William Palfrey was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1741. He was an active participant in the American Revolution, serving as chief clerk to John Hancock, as aide-de-camp to George Washington and, later, as a paymaster-general of the Continental Army with the rank of lieutenant colonel.

In 1780, the new United Stated Congress unanimously appointed Palfrey as U.S. consul general to France. He began his sea voyage on December 20 of that year on the ship Shillala but was never heard from again.

Joel Barlow was born in Redding, Connecticut in 1754. A graduate of Yale College, he served as a chaplain for the 4th Massachusetts Brigade in the American Revolution, was later admitted to the Connecticut bar and became a minor poet best known for his satirical publication The Hasty-Pudding.

Barlow served as the American consul in Algiers between 1795 and 1799. During this time, he engaged in a bargain to free more than 100 American merchants capture by Barbary pirates and negotiated treaties with the Barbary States to prevent future attempts to kidnap American citizens.

Appointed minister plenipotentiary to France in 1811, Barlow planned to meet with Napoleon Bonaparte in modern-day Lithuania to discuss a commercial agreement. He never encountered the famous emperor and, having accompanied the French army on its retreat from Russia, died of exposure in the village of Zarnowiec.

Richard Clough Anderson, Jr. was born in Soldier’s Retreat, Kentucky in 1788. He graduated from the College of William and Mary, was admitted to the bar in Louisville, became a Freemason and served as a Democratic-Republican in both the Kentucky State Legislature, in which he served as speaker of the house, and the U.S. House of Representatives, in which he became chair of the House Committee on Public Lands.

In 1823, Anderson was appointed the first U.S. minister to the Gran Columbia. While at his post he negotiated the Anderson-Gual Treaty, a commercial agreement and the first bilateral treaty between the U.S. and another American state. Later appointed envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to the Panama Congress of Nations, Anderson died of yellow fever en route to his post on July 24, 1826.

Anderson had been writing a book on the politics and history of Columbia at the time of his death. Anderson County, Kentucky is named in his memory.

Nathaniel G. Ingraham, Jr., was born in New York. After living for a time in England, he was appointed as U.S. consul in Tampico, Mexico. He died of a fever there in 1824.

Harris E. Fudger resided in Boston, Massachusetts. At the time of his death, he was U.S. consul to the Port of Santa Martha, Columbia. It is suspected that he was killed in a swordfight by a Scottish soldier. He was the first American diplomat murdered at post.

James A. Holden was born in Massachusetts. He served as a U.S. consular and commercial agent at Aux Cayes, Haiti.

John S. Meircken was born in Pennsylvania. He served as U.S. consul to the island of Martinique.

William Shaler was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut in 1773. He spent his younger years as a commercial agent for a mercantile firm based in New York and later worked as a sea captain for numerous trade vessels. Shaler published his travel narrative, “Journal of a Voyage between China and the Northwestern Coast of America,” in American Register in 1808.

Shaler served in Natchitoches, Louisiana, as an official agent to monitor and report the exploits of José Álvarez de Toledo y Dubois, who was briefly a leader in Texas’ revolt against Spain. While at this post, he encouraged and participated in the filibustering Gutiérrez-Magee expedition. Shaler later contributed to peace conferences in Europe and Algiers, serving as U.S. consul general in the latter location for 12 years and helping to end the Second Barbary War. His accounts were published in Transactions of the American Philosophical Society and Sketches of Algiers.

In 1825, the American Philosophical Society elected Shaler a member, and in 1828 the diplomat received an honorary master’s degree from the College of New Jersey (now Princeton). One year later, Shaler was appointed the U.S. consul general to Havana, Cuba. He died at post in a cholera epidemic on March 29, 1833.

William S. Sparks was born in South Carolina. He served as U.S. consul to Venice, Italy.

Thomas T. Turner was born in 1820. He served as U.S. consul to Bahia, Brazil and died on December 2, 1849.

Thomas I. Morgan was born in Ohio. He served as secretary of legation in Brazil and died on March 30, 1850.

Hardy M. Burton was born in 1818. He served as U.S. consul to the Isle of St. Thomas and died on December 15, 1852.

George R. Dwyer was born in Massachusetts. He served as U.S. Consul to Lourenco, Marques (modern-day Maputo, Mozambique) and died on June 24, 1854.

Beverly Leonidas Clarke was born in Winterfield, Virginia in 1809. A graduate of Lexington Law School, he was admitted to the bar in 1833 and served as a Democrat in the Kentucky and U.S. Houses of Representatives. He was a delegate to the State constitutional convention in 1849 and later ran unsuccessfully for the governorship of his home state.

President James Buchanan appointed Clarke as minister to Guatemala and Honduras in 1858. Clarke died in the former nation two years later.

Isaac S. McMicken was born in Pennsylvania. He fought in the Mexican- American War and served as U.S. consul to Acapulco, Mexico, between 1858 and his death in 1860.

George True was born in Maine in 1833. He served as U.S. consul to Funchal, Madeira (then part of Spain).

Edward W. Gardner was born in Nantucket, Massachusetts in 1800. He was lost in the Pacific Ocean in January 1863.

Charles G. Hannah was born in New Jersey. He served as U.S. consul to Demerara, British Guinea (modern-day Guyana) and died on December 8, 1964.

Abraham Hanson was born in South Yorkshire, England in 1816. After graduating from Bromley College, he emigrated to the United States to serve as a pastor in the Methodist Episcopal Church. A staunch abolitionism, he preached throughout the Midwest before becoming a local politician and city treasurer in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln appointed Hanson as the first commissioner and consul general to Liberia – the first American diplomat permanently posted in sub-Saharan Africa. He became determined to support the growing population of freed slaves taking up residence in the new country. Hanson worked in Liberia for three years before dying on July 20, 1866.

