The Norwegian statesman Trygve Halvdan Lie (1896-1968), first secretary general of the United Nations, developed a political role for this new office that his successors maintained.

Trygve Lie was born in Oslo, Norway, on July 16, 1896. The son of a carpenter, he worked his way through school as an office boy with the Labor party. He was elected president of a branch of the Labor party at the age of 16. On graduation from the Oslo University faculty of law in 1919, he joined the secretariat of the Labor party.

At the age of 25 Lie was appointed one of three of the Labor party's national executive secretaries. A year later he became legal adviser to the Trade Union Federation. When the Labor government came to power in 1935, Lie, then elected to Parliament, was appointed minister of justice. In 1939 he became minister of commerce and, with the outbreak of World War II...