Alexander Buel Trowbridge
Encyclopedia
United States Secretary of Commerce
The United States Secretary of Commerce is the head of the United States Department of Commerce concerned with business and industry; the Department states its mission to be "to foster, promote, and develop the foreign and domestic commerce"...
from June 14, 1967 to March 1, 1968 in the administration of Lyndon Johnson.
Alexander Trowbridge was born on December 12, 1929, in Englewood, New Jersey
Englewood, New Jersey
Englewood is a city located in Bergen County, New Jersey. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 27,147.Englewood was incorporated as a city by an Act of the New Jersey Legislature on March 17, 1899, from portions of Ridgefield Township and the remaining portions of...
. He was the son of American University
American University
American University is a private, Methodist, liberal arts, and research university in Washington, D.C. The university was chartered by an Act of Congress on December 5, 1892 as "The American University", which was approved by President Benjamin Harrison on February 24, 1893...
Professor of Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n History Alexander Buel Trowbridge, Jr., and the grandson of Alexander Buel Trowbridge, former dean of the Cornell University
Cornell University
Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...
College of Architecture (1897-1902). His grandmother Gertrude Mary Sherman was the great-great-granddaughter of American founding father Roger Sherman
Roger Sherman
Roger Sherman was an early American lawyer and politician, as well as a founding father. He served as the first mayor of New Haven, Connecticut, and served on the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence, and was also a representative and senator in the new republic...
. His mother, the former Julie Chamberlain, was the executive director of the Woodrow Wilson Foundation
Woodrow Wilson Foundation
The Woodrow Wilson Foundation was an educational non-profit created in 1922, organized under the laws of New York, for the "perpetuation of Wilson's ideals" through publications and support of research. Franklin D. Roosevelt was the national chairman, and there were local chairmen in each of the 48...
from 1942 to 1961. Trowbridge's parents divorced, and he was raised by his mother.
As a young man he attended Phillips Academy
Phillips Academy
Phillips Academy is a selective, co-educational independent boarding high school for boarding and day students in grades 9–12, along with a post-graduate year...
in Andover, Massachusetts
Andover, Massachusetts
Andover is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. It was incorporated in 1646 and as of the 2010 census, the population was 33,201...
, in 1947, graduating from Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
in 1951. After World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
he worked with various reconstruction efforts. After working with the International Intern Program of the United Nations in Lake Success, New York
Lake Success, New York
Lake Success is a village in Nassau County, New York in the United States. The population was 2,934 at the 2010 census.Lake Success is in the Town of North Hempstead on northwest Long Island. Lake Success was the temporary home of the United Nations from 1946 to 1951, occupying the headquarters of...
he attended university and served in the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
in the Marine Corps
Marine corps
A marine is a member of a force that specializes in expeditionary operations such as amphibious assault and occupation. The marines traditionally have strong links with the country's navy...
.
Between 1954 and 1965 he served as an oil businessman. In 1965 President Lyndon Johnson made him Assistant Secretary of Commerce. On 19 January 1967 he became acting Secretary of Commerce. He became Secretary of Commerce on 14 June 1967 and served until 1 March 1968, at age 36 the youngest Secretary of Commerce in American history. He resigned to return to business, serving first as the President of the American Management Association before joining Allied Chemical as Vice-Chairman of the Morristown,NJ-based parent company and Chairman of their Canadian subsidiary, Allied Chemical Canada Ltd. of Pointe-Claire (QC). He later served as head of the National Association of Manufacturers
National Association of Manufacturers
The National Association of Manufacturers is an advocacy group headquartered in Washington, D.C. with 10 additional offices across the country...
(from 1981 to 1989). In the early 1990s, he served as a member of the Competitiveness Policy Council
Competitiveness Policy Council
The Competitiveness Policy Council was an independent federal advisory committee chartered in 1988 to advise the President and the Congress on more effective policies to promote U.S. competitiveness...
.
As Secretary he proposed to re-merge the Department of Commerce with the Department of Labor
United States Department of Labor
The United States Department of Labor is a Cabinet department of the United States government responsible for occupational safety, wage and hour standards, unemployment insurance benefits, re-employment services, and some economic statistics. Many U.S. states also have such departments. The...
.
He died at his home in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, at the age of 76 after suffering from Lewy body dementia.