Hiram R. Hawkins was born in Lansingburg, New York in 1826. One of the earliest mining settlers in Placer County, California, and later became deputy county clerk, justice of the peace and a candidate for the U.S. Senate. He also worked as an editor for several newspapers, including the Placer Press, the Union Advocate and Gold Hill News, a Republican newspaper in Nevada.

In 1865, Hawkins was appointed U.S. consul to Tumbez, Peru. He died there of on November 20, 1866.

Allen A. Hall lived in Tennessee. After serving as charge d’affaires to Venezuela between 1841 and 1844, he moved to Nashville, Tennessee, to practice law and edit an antislavery newspaper entitled the Nashville Daily News. Hall returned to the Union at the start of the Civil War and was later appointed U.S. minister resident to Bolivia by President Abraham Lincoln. He died there on May 28, 1867.

Henry Everard Peck was born in Rochester, New York in 1821. A graduate of Bowdoin College and the Oberlin Theological Seminary, he became a Professor of Sacred Rhetoric and an Adjunct Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy at Oberlin College. Peck was also an avid abolitionist who traveled throughout Ohio giving speeches and campaigning for anti-slavery candidates.

In September 1858, Peck and a group of fellow abolitionists helped John Price, an escaped slave arrested by Oberlin authorities under the Fugitive Slave Act, flee to freedom in Canada. Peck spent 85 days in jail for his participation in what is now known as the Oberlin-Wellington Rescue.

After helping to recruit Union soldiers for the Civil War, Peck served as the first U.S. minister resident and consul general to Haiti. He died there on June 9, 1867.

James Wilson was born in Crawfordsville, Indiana in 1825. He graduated from Wabash College and, later, earned a law degree from Indiana University. After serving in the Mexican-American war, he was admitted to the Indiana bar and elected as a Republican to the U.S. House of Representatives. Wilson later reached the rank of brevet lieutenant colonel while fighting for the Union in the Civil War.

In 1866, President Andrew Johnson named James Wilson the U.S. minister resident to Venezuela. He served for one year before succumbing to yellow fever on August 8, 1867.

James H. McColley was born in Pennsylvania. He served as U.S. consul to Callao, Peru, from 1864 until his death on April 17, 1869.

William Stedman was born in Granville, Ohio in 1815. He was elected as a Republican to the Ohio State Legislature in 1859. He and his three sons fought in the same Union regiment during the Civil War, and Stedman himself retired after forty months with the rank of brevet brigadier-general. After the war, he continued to serve in the Ohio State Legislature and Senate.

President Ulysses S. Grant appointed Stedman as U.S. consul to Santiago, Cuba, in 1869. Unfortunately, the years of fighting had taken a toll on his immune system, and he died of yellow fever a mere three months after his arrival: on July 6, 1869.

Charles E. Perry was born in New York in 1834. He was appointed U.S. consul to Aspinwall, Columbia by President Ulysses S. Grant. In October 1872, he died of a sudden illness.

Thomas Biddle was born in Pennsylvania in 1827. He served as U.S. special diplomatic agent to Cuba, U.S. minister resident to El Salvador and U.S. minister resident to Ecuador before dying of yellow fever in the latter nation on May 7, 1875.

John J. Flint served as U.S. consul to La Union, El Salvador.

Phillip Clayton was born in Athens, Georgia in 1815. After graduating with honors from Franklin College (now the University of Georgia), he studied law and worked as the editor of the Athens Southern Whig. He later served for twelve years as second auditor of the Treasury and for four years as assistant secretary of the Treasury. Upon the secession of Georgia, Clayton left the Union and became assistant secretary of the Treasury of the Confederate States.

After the Civil War, Clayton worked at a Georgia savings bank before President Ulysses S. Grant named him U.S. consul to Peru. Clayton served in the country for three years before his death on March 22, 1877.

Henry Highland Garnet was born into slavery in New Market, Maryland in 1815. His family escaped via the Underground Railroad and settled in New York City. Garnet began his college education at Noyes Academy, but a segregationist mob forced him to relocate to the Oneida Theological Institute. He was nonetheless renowned for his rhetorical talents.

After graduating, Garnet married, became a pastor at Liberty Street Presbyterian Church and began advocating for the eradication of slavery. His delivered his most famous abolitionist speech, Address to the Slaves of the United States of America or Call to Rebellion, to the Negro National Convention in Buffalo, New York, in 1843. Later, in 1865, he became the first black minister to preach to House of Representatives. He also aided in the Union effort by recruiting free black men to serve in the army.

In accordance with the aging Garnet’s final wish, President Ulysses S. Grant appointed him as U.S. minister and consul general at Liberia. Garnet only lived in the country for two months before his death on February 13, 1882.

Jesse Hale Moore was born in Lebanon, Illinois in 1817. In his early years, he attended McKendree College, worked at as a schoolteacher and became a Methodist minister. He later served in the Union Army, serving in the Atlanta Campaign and the Battles of Chickamauga, Franklin and Nashville before retiring with the rank of brevet brigadier general.

A Republican, Moore was elected as a U.S. Representative from Illinois in 1869 and served as chair of the Committee on Invalid Pensions. He then became a U.S. pension agent before his 1881 appointment by President Chester A. Arthur as U.S. consul to Callao, Peru. Moore died at post two years later, on July 11, 1883.

David Thayer Bunker was born in Charleston, Maine in 1836. He briefly attended Harvard Medical School, worked for several years in the Boston Custom House and finally joined the Union Army. He fought at Baton Rouge, Port Hudson and the Red River Campaign before retiring with the rank of major.

