several convents in town , and the building of a renowned bishops palace by Mgr . Tubœuf , still the most famous monument in town today . A new cathedral was also built , after the destructions of the religious wars . Perhaps even more important , Castres was made the seat of the Chambre de lÉdit of the Parliament of Toulouse , a court of justice detached from the Parliament of Toulouse and in charge of dealing with the cases involving the Protestants of Languedoc , a measure of protection granted to them by the Edict of Nantes . This court attracted much business to Castres . In 1665 , there were 7,000 inhabitants in Castres , 4,000 of whom Catholic , and 3,000 Protestant . In 1670 however , the Chambre de lÉdit was transferred to Castelnaudary , much to the discontent of even the catholic citizens of Castres , who lost a major source of business and revenue with the departure of the lawyers and the plaintiffs . The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes soon followed , and Castres suffered greatly when many Protestants chose to go into exile . Then came the plague of 1720-1721 and the fire of 1724 . Last but not least , Castres lost its liberal charter in 1758 . In the 1760s , a few years after the famous Calas Affair in Toulouse , Castres made the headlines nationwide : Pierre-Paul Sirven and his wife , both Protestants , were wrongly accused of having murdered their daughter in order to prevent her from converting to Catholicism . Tried and sentenced to death in absentia on March 29 , 1764 , they were defended by Voltaire , and eventually exonerated in 1771 . The outbreak of the French Revolution was generally welcomed in Castres , particularly among the local Protestant merchants and entrepreneurs , but the majority of the population remained moderate during the whole period . In 1793 for instance , Protestant pastor Alba La Source , Castres representative at the Convention in Paris , opposed the deportation of non-juror Catholic priests to French Guiana , where death in the horrid jungle was certain ( see Civil Constitution of the Clergy ) . Non-juror priests were by far the majority in the region of Castres . Accused of being a moderate , Alba La Source was guillotined in October 1793 . Suspected of being lukewarm toward the revolution , Castres was duly chastised . The bishopric which had been established by Pope John XXII in 1317 was abolished , Castres later becoming part of the bishopric of Albi . Capital of the of Tarn in 1790 , the town was downgraded to capital of an arrondissement in 1797 , Albi being made the capital of the . Despite these setbacks , in the 19th century the economy of Castres developed greatly , and the town grew outside of its old medieval center . As early as 1815 , the first mechanized wool mill was set up in town . Originally specialized in luxury cloth , the Castres textile industry then turned toward more ordinary types of cloth , whose markets were considerably larger . Around 1860 , there were 50 wool mills in town , employing 3,000 people . In the end of the 19th century , mechanical engineering industries appeared beside the textile industry , which led to Castres becoming a major arsenal for the French army during the First World War . Castres was linked to the French railway network in 1865 . At the end of the 19th century , Castres was the largest town in the of Tarn , with 5,000 more inhabitants than Albi . However , in the 20th century the town entered a new period of decline . Although Castres emerged from the two world wars unscathed , no military operations or combats taking place in southwest France , the local economy has been hard hit by change . Like so many towns and cities of Europe which had benefited most from the Industrial Revolution , Castres is experiencing a difficult restructuring of its industrial base . Textile has particularly suffered . Castres is also crippled by its geographical location , isolated in a dead end at the foot of the Massif Central mountains , away from the main exchange and transport routes . Castres is still not connected to the motorway ( freeway ) network of France , the only town of that size in France not yet connected . The creation of the Greater Castres-Mazamet Council in 2000 was expected to deal with the transport problem , and to work on attracting new industries . The good fortune of Castres is to be located only away from the very dynamic Toulouse . The long-promised motorway link with Toulouse is due