The Foreign Service Journal, June 2003

Paul H. Boeker , 64, retired Foreign Service officer and former ambassador to Bolivia and Jordan, died March 29 of a brain tumor at his home in San Diego, Calif. Born in St. Louis, Mr. Boeker graduated Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude from Dartmouth College. He received a master’s degree in eco- nomics from the University of Mich- igan and pursued further economic studies at Princeton University. Mr. Boeker joined the Foreign Service in 1961. His career included postings in Germany and Colombia and service on the State Department Policy Planning Staff in Washington, D.C. In 1975, he received the Arthur S. Fleming Award, given annually to 10 outstanding young men and women in the federal gov- ernment. Mr. Boeker served as ambassador to Bolivia from 1977 to 1980, and received the State Department’s Superior Honor Award for protecting American lives during a military coup d’etat there in 1979. From 1980 to 1983 he was director of the Foreign Service Institute. From 1984 to 1987, Mr. Boeker was ambassador to Jordan, where he brokered secret meetings between Jordanian and Israeli officials on a range of issues, including telecommunications, counter-terrorism and water sharing. At the time of his retirement in 1988, Mr. Boeker was a member of the U.S. delegation to the United Nations. After leaving the Foreign Service, he became president and chief executive of the Institute of the Americas at the University of California at San Diego, a nonprofit business networking organization serving the U.S., Canada and Latin America. Formerly a resident of Chevy Chase, Md., he moved to California at this time. Mr. Boeker was a member of the American Academy of Diplomacy. At the funeral service in California on April 3, Alex Watson read a resolution expressing the Academy’s admiration for the example set by Mr. Boeker during his 27-year career in the Foreign Service and subsequent 15 years of public service at the Institute of the Americas. Survivors include his wife, Margaret Macon Campbell Boeker of San Diego; and three children, Michelle Horn of Atlanta, Kent Boeker of San Diego and Madison Boeker of Washington, D.C. David Garrison Briggs , 83, retired FSO, died on March 29 in Laconia, N. H. Mr. Briggs was born Jan. 19, 1920, in Ashaway, R.I., the son of Ralph Maxon and Frances Heard (Babcock). He earned a bach- elor’s degree in journalism at the University of Wisconsin in 1942. He served as a volunteer with the American Field Service, British 8th Army, from 1942 through 1944, and with the French 1st Army in 1944 and 1945. Following World War II, in 1945 and 1946, Mr. Briggs was a reporter for the New York and Paris Post , based in Paris. From 1946 through 1949, he was a foreign correspondent for Reuters in Paris, London and Washington. From 1949 to 1952, he served as a correspondent for United Press in Washington. Mr. Briggs joined the Foreign Service in 1952, and was posted as press attaché to Embassy Belgrade from 1952 through 1954. Thereafter, he was assigned as a USIA informa- tion officer to Paris (1954-57), Calcutta (1957-59), Ankara (1959- 63), and Saigon (1964-66). He attended the National War College in Washington, D.C. in 1963 and 1964. From 1966 to 1971 Mr. Briggs was posted to New Delhi as counselor and deputy public affairs officer. He served in Washington as chief of the National Security Advisory Staff of USIA from 1971 to 1974. He was counselor and public affairs officer in Colombo (1974-76) and Islamabad (1976-78). He retired from the Foreign Service in 1978 and settled in Meredith, N.H. Mr. Briggs published poetry, and is the author of Action Amid Ruins (1945). He is survived by his wife of 56 years, Yvonne Armande Hare, and three children: Jean Ellen, Anne Babcock and David Garrison Jr. John M. (Jack) Cornelius , 78, a retired Foreign Service officer, died March 27 in Oklahoma City, Okla. As a career employee with USAID, he served in Thailand, Tanzania, Liberia, and Washington, D.C. Prior to his employment with the State Department, Mr. Cornelius was J U N E 2 0 0 3 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 83 I N M EMORY