After the war, Bunker returned to the Custom House and later found work at a Boston Bank. In 1874, he became president of the Regimental Association.

Bunker was eventually appointed U.S. consul for Demerara, British Guinea. He died there on February 5, 1888.

Victor F. W. Stanwood was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He served as a U.S. commercial and consular agent in Andakabe, Madagascar, from 1881 until the time of his death. Stanwood was killed via gunshot by Captain Leon de Rathier Duverge while investigating the latter’s ship, Solitaire. It is suspected that the circumstances of Stanwood’s death were related to his prior call for the U.S. end the slaves-for-weapons trade rampant in the region at the time.

William D. McCoy was born in Cambridge, Indiana in 1853 and educated in Boston, Massachusetts. He worked as county superintendent of schools in Helena, Arkansas and the principal of several public schools in Indianapolis, Indiana. McCoy later ran (unsuccessfully) as a Republican candidate for the Indiana State Legislature.

In 1892, President Benjamin Harrison named McCoy U.S. minister resident and consul general to Monrovia, Liberia. The new diplomat died of fever on May 16, 1893, only four months after arriving in the country. Celeste McCoy, his widow, established the McCoy Fund for black pupils in Indianapolis with $1500 from the McCoy estate. The fund is still administered by public schools in Indianapolis today.

John R. Meade lived in New London, Connecticut. He served as U.S. consul to Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

Alexander L. Pollock was born in Prague, Netherlands. He worked as a newspaper editor in Salt Lake City, Utah before President Grover Cleveland named him U.S. consul to San Salvador, El Salvador.

Frederick Munchmeyer lived in West Virginia. He served as U.S. consul to San Salvador, El Salvador.

John Berry Gorman, Jr. was born in Tallbotton, Georgia in 1839 and became a planter and journalist. In 1884, he published A Tour around the World or Sketches of Travel in Eastern and Western Hemispheres, an account of his many international journeys. He served as U.S. consul to Matamoros, Mexico, from 1894 until his death on September 6, 1896.

Albert Shelby Willis was born in Shelbyville, Kentucky in 1843. He graduated from University of Louisville School of Law in 1866, was admitted to the bar and served for three years as prosecuting attorney for Jefferson County, Kentucky. Between 1877 and 1887, he served in the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democrat and the chair of the Committee on Rivers and Harbors.

President Grover Cleveland appointed Willis U.S. minister to Hawaii in 1893. Willis was assigned to convince Queen Liliuokalani, Hawaii’s recently deposed queen, to provide amnesty to her enemies if the president restored her rule. President Cleveland reneged on his promise when the Hawaiian President Sanford B. Dole refused to step down, and the mission became a failure. Nevertheless, Willis remained the U.S. Minister to the then-independent country for the next four years before his death on January 6, 1897.

Rounsevelle Wildman, Sr. was born in Batavia, New York in 1864. He graduated from Syracuse University, moved west and served in the Idaho delegation to Congress. His efforts helped the then-territory of Idaho to become a state.

Wildman served as the U.S. consul to Singapore; Barmen, Germany; and Hong Kong. He wrote several accounts of his experiences, including China’s Open Door: A Sketch of Chinese Life and History and Tales of the Malayan Coast: From Penang to the Philippines.

While en route from Hong Kong to the inauguration of President William McKinley in Washington, D.C., Wildman’s ship, the S.S. City of Rio de Janiero, crashed on a submerged reef in San Francisco Bay. Wildman and his family were lost in the shipwreck.

Thomas T. Prentis was born in Michigan in 1864. He entered the consular service in 1871, serving as U.S. consul to Seychelles Islands; Port Louis, Mauritius; Rouen, France; Batavia; and Martinique. In the latter nation, Prentis and his family were killed by the devastating eruption of Mont Pelee on May 7, 1902.

Amedee Testart was born in Louisiana. He entered the consular service in 1898. Testart was serving as U.S. vice consul to Martinique during the devastating eruption of Mont Pelee on May 7, 1902. Testart fled the eruption but died of exertion upon arriving at the British steamer The Roddam – the only ship to successfully escape the harbor.

Thomas Nast was born in Landau, Germany in 1840. His family moved to New York City when he was still young, and his aptitude for drawing inspired him to attend the National Academy of Design and begin working for Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper and, later, Harper’s Weekly.

Nast quickly became a celebrated cartoonist – the “Father of the American Cartoon” – best known for his creation of modern version of Santa Claus, Uncle Sam and the symbols for both major political parties: the Republican Elephant and the Democratic Donkey. His cartoon campaign was responsible for the downfall of Boss Tweed, the powerful and corrupt leader of Tammany Hall Democratic party political machine, and aided in the election of Ulysses S. Grant as president.

In 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt appointed Nast as U.S. consul to Guayaquil, Ecuador. During a deadly yellow fever outbreak, Nast stayed in the city helping members of diplomatic missions and businesses flee the epidemic. He became infected and died on December of that year.

William F. Havemeyer was born in New York in 1875. He served as a U.S. consular agent to Bassorah, Persia (now Iraq). He died on June 25, 1904.

Dr. Philip Carroll was born in New York. He served as U.S. consul to Manzanillo, Mexico.

Benjamin H. Ridgely was born in Caroline County, Maryland in 1861. He attended law school but chose instead to pursue a career in journalism. He founded The Louisville Truth, wrote The Comedies of a Consulate and served as U.S. consul to Geneva, Nantes, Barcelona and Mexico.

Arthur A. Cheney was born in New Haven, Connecticut. He graduated Yale Medical School and served as U.S. Vice Consul to Regensburg, Austria, and U.S. Consul to Messina, Italy. He died during an earthquake on December 28, 1908.

