Harold Brown (Secretary of Defense)

Harold Brown


14th United States Secretary of Defense
In office January 21, 1977 – January 20, 1981
President	Jimmy Carter
Preceded by	Donald Rumsfeld
Succeeded by	Caspar Weinberger
Personal details
Born	(1927-09-19) September 19, 1927 (age 89) New York City, NY, U.S.
Spouse(s)	Colene Dunning McDowell (m. 1953; 2 children)
Alma mater	Columbia University
Profession	Physicist

Harold Brown (born September 19, 1927) is an American scientist who served as U.S. Secretary of Defense from 1977 to 1981 in the cabinet of President Jimmy Carter. He had previously served in the John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson administrations as Director of Defense Research and Engineering and Secretary of the Air Force.

While Secretary of Defense, he insisted in laying the groundwork for the Camp David accords. He took part in the strategic arms negotiations with the Soviet Union and supported, unsuccessfully, ratification of the SALT II treaty. He advocated détente with the Soviet Union, an issue over which he conflicted with National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski.

Brown was born in New York City and graduated from the Bronx High School of Science; Brown took three degrees at Columbia University, including, at age 21 in 1949, a Ph.D. in physics. After a short period of teaching and postdoctoral research, Brown became a research scientist at the Radiation Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley. In 1952 he joined the staff of the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory at Livermore, California, and became its director in 1960. During the 1950s he served as a member of or consultant to several federal scientific bodies and as senior science adviser at the 1958-59 Conference on the Discontinuance of Nuclear Tests. Brown worked under Robert McNamara as director of defense research and engineering from 1961 to 1965, and then as Secretary of the Air Force from October 1965 to February 1969. Between 1969 and 1977, he was president of the California Institute of Technology.