After serving in U. S. Army intelligence during World War II, McGeorge Bundy worked as an assistant to former Secretary of War, Henry L. Stimson. Though he considered himself a Republican, then Harvard Dean of Faculty, Mr. Bundy was disillusioned with 1960 Republican candidate Richard Nixon, and organized support for Kennedy among academics and scientists. Bundy was appointed Special Assistant to the President for National Security in 1961. He was considered one of the "best and brightest" of President Kennedy's circle of advisors and cabinet members. Following President Kennedy's assassination, Mr. Bundy stayed on as President Johnson's National Security Adviser, and was best known for his role as a supporter of the American military effort in Vietnam. He resigned in 1966 to become President of the Ford Foundation.
1919 Born, Boston, Massachusetts
1940 A.B., Yale University
1941 Junior fellow, Harvard University
1941-1946 Served, United States Army
1946-1947 Assistant to Henry L. Stimson
1948-1949 Political Analyst, Council on Foreign Relations
1949-1951 Visiting Lecturer, Harvard University
1951-1954 Associate Professor of Government, Harvard University
1953-1961 Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Harvard University
1954-1961 Professor of Government, Harvard University
1961-1966 Special Assistant to the President for National Security
1966- President, Ford Foundation
1996 Died
Author
On Active Service in Peace and War, 1948.
The Strength of Government, 1968.
Presidential Promises and Performance (with Edmund S. Muskie), 1980.
Danger and Survival: Choices about the Bomb in the First Fifty Years, 1988.
Reducing Nuclear Danger: The Road Away from the Brink (with William J. Crowe, Jr. and Sidney D. Drell), 1993.
Editor
Pattern of Responsibility, 1952.
Contributor: US Interests and Global Natural Resources: Energy, Minerals, Food, (ed. Emery N. Castle and Kent A. Price), 1980.
Source
"McGeorge Bundy." Encyclopedia of World Biography, 2nd ed. 17 Vols. Gale Research, 1998.
Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, MI: The Gale Group. 2004.
See also
Archives and Manuscripts
Oral History Project