John Webster Gourley was born in San Antonio, Texas in 1886. He was appointed by President Howard Taft as U.S. vice consul to Ciudad Juarez, Mexico – the youngest vice consul in the Foreign Service at the time.

Theodore Cushing Hamm was born in Newport, Vermont in 1882. He served as U.S. consul to Durango, Mexico, from 1911 until his death in 1914.

Robert N. McNeely was born in Monroe, North Carolina in 1883. He and 384 others died when the British liner Persia sank (most likely hit by a German torpedo) en route to his post as U.S. consul to Aden in modern-day Yemen.

Charles Patrick Mckiernan was born in Naugatuck, Connecticut in 1887. He served as U.S. vice consul to Canton, China, and died on May 28, 1916.

Charles Frederick Brissel was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1879. He served as U.S. vice and deputy Consul to Amoy (now Xiamen), China and U.S. consul to Baghdad in modern-day Iraq.

Alfred Louis Moreau Gottschalk served as U.S. consul general to Callao, Peru; Mexico City, Mexico; and Rio de Janiero, Brazil. During his assignment at the latter post he was lost at sea on the U.S.S. Cyclops, which never reached its final destination at Baltimore. No wreckage has ever been found, and it was speculated that the ship was sunk by a German submarine.

Maddin Summers was serving as U.S. consul general to Moscow, Russia, when he collapsed after months of overwork.

John Davis O’Rear was born in Audrain County, Missouri in 1870. During his early years, he practiced law and served as the city counsel of Mexico, Missouri; the prosecuting attorney of Audrain County, Missouri and a member of the State Democratic Committee of Missouri.

In 1913, O’Rear was appointed envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to Bolivia by President Woodrow Wilson. He championed U.S. commercial and trade interests in the country until his death on July 14, 1918.

Luther Kimbell Zabriskie was born in Preston, Connecticut in 1879. He graduated from Yale College, studied at Edinburg University in Scotland and spent a year traveling across Europe and Russia. He was later elected as a Republican to the Connecticut General Assembly, served as secretary of the Preston School Committee and worked as a legislative reporter for the Norwich Bulletin.

Zabriskie entered the U.S. consular service in 1911. He served as a clerk, vice consul and later deputy consul at the U.S. Consulate General in Callao, Peru and a vice consul in Moscow and Mexico City. He wrote The Virgin Islands of the United States of America following a government mission to secure the purchase of St. Thomas from Denmark.

Zabriskie’s final post was as U.S. consul to Aguas Calientes, Mexico. He died there on January 17, 1921.

Carl L. Loop was born in New Ross, Indiana in 1877. He served as U.S. vice and deputy consul general to Winnipeg, U.S. deputy consul general to London, and U.S. consul to Hamilton and Malta. He died on July 29, 1923.

Max David Kirjassof was born in Russia in 1888. His family emigrated to the U.S., moving first to Waterbury, Connecticut and then to Brooklyn, New York. He graduated from Yale University in 1910. A friendship with the son of President Taft lead to his appointment to the consulate in Yokohama. Serving there as U.S. consul, he died on September 1, 1923, when his hotel collapsed during the Great Kanto earthquake. His pregnant wife Alice Ballantine Kirjassof also died in the earthquake which killed over 100,000 people.

Paul Emott Jenks was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1861. He graduated from Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute and Yale College, where he played tennis, baseball and football. Jenks later worked for the Scovil Manufacturing Company and the Citizens Bank of Waterbury before taking a position in the city treasurer office in Brooklyn.

In 1896, Jenks moved to Japan to represent the J. B. Millet Company in Boston. He remained in the country as a commission merchant and as a secretary at the publishing office of the London Times.

Jenks eventually became a U.S. consular officer in Yokohama, Japan and was appointed U.S. vice consul to the nation in 1916. He died seven years later, on September 1, 1923, when the U.S. Consulate at Yokohama, Japan collapsed during the Great Kanto earthquake.

Clarence Cecil Woolard was born in Grafton, West Virginia in 1873. He served as U.S. vice consul in Cape Haitien, Haiti.

Robert Whitney Imbrie was born in Washington in 1883. He studied admiralty law and spent a brief period studying chimpanzees in the Congo before returning to the U.S. Imbrie served in the American Ambulance Corps during WWI, attained the rank of major and wrote Behind the Wheel of a War Ambulance regarding his experiences.

Imbrie pursued diplomatic missions in post-revolution Russia and modern-day Turkey before serving as U.S. vice consul in Tehran. He was beaten to death by a radical religious mob on July 18, 1924 and buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

William Treyanne Francis was born in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1869. He earned a law degree from St. Paul College of Law (now William Mitchell College of Law), worked in the legal department of North Pacific Railroad and opened his own law firm in Minnesota. As president elector of the Republican State Convention, Francis aided in the passage of an anti-lynching law in the Minnesota State Legislature.

In 1927, President Calvin Coolidge appointed Francis U.S. minister resident and consul general to Liberia. He died two years later, on July 15, 1929.

William I. Jackson served as U.S. consul to Havana, Cuba. He drowned on November 2, 1930, while attempting to save his wife’s life.

John T. Wainwright was born in New York in 1897. He served as U.S. consul to Havana, Cuba, and drowned on November 2, 1930, while attempting to save another consul, William I. Jackson.

Giles Russell Taggart was born in Clarksboro, New Jersey in 1870. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Columbia University and a law degree at George Washington University before serving in the Departments of Justice and Commerce and Labor.

Taggart later served as U.S. consul to Cornwall, Fort William, Port Arthur and Belize, British Honduras. A devastating hurricane in the latter nation caused him to fall ill with pneumonia – in addition to suffering from several broken ribs – and die on September 15, 1931.

