The Foreign Service Journal, September 2004

agement remarked, “I don’t get many volunteers for Baghdad.” Mr. Horan studied Arabic in Beirut and later in Libya. From 1966 to 1970, he served as Libyan desk officer in Washington during Mu’ammar al-Qadhafi’s coup and as a congressional fellow to Rep. Brad Morse, R-Mass., and Sen. Edmund S. Muskie, D-Maine. In 1970, Mr. Horan was assigned to Amman as a polit- ical officer, and from 1972 to 1977, he was deputy chief of mission in Jeddah (then the site of the U.S. embassy in Saudi Arabia). After several years in Washington, culmi- nating in an assignment as principal deputy assistant sec- retary of state for consular affairs, Mr. Horan was named ambassador to the Republic of Cameroon and non-resi- dent ambassador to Equatorial Guinea in 1980. His next ambassadorship (1983-1987) was to Sudan, a time that included the rescue of Ethiopian Jews and their transport to Israel, terror attacks against the embassy and the overthrow of President Gaafar Muhammad al- Nimeiry. After that assignment ended, he spent 1987 as a diplomat-in-residence at Georgetown University and then was assigned to Saudi Arabia. After the incident in Riyadh, he was recalled to Washington, where his assign- ments included service as president of the American Foreign Service Association from 1991 to 1992. In 1992, he was named ambassador to Cote d’Ivoire, which he described as “a pleasant and stable country, at least until the death of the country’s founder.” Upon returning to the United States, Amb. Horan spent a year at Howard University as diplomat-in-residence, directed the African training program at the Foreign Service Institute and then retired from the Service in 1998. Amb. Horan was a longtime member of Chevy Chase Presbyterian Church and, more recently, the Georgetown Presbyterian Church. He was an enthusiastic cyclist who toured in France, New Zealand and many parts of the United States. His many other interests included French, German, Spanish and Arabic literature; he translated a novel and several short stories from Arabic into English. He was also the author of a novel about the Foreign Service, To the Happy Few (Electric City Press, 1996), and served as an analyst on Middle Eastern affairs for MSNBC, NPR, the BBC and FOX News. For his work with the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad in 2003, he received the Department of Defense’s Distinguished Public Service Award, the Pentagon’s highest honorary award for private citizens. His marriage to Nancy Reinert Horan ended in divorce. Survivors include his wife, FSO Lori Shoemaker of Annandale; two children from his second marriage, Michael Harry Horan and Elizabeth Hume Horan, both of Annandale; three adult children from his first marriage, Alexander Hume Horan of San Diego, Margaret Bond Horan of Annandale and Jonathan Theodore Horan of Boston; a sister; and four grandchildren. A memorial service was held for Amb. Horan at Georgetown Presbyterian Church on July 30, after which he was buried at Arlington National Cemetery. In response to an AFSANET message announcing Amb. Horan’s passing, the Journal received many tributes from friends and colleagues, all of which have been for- warded to his family. In fact, we received so many contri- butions that we will run more next month. — Susan Maitra, Senior Editor H UMBLE Y ET G REAT I would like to offer my condolences to the Horan fam- ily and the Foreign Service family in general on the death of a great officer and an experienced diplomat, the late Ambassador Hume Horan. The passing of Amb. Horan marks an important chap- ter in the history of the U.S. Foreign Service. He took with him a wealth of information and experience that will be hard to replace. I am a Foreign Service National employee in the politi- cal section of the U.S. consulate general in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. I have good memories of Mr. Horan, particularly his tenure as United States ambassador to Saudi Arabia in 1988, when I had the good fortune and honor of working under his expert guidance during several visits by the Secretary of Defense to Dhahran. While he was a real pro, Amb. Horan was also a humble man who led by example. I and my colleagues found him quite accessible, knowledge- able about his work, and willing to go the extra mile to help his staff. I was also struck by his linguistic skills, particularly his fluency in Arabic. I do not believe I have met an FSO, or any American, for that matter, who spoke Arabic as flu- ently as he did. Nor do I believe that I will ever meet one. I recall that most of his conversations with me and others, among them several Saudi officials, including the Saudi ambassador to the United States, Prince Bandar, were entirely in Arabic. In my book, that’s an accomplishment that few people can ever hope to match. May his soul rest in peace. Ibrahim M. Nur Political/Economic Specialist American Consulate General Dhahran, Saudi Arabia A MONG O UR B EST Ambassador Hume Horan was among our legendary ambassadors. He had enormous intelligence, good humor, grace under fire and an incredible knowledge of Africa. He was a scholar, teacher and diplomat — an S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 4 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 69