ACCESSION NUMBER:00000
FILE ID:95082802.WWE
DATE:08/28/95
TITLE:28-08-95 SECRETARY OF DEFENSE WILLIAM J. PERRY
TEXT:
(Official biography) (580)
(The following biography of Secretary of Defense William J. Perry was
provided August 28, 1995, by the press office of the Department of
Defense. Secretary Perry will begin a trip September 15, visiting
Slovenia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and the Marshall
Center in Garmisch, Germany.)
Dr. William J. Perry was sworn in as Secretary of Defense on February
3, 1994, following a unanimous vote by the Senate. He previously
served as Deputy Secretary of Defense from March 5, 1993, until his
confirmation as Secretary. Prior to his nomination to these positions,
he was the chairman of Technology Strategies & Alliances, a professor
in the School of Engineering at Stanford University, and co-director
of Stanford's Center for International Security and Arms Control.
Dr. Perry was born Oct. 11, 1927, in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania. He
received his B.S. and M.S. from Stanford University and his Ph.D. from
Penn State, all in mathematics. He is a member of the National Academy
of Engineering and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences.
From 1946 until 1947, Dr. Perry was a noncommissioned officer in the
Army Corps of Engineers, serving in Japan and Okinawa. He joined the
Reserve Officer Training Corps in 1948 and was commissioned a second
lieutenant in the Army Reserves in 1950. He remained in the reserves
until 1955.
Dr. Perry's extensive experience as an entrepreneur includes being one
of the founders of ESL Inc. in 1964 and serving as its president until
1977. Prior to that, he was with Sylvania/General Telephone and was
the director of their Electronic Defense Laboratories. He has also
served as executive vice president of Hambrecht and Quist
Incorporated, an investment banking firm in San Francisco specializing
in high technology companies.
From 1977 to 1981, Dr. Perry was Under Secretary of Defense for
Research and Engineering. As the Under Secretary, he was responsible
for all weapon systems procurement and all research and development.
He was the Secretary of Defense's principal advisor on technology,
communications, intelligence, and atomic energy.
He received the Army's Outstanding Service Medal in 1977, the
Department of Defense's Distinguished Public Service Medal in 1980 and
again in 1981, and NASA's Distinguished Service Medal in 1981. He was
awarded the 1980 Medal of Achievement by the American Electronics
Association. The Federal Republic of Germany awarded him the Knight
Commander's Cross in 1981, and the French government conferred the
Grand Officer de L'Ordre National du Merite in 1982. He received the
James Forrestal Memorial Award for 1993 in March 1994.
Dr. Perry has served as a director of FMC Corporation, United
Technologies Corporation, and a number of private companies. He has
also been a trustee of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
and served on a number of U.S. government advisory boards, including
the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board and the Technical
Review Panel of the U.S. Senate's Select Committee on Intelligence. He
is a member of the Carnegie Commission on Science, Technology, and
Government and the Committee on International Security and Arms
Control of the National Academy of Science.
His wife, Lee, is a CPA, formerly associated with the firm of Hemming
and Morse in San Mateo. Secretary and Mrs. Perry have two sons living
in the San Francisco area, a son and a daughter in the Washington,
D.C. area, and a daughter in New York.
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