In 1934, the U.S. House of Representatives honored Taggart’s heroism in saving others’ lives during the storm.

James Theodore Marriner was born in Portland, Maine in 1892. He graduated from Dartmouth College and Harvard University before taking the Foreign Service entrance exam in 1918.

Marriner was later assigned to Stockholm, Bucharest, Bern, Paris and the following conferences: the Preparatory Commission for Disarmament Conference in Geneva, the Special Commission for the Preparation of a Draft Convention on the Manufacture of Arms in Geneva, the Pact for Renunciation of War in Paris, the London Naval Conference, the Conference of Ministers for a Moratorium on International Debts in London, the General Disarmament Conference in Geneva and the Eighth General Conference on Weights and Measures in Paris.

Marriner’s final post was as U.S. consul General in Beirut, Syria (now Beirut, Lebanon). He was murdered on October 12, 1937, by an Armenian-born U.S. citizen over a perceived insult.

John M. Slaughter was born in Goshen, Indiana in 1904. He served as vice consul to the U.S. Embassy at Guayaquil, Ecuador, and became one of 115 victims of a devastating earthquake on May 13, 1942.

Thomas Campbell Wasson was born in Essex, New Jersey in 1896. He served as U.S. vice consul to Melbourne, Australia and Puerto Cortes, Honduras; U.S. consul to Lagos, Nigeria; and U.S. consul general to Jerusalem.

On May 22, 1948, Wasson was shot while returning to the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem after a meeting of the UN Truce Commission at the French consulate. He died the following day, and the killer was never found.

Douglas Seymour Mackiernan was born in Mexico City, Mexico in 1913. His family moved to Stoughton, Massachusetts when he was still a child. Mackiernan became a research assistant at MIT and, during WWII, a major in the U.S. Army Air Corps as a cryptographer and a meteorologist.

Mackiernan later served as an undercover CIA officer – the first U.S. atomic spy – and U.S. vice consul at Urumqi, China. In 1949, when Secretary of State Dean Acheson ordered that the consulate be closed, Mackiernan was required to stay behind and continue his covert activities. When the threat of Communist troops arriving at Urumqi became immediate, the CIA ordered Mackiernan to travel through Tibet to India in order to arrive home safely. Mackiernan and a CIA contract agent escaped the embassy and, along with three Russian allies, began a 1000-mile camel and horseback journey across the Taklimakan desert.

On April 29, 1950, Tibetan border guards shot and killed Mackiernan and two other members of his party while he was crossing the Chinese border into Tibet. The U.S. Government had not requested permission for the group to enter Tibetan lands in time, and the guards had been issued orders to kill all foreigners who attempted to cross the frontier.

Mackiernan was the first CIA officer killed in the line of duty – yet as the CIA had not yet created official pension regulations, it was the Department of State which offered Mackiernan’s wife a pension following the tragedy.

Robert Lee Mikels was born in Cerro Gordo, Illinois in 1919. He served as an accounting clerk at the U.S. Embassy in Pusan, South Korea. On November 26, 1951, Mikels died while trying to alert his colleagues of a fire caused by the heater.

David LeBreton, Jr., served as U.S. consul in Tunis, Tunisia. He drowned on August 28, 1953 while saving the lives of two children of Morrils Nelson Hughes, who had arrived earlier in the day to take over the consulate.

William P. Boteler served as an undercover CIA officer under diplomatic cover as a U.S. vice consul at Nicosia, Cyprus. He died on June 16, 1956, during the bombing of a restaurant by the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (EOKA).

Robert Allen McKinnon served as the first ad interim charge d’affaires to the U.S. Embassy in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.

Barbara Annette Robbins was born in South Dakota in 1943. Raised primarily in Colorado, she attended Colorado State University and joined the CIA soon after graduation.

Robbins served as a CIA officer under diplomatic cover at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, Vietnam. On March 30, 1965, she was killed when insurgents detonated a car bomb outside of the Embassy.

Robbins was the first American woman to die in the Vietnam conflict, the first female CIA employee to be killed in action and, at age 21, the youngest CIA employee to ever die in action. A star in her honor has been placed on the Memorial Wall at the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.

Joseph William Grainger was born in 1925 and lived in Hartford, Connecticut. He served as a USAID officer. Captured by the Viet Cong on October 8, 1964, he attempted escape but was killed in a prison camp on March 17 of the following year. The two individuals who had shot him were executed themselves, as the Viet Cong was no longer able to collect USAID reward money in exchange for Grainger’s safe return.

Grainger was the first civilian U.S. official captured in South Vietnam. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery and posthumously awarded the Department of State’s highest award.

Joseph Robert Rupley was born in Spokane, Washington in 1941. He earned an economics degree from University of California – Berkley and served as associate director of the U.S. Peace Corps in Venezuela. On February 19, 1965, he was mistaken for a rebel, shot and killed by Caracas Police while driving through an area going through an ongoing uprising.

Dolph B. Owens was born in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1927 and lived in Tuscaloosa. He served in the U.S. army before becoming a USAID public safety advisor at the American Embassy in Saigon, Vietnam. On November 5, 1960, Owens and his Vietnamese driver were killed in a Viet Cong machine-gun ambush.

Jack J. Wells was born in New Boston, Ohio, in 1925 and grew up in Minford, Ohio. He enlisted in the U.S. Army soon after graduating high school, served in two WWII campaigns in the South Pacific, worked as a military advisor in South Vietnam and retired a major. He earned the Bronze Star and commendation medal for performance of duty as confinement officer for his service.

