OVERVIEW:

FULL NAME:
William Averell Harriman

BORN:
November 15, 1891;
New York, New York 

DIED:
July 26, 1986 (age 94)
Yorktown Heights, New York,

EDUCATION:
Yale University (BA, 1913)

POLITICAL PARTY:
Republican (Before 1928)
Democratic (1928–1986)

HIGHLIGHTS:
1915:
Married Kathleen Lanier Lawrence (divorced 1929)
1915-1917:
Vice President, Union Pacific Railroad Company
1915-1946:
Director, Illinois Central Railroad Company
1915-1954:
Member, Palisades Interstate Park Commission
1917-1925:
Chairman of the board, Merchant Shipbuilding Corp.
1920-1931:
Chairman of the Board, W. A. Harriman & Co.
1925-1928:
Investment in Soviet Georgian manganese concessions
1926
Trip to USSR to investigate concessions
1930:
Married Marie Norton Whitney (died 1970)
1931-1942:
Chairman, Executive Committee, Illinois Central Railroad Co.
1931-1946:
Partner, Brown Brothers Harriman & Co.
1932-1946
Chairman of the Bboard, Union Pacific Railroad Co.
1933:
Cofounder with Vincent Astor of Today magazine (merged with Newsweek in 1937)
1934-1935:
Administrator and Special Assistant, National Recovery Administration
1935-1936:
Founded Ski Resort, Sun Valley, Idaho
1937-1939:
Chairman, Business Advisory Council
1941:
Chief, Materials Branch, Production Division, Office of Production Management
1941-1943:
Special Representative of the President to Great Britain (“Lend-Lease” mission),
Chairman of President’s Special Mission to USSR
1943-1946:
Ambassador to the Soviet Union
1946:
Ambassador to Great Britain
1946-1948:
U.S. Secretary of Commerce
1948-1950:
U.S. Coordinator European Recovery Program (Marshall Plan)
1950-1952:
Special Assistant to the President
1951-1952:
American Representative and Chairman, North Atlantic Commission on Defense Plans
1951-1953:
Director, Mutual Security Agency
1952:
Candidate for the Democratic Nomination for President
1955-1959:
Governor of New York
1956:
Candidate for the Democratic Nomination for President
1961:
Ambassador-at-large
1961-1962:
United States deputy representative, International Conference on the Settlement of the Laotian Question (Geneva Accords)
1961-1963:
Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs
1963:
Special Representative of the President for the Negotiation of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty
1963-1965:
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs
1965-1969:
Ambassador-at-large
1968-1969:
Delegation Chief, Vietnam Peace Talks in Paris, France
1971:
Married Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward
1976:
Chairman, Foreign Policy Task Force, Democratic National Committee
1977:
Member, Presidential Advisory Board on Ambassadorial Appointments
1978:
Senior member, United States delegation to the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Disarmament

PORTRAIT:

RESOURCES: 

BIOGRAPHIES:
Wikipedia

PAPERS:
Library of Congress

ORAL HISTORY:
Oral History (Truman Library, 1971)
Oral History (JFK Library #1, 4/13/1964)
Oral History (JFK Library #2, 1/17/1965
Oral History (JFK Library #3, 6/6/1965

MEDIA COVERAGE:

PROFILES:
Washington Post (11/8/1981)

OBITUARIES (7/27/1986):
New York Times
Washington Post
Los Angeles Times