After it was mentioned in class today – and with the
discussion of unpublicized acts of courage - I thought I would share some more information
about Professor Elliott, Sr. This comes from Hugh Wilford’s very interesting
biography of the CIA and its role in American culture, The Mighty Wurlitzer.
“Kissinger had been put in touch with the Office of Policy
Coordination by Harvard professor William Y. Elliott. An all-American tackle at
Vanderbilt, poet of the southern Fugitive school, and Roosevelt braintruster,
Elliott had done his best academic work, on European political relations, in
the 1920s, thereafter living off his reputation as the “grand seigneur” of
Harvard’s Government Department and trusted counselor of six U.S. presidents. […]
In addition to regularly advising Frank Wisner, Elliott helped the CIA by
sitting on the board of the émigré organization AMCOMLIB, overseeing student
front groups, and steering promising Harvard graduates toward secret government
service.
[…] It was Elliott who provided the future National Security
Advisor and Secretary of State [Kissinger] with his principal power base at
Harvard – and Launchpad for his rise to global celebrity – in the shape of the
university’s International Summer School.”
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