Wells joined USAID after retiring from the army. He died when his plane crashed due to small arms fire on September 27, 1965.

Norman L. Clowers was born in Tacoma, Washington in 1915. He served as public safety advisor for USAID in South Vietnam and was killed by the Viet Cong after delivering building materials to a small village near his post.

William D. Smith III was born in Ione, Arkansas in 1934. He served as a USAID officer. On July 23, 1966, he was serving on a forward air control mission controlling a flight of F-4B aircraft when, at the completion of the airstrike, his O-1E collided with a Marine helicopter at 2500 feet.

Don M. Sjostrom was born in Bothell, Washington in 1940. He earned a degree in philosophy from the University of Washington and served in Thailand with the Peace Corps and in Laos as a USAID operation officer. In January 1967, he died in a conflict in the town of Nakhang, where he had gone to help refugees fleeing from the Communists.

John R. McLean was born in Detroit, Michigan, in 1935. He served as a USIS operative in Laos and died on May 26, 1967.

Robert K. Franzblau served as a USAID officer.

Dwight Hall Owen, Jr., was born in Providence, Rhode Island in 1946. He worked as a freelance newspaper correspondent before joining USAID at the age of 19. Owen died of a gunshot wound on August 30, 1967.

Carrol H. Pender was born in Jefferson County, Indiana in 1921. He served with the Canadian Army in WWII – a result of being too young to join the U.S. Army – and briefly became a POW. After returning to his home county, Pender entered the U.S. Army. He fought in the Korean War and served in the Vietnam War as a senior enlisted advisor to the South Vietnamese 25th Infantry Division. Pender retired a command sergeant major in 1966.

Pender immediately joined USAID as a hospital administration specialist. He was killed by a landmine on December 27, 1967.

Frederick J. Abramson was born in Belleview, VA. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Stanford University and a master’s degree from the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. Abramson was the youngest American deputy province advisor in the Mekong Delta and died, along with four American soldiers, when the Viet Cong attacked a military convoy.

Thomas M. Gompertz was born in California in 1942. He served as an assistant USAID representative at Hue and was shot and killed only a week before his tour was scheduled to end.

John Thomas McCarthy was born in Pennsylvania in 1909. He served with USAID as a public safety officer at Nha Trang. On January 30, 1968, he was killed by sniper fire.

Kermit J. Krause was born in Sacramento, California, in 1919. He served with USAID as an assistant supply advisor and died on January 30, 1968.

Jeffrey S. Lundstedt was born in Centerport, New York, in 1942. He served with USAID in Hue, Vietnam.

Robert R. Little was born in New York in 1938. He served with USAID at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon and died on February 7, 1968.

Stephen H. Miller was born in Silver Spring, Maryland in 1940. He served with the Joint U.S. Public Affairs Office. On February 7, 1968, he was executed via gunshot by the Viet Cong.

Hugh C. Lobit was born in Texas in 1933. He served with USAID. On February 9, 1968, he was shot and killed by a sniper while escorting a U.S. news correspondent.

Richard A. Schenk was born in Missouri in 1939. He served with USAID and died on March 2, 1968.

Michael Murphy was born in Cork City, Ireland in 1928. He served in WWII with the Royal Air Force Police before becoming a lieutenant in the Malayan Constabulary.

Murphy emigrated to the U.S. in 1954 and later joined the Alaska State Troopers. He served with USAID as a police advisor with the Office of Public Safety in Vietnam. On June 14, 1968, he was killed by a missile during a Viet Cong patrol ambush.

The Michael Murphy Memorial Scholarship for Alaskan college students pursuing a career in law or law enforcement was established in his honor.

John Gordon Mein was born in 1913 and lived in Maryland. He was appointed U.S. ambassador to Guatemala in 1965, when the national was suffering from a civil war.

On August 28, 1968, members of the Guatemalan Rebel Armed Forces (FAR) forced Mein out of his limousine one block from the U.S. Consulate in Guatemala City.

U.S. officials believe that FAR planned to kidnap the ambassador and demand the freedom of a recently arrested guerrilla leader in exchange for Mein’s safe release. When Mein tried to escape, however, the rebels shot him with a submachine gun. He was the first U.S. ambassador assassinated in office.

George B. Gaines was born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1922. He served with USAID as a civilian logistics officer at Quang Ngai Province and died on February 23, 1969.

Major Robert P. Perry was born in 1935. He served as an assistant army attaché in Amman, Jordan. On June 10, 1970, Perry was murdered by a Palestinian gunman, who shot him through the front door of his house.

Dan A. Mitrione was born in Italy in 1920. He served as a police officer in Indiana before joining the FBI in 1959. One year later, he was assigned to the U.S. State Department's International Cooperation Administration to teach counterinsurgency techniques and provide weapons and training for police officers and military officials in South American nations.

Mitrione began his work in Brazil, spent a brief period in the Dominican Republic and, in 1969, moved to Uruguay under USAID to oversee the Office of Public Safety. On July 31, 1970, Mitrione was kidnapped by Tupamaros rebels, who interrogated him and demanded the freedom of 150 political prisoners. After the refusal of the Uruguayan government, Mitrione was found dead of a gunshot wound.

Cleo Allen Noel, Jr., was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1918, and grew up in Moberly, Missouri. He received a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in history from the University of Missouri.

Noel briefly taught American history at the University of Missouri before joining the U.S. Navy in June of 1941. He served as a gunnery officer aboard merchant vessels throughout the Pacific Ocean and the Persian Gulf, retiring after WWII with the rank of Lieutenant Commander.

Noel later earned his Ph.D. from Harvard, married a Foreign Service employee and joined the Foreign Service himself. He served at consulates in Italy, Saudi Arabia, France and Lebanon and learned Arabic.

