Huntington D. Sheldon, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death
TweetHuntington D. Sheldon
CIA officer
Date of Birth: 14-Feb-1903
Place of Birth: Greenwich, Connecticut, United States
Date of Death: 19-May-1987
Nationality: United States
Zodiac Sign: Aquarius 
About Huntington D. Sheldon
- Huntington Denton "Ting" Sheldon (February 14, 1903 – May 19, 1987) served as the Director of the Office of Current Intelligence of the US Central Intelligence Agency from 1951 to 1961, serving under Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, and Kennedy.
- Sheldon was the second Director of the OCI, and developed it into a major Office.
- Sheldon briefed all three Presidents; the President's Intelligence Check List, which became the President's Daily Brief, was developed by Richard Lehman under his direction.
- His first wife was Magda Merck, youngest daughter of George Merck, the founder of Merck & Co.
- (Anonymous 1928).
- They were married on April 12, 1928, and had three children, Huntington, Audrey, and Peter.
- The marriage ended in divorce in November 1936 (Anonymous 1936).
- He was later the husband of science-fiction writer Alice B.
- Sheldon (alias James Tiptree Jr.), who in 1987 shot him in what was either a murder-suicide or a suicide pact (Lothian 2019). As an undergraduate, he earned a bachelor's degree from Yale University and was a member of Scroll and Key. I would like to talk a bit about [Huntington D.] "Ting" Sheldon, because he was a great man.
- He had been in Air Force intelligence in England during the war and then went off into private life again, where he was not a great success.
- He came back in 1951 or 1952 to be the second D/OCI, and he really was the man who built the place.
- He built an empire while he was at it, because OCI had its own security, its own courier service, its own print shop, and a lot of other things that were all justified by the fact that communications intelligence needed special handling.
- And so he really had a self-contained operation. This enabled him over the few years after that to build a powerful organization, and he was completely ruthless in how he did it.
- People he didn't like were brushed aside one way or another, so that he built a core of people who were basically what he wanted for his shop, which were versatile generalists.
- He didn't mind having people around who were specialists, but his interests were in the generalists, because in his mind they were a core of people who could do anything.
- Knight McMahan, his deputy, [tried] to sort of cushion him, because he was not the easiest man in the world. It was a good combination, and the office found its soul during those years.
- The thing about it was, if anything happened, people always showed up.
- They were committed to their jobs and could be counted on in the middle of the night to come in and do whatever was required.
- At the same time, [they] bitched all the time; it was built in.
- But while bitching, they were there. Just to finish his [Sheldon's] story, when Ray Cline took over the Directorate of Intelligence (DI) in early 1962, I think—after Dulles left—he wanted OCI to be under his control, and he booted Sheldon aside, or pushed Sheldon aside, I should say.
- But Ting stayed on for several years as the Agency's SIGINT Officer and also as the Agency's officer for overhead stuff, and Chairman of the Watch Committee.
- Then, finally, he retired and went downhill fairly fast.
- Lost his eyesight and all kinds of things.
- Eventually, he and his wife made a pact; she shot him and then shot herself.
- That was the end of the story.
- While he was there, though, he was a force for good to a great extent even though his personnel decisions were a bit difficult.
- He ran the place very firmly indeed.
- The OCI promotions board, or whatever it was called at that point, consisted of himself and Knight McMahan.
- No one else had a say of any kind.
- (Kovar 2000)
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