to be completed soon , and Castres hopes to benefit from its proximity with the big Occitan city . Economy . The principal industries are mechanical and electrical engineering , machine tools , wooden furniture , granite , textile , fur and leather-dressing , tanning , chemicals , pharmaceuticals , and selective breeding of cows . Traditional and polluting industries such as textile , tanning , fur and leather-dressing , or chemicals , are in sharp decline . However , a multinational pharmaceutical group ( Pierre Fabre Group ) emerged in the town in the 1960s , and it has kept its headquarters and R&D division in the metropolitan area , helping to counterbalance the general decline in industry . Some now accuse its founder and president , Pierre Fabre , of being the real master of Castres , making and designating Castres mayors at will . Transport . The Gare de Castres railway station is served by regional trains to Mazamet and Toulouse . People . Castres is the hometown of socialist politician and newspaper publisher Jean Jaurès ( 1859–1914 ) , who was murdered in Paris the day before the start of the First World War . Mathematician Pierre de Fermat died in Castres in 1665 , while attending a session of the Chambre de lÉdit there . French writer Roger Peyrefitte was born into a wealthy family of Castres in 1907 . Former French footballer Claude Puel was also born in Castres . Other people born in the city include : - Guilhabert de Castres - Cathar bishop - Nicolas Jean de Dieu Soult - Politician and marshal during the Napoleonic wars - André Dacier - Scholar - John Ligonier , 1st Earl Ligonier - British general - Paul de Rapin - Historian - Roger Peyrefitte - Diplomat and author - Claude Puel - Football player and manager - Charles Blanc - Art critic - Yannick Jauzion - Rugby union player - Clément Poitrenaud - Rugby union player - Pierre Camara - Athlete - Pierre-Paul Sirven - philosopher - Maryline Salvetat -cyclist . - Guillaume Borne - footballer - Maurice Gabolde - Minister of Justice in the Vichy regime of Philippe Petain - Lore Baudrit - ice hockey player Residents of Castres include : - Paul Pellisson - Author - Anne Lefèvre - Scholar - Jean Bon Saint-André - Politician during the Revolution era - Bernardo Gui - Inquisitor - Philip of Montfort , Lord of Castres - Nobleman - Boffille de Juge - Statesman - Vincent Baron - Theologian - Pierre de Fermat - Mathematician - Kees Meeuws - Rugby union player - Christophe Farnaud - French ambassador to Greece - Hans Bellmer - Artist Main sights . Castres is intersected from north to south by the Agout River . The river is fringed by old houses the upper stories of which project over its waters . The church of Saint Benoît , once the cathedral of Castres , and the most important of the churches of Castres today , dates only from the 17th and 18th centuries . The city hall occupies the former bishops palace , designed in the 17th century by Jules Hardouin-Mansart ( the architect of Versailles ) , and with gardens designed by André Le Nôtre ( the designer of the gardens in Versailles ) . The Romanesque tower beside it ( Tour Saint Benoît ) is the only survival of the old Benedictine abbey . The town possesses some old mansions from the 16th and 17th century , including the Hôtel de Nayrac , of the Renaissance . Castres possesses the renowned Goya Museum , created in 1840 , which contains the largest collection of Spanish paintings in France . A Jaurès Museum was also opened in 1954 in the house where Jean Jaurès was born in 1859 . The Jardin botanique Pierre Fabre La Michonne is a private botanical garden and conservatory that can be visited . Sports . As one might expect of a town of western Occitania nicknamed Ovalie , the main sport in Castres is rugby union , followed religiously by many locals . The local professional club is Castres Olympique , who are five-time champions of France as well as the current champions ( in 1949 , 1950 , 1993 , 2013 and 2018 ) . Castres Olympique is the property of local tycoon Pierre Fabre , founder and president of Pierre Fabre Group . The finish of Stage 12 of the 2007 Tour de France was in Castres . Education . - Jean-François Champollion University Center for Teaching and Research Cinema . Castres is the place where a short film festival occurs each year Medias . The city happened to see the birth of its first student radio ( ) in 2007 . Twin towns . Castres is twinned with : - Linares , Spain - Wakefield , England - Butare , Rwanda