While serving as U.S. ambassador to Sudan, Noel and nine others were kidnapped by militants from the Black September faction of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, who stormed the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum on March 1, 1973. He was shot by the terrorists one day later and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

George Curtis Moore was born in California in 1925. He served as ad interm charge d’affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum, Sudan.

Curtis and nine others were kidnapped by militants from the Black September faction of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, who stormed the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum on March 1, 1973. He was shot by the terrorist one day later and was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

Everett Dixie Reese was born in Houston, Texas in 1923. He served as director of the USAID photo service and died on April 29, 1955, when his plan was shot down over Binh Xuyen.

Thomas W. Ragsdale served as a civilian agricultural specialist with USAID in Vietnam. He was captured by Communist forces during the Tet Offensive and died during imprisonment.

Donald Vern Freeman was born in 1935 in Indiana. He became a captain in the Army and was killed October 3, 1967 in Vietnam while serving the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Albert Farkas was born in 1913 in Conneaut, Ohio, and attended Franklin and Marshall College. He joined the Lancaster Pennsylvania Police Department in 1937 before taking a leave of absence in 1943 to join the Navy. After World War II, Farkas returned to the Lancaster Police Department, where he eventually became Chief of Police. He retired in 1966 and served as a USAID civilian advisor to the police department in Vinh Long Province, Vietnam. He was killed in action February 1968.

Robert W. Brown, Jr., was born in Centreville, Maryland in 1941. A U.S. Marine Corps captain, he served with USAID and died on February 26, 1968.

Robert Walker Hubbard was born in Auburn, Alabama, in 1940. He served as a captain in the Marine Corps and, at the time of his death, a civilian advisor in Vietnam.

During a Viet Cong attack on the city of Hue, Hubbard aided a small group of American civilians and soldiers by moving from shelter to shelter, foraging for food, tending to the wounded and returning enemy fire. Although he was shot and killed during this operation on February 4, 1968, he made possible the safe escape of his companions.

Joseph Brooks Smith was born in New York in 1942. He served as an assistant area development officer with USAID. On August 30, 1970, Smith was killed by a landmine explosion while visiting a new refugee resettlement center.

Rudolph Kaiser lived in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He served as a USAID senior advisor in Go Cong Province and died in a Viet Cong ambush while accompanying South Vietnamese militia forces in the Mekong Delta.

John Paul Vann was born in Norfolk, Virginia in 1924. He served in the Army Air Corps during WWII and later as a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, working in Korea and Japan as a logistics officer and later leading the transportation of the 25th Infantry Division to Korea, where he and his unit guarded the Pusan Perimeter.

Vann later received an M.B.A. from Syracuse University and returned to the army as an advisor in South Vietnam, earning the Distinguished Flying Cross for his bravery. He returned to Vietnam with USAID in 1965, becoming a deputy for Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support (CORDS). He helped to train and encourage Army of the Republic of Vietnam soldiers and later, as senior American advisor in the II Corps Military Region, became the first U.S. civilian to command U.S. regular troops in combat.

Vann died during a helicopter crash on June 9, 1972. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery and was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Distinguished Service Cross (the only civilian so honored in Vietnam).

John S. Patterson served as U.S. vice consul in Hermosillo, Mexico. He was kidnapped by terrorists on March 22, 1974 and later found dead.

Rodger Paul Davies was born in Berkley, California in 1921. A WWII veteran, he served as director of the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs. He was appointed U.S. ambassador to Cyprus in July of 1974.

Only six weeks after his appointment to the latter post, Davies was killed by a sniper during an anti-American demonstration outside the U.S. Embassy in Nicosia on August 19, 1974. The murdered was allegedly a gunman from EOKA-B, a Greek Cypriot paramilitary terrorist organization responsible for a coup d’état that took place one month before.

Corporal James Conrad Marshall was born in 1946. He joined the U.S. Marine Corps in 1964 and trained at Parris Island before serving in supply administrations and operations. In 1966, he was accepted into the Marine Security Guard Program and posted to the U.S. Embassy in Saigon.

Marshall was shot and killed on January 31, 1968 while guarding the embassy from a Viet Cong attack. Marshall was the first U.S. Marine to be killed while defending an American embassy, and he was posthumously awarded a Bronze Star for his heroism. The USMC Embassy Training Facility at Quantico, Virginia is named in his honor.

Steven Andrew Haukness was born in 1941. He served at the U.S. Consulate in DaNang as a communicator and was captured by the Viet Cong on February 1, 1968. He was found dead seven years later.

Charles W. Turberville, a sergeant in the U.S. Marine Corps, was killed on September 26, 1971, while defending the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh.

John Patrick Egan served as a U.S. consular agent to Cordoba, Argentina. He was kidnapped by the Montoneros, a leftist terrorist group which demanded the release of four political prisoners in exchange for the diplomat’s safety. The prisoners were already dead, however, and the militants executed Egan on February 28, 1975. His body was found wrapped in the Montoneros flag.

Charles McMahon resided in Woburn, Massachusetts in 1953. He served as U.S. Marine corps corporal at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon.

McMahon was killed by a rocket attack on April 29, 1975 – only a few days after his arrival in Vietnam. He had been defending the defense attaché building on Tan Son Nhut Airbase. McMahon was one of the last two servicemen killed in action in the Vietnam War.

Lance Corporal Darwin L. Judge was born in Marshalltown, Iowa in 1956. An Eagle Scout, he served with the Marine Corps at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon.

Judge he was killed by a rocket attack on April 29, 1975. He had been defending the defense attaché building on Tan Son Nhut Airbase and was one of the last two servicemen killed in action in the Vietnam War.

