Voces del Prado

Don Diego Angulo Was Very Serious

Francisco Manso Guerrero, Gallery attendant and Clerical Support, 1966-1991

I think don Diego Angulo left the Museum management because people were demanding more money. Don Diego agreed that the staff were underpaid and he went to the Ministry to tell them that if they didn’t increase the wages of the staff at the Museum he would resign, that if they didn’t pay the Museum staff the same as other State employees he would go. They told him it wasn’t possible, so he left. But he continued to come to the library, and when he was there nobody spoke at all. Not the girls or anybody; everybody was quiet. Because he had been Alfonso Pérez Sánchez’s teacher and he’d taught others too, and he was held in enormous esteem. Everybody respected him. If don Diego Angulo entered the library, you could go in there and there was just a resounding silence. I knew him because on some occasion we had to pass by close to the Hotel Palace, which is where the CSIC History Institute was located. Don Diego was always there, and we very often went in to see Isabel Mateo [Gómez], who was with him, and who often came over here. We went over to bring things that don Diego had requested. He was a lovely person, and really calm. But serious. He’d come in and say, “Hello, good day”.