Thomas Olmstead served as USAID chief of mission in Cambodia. He died on February 12, 1975.

Francis Edward Meloy, Jr., was born in Washington, D.C. in 1917. He served with the U.S. Navy in WWII and as U.S. ambassador to the Dominican Republic, Guatemala and Lebanon.

While at the latter post, he, the U.S. economic counselor Robert O. Waring and their driver Zuhair Mohammed Moghrabi were kidnapped by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine while on their way to meet the new President of Lebanon, Elias Sarkis. Their bodies were found later that day – June 16, 1976 – in west Beirut.

Robert Olaf Waring was born in Long Island City, New York, in 1919. He served in Rabat, Athens, London, Berlin, Vienna and Beirut as U.S. economic counselor.

While at the latter post, he, U.S. ambassador to Lebanon Francis E. Meloy, Jr. and their driver were kidnapped by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine while on their way to meet the new President of Lebanon, Elias Sarkis. Their bodies were found later that day – June 16, 1976 – in west Beirut. Waring was buried in Arlington National Cemetery and honored on a plaque at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut.

Adolph Dubs was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1920. He studied at Beloit College, Georgetown University, Harvard University and Washington University at St. Louis before entering the Foreign Service. He served in Germany, Liberia, Canada, Yugoslavia and, as an expert on the Soviet Union, at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow as charge d’affaires.

Dubs was named U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan in 1978, soon after a coup d’état which gave power to the Soviet-aligned Khalq faction. On February 14, 1979, Dubs was kidnapped by four armed militants posing as police and held captive in Room 117 in the Kabul hotel. The militants allegedly demanded the release of multiple political prisoners in exchange for the ambassador’s safety, although their true intentions were never explained.

Against the wishes of the U.S. government, which proposed peaceful negotiations, the Afghan police stormed the hotel room and began a violent firefight. Only one minute later, Dubs was found dead of a gunshot to the head. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Steven J. Crowley was born in 1959 and lived in Long Island, New York. A corporal, he served as a Marine security guard at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan.

On November 21, 1979, Pakistani students stormed the U.S. Embassy at Islamabad after hearing a false radio report claiming that the U.S. had bombed and burned Islam’s holy site at Mecca. Crowley was shot by a sniper while posted on the roof of the Embassy. He was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star Medal and the Purple Heart and buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

Bryan L. Ellis was born in 1950. He served as chief warrant officer at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan. On November 21, 1979, Pakistani students stormed the U.S. Embassy at Islamabad after hearing a false radio report claiming that the U.S. had bombed and burned Islam’s holy site at Mecca. Ellis was burned during the riots and died in his apartment.

Charles Robert Ray was born in New York City in 1938 and joined the U.S. Army in 1960. A lieutenant colonel and decorated Vietnam Veteran, he served as an assistant army attaché in Paris. On January 18, 1982, George Ibrahim Abdallah of the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Faction shot and killed Ray outside his apartment building. He was posthumously promoted to Colonel and buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Robert Clayton Ames was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1934. A talented basketball player and graduate of La Salle University, he served in the U.S. Army and the CIA as Near East Chief. Ames was fluent in Arabic, served all throughout the Middle East and helped open a path to peaceful negotiations with the Palestinian Liberation Organization.

On April 18, 1983, Ames became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Thomas R. Blacka was born in Connellsville, Pennsylvania in 1923. He graduated from the Universities of Miami and Denver and served with the U.S. military in England during WWII. He later joined USAID, with which he traveled worldwide until his retirement.

Blacka returned to USAID in 1982 to serve at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

Phyliss N. Faraci was born in Monessen, Pennsylvania in 1939. She graduated from Douglas Business School and served with the CIA in Vietnam and Kuwait.

Faraci’s final post was as an administrative assistant and an undercover CIA agent at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, she became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

Terry L. Gilden was born in Chandler, Arizona in 1957. A sergeant first class in the U.S. Army, he became a member of the Special Forces Unit and served as a bodyguard to the U.S. ambassador at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

Kenneth E. Haas was born in Akron, Ohio, in 1944. He earned a Ph.D. in philosophy from Syracuse University and served with the CIA in Bangladesh, Iran and Oman.

Hass’ final post was as CIA station chief at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

Deborah M. Hixon was born in Denver, Colorado, in 1952. She graduated from the University of Colorado - Boulder and served as a foreign affairs analyst and undercover CIA agent at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, she became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

Frank J. Johnston was born in New York in 1936. He had served with the CIA for 25 years when he began his post at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

James Frederick Lewis served as a paramilitary officer for the CIA at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he and his wife became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

Monique Lewis served as a CIA agency officer at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, she and her husband became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

William R. McIntyre was born in Detroit, Michigan in 1931. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in political science from the University of Michigan and served with USAID in India and Pakistan.

McIntyre’s final post was as deputy director of USAID at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

Corporal Robert V. McMaugh served with the Marine Security Guard Detachment at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy.

William R. Sheil was born in 1924. A retired first lieutenant in the U.S. Army, he served with the CIA at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. On April 18, 1983, he became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy. He was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Albert N. Votaw was born in Chester, Pennsylvania in 1925. He graduated from Deep Springs College and earned master’s degrees in economics and anthropology from the University of Chicago. Votaw worked briefly as a reporter before serving in public housing with USAID, serving in Abidjan, Tunis, Bangkok and Beirut.

While at the latter post, Votaw became one of 63 people (including 17 Americans) killed when a car carrying a bomb crashed through the gates of the embassy on April 18, 1983.

George Tsantes was born in 1930. A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, he served as an engineer officer aboard the destroyer U.S.S. McNair, the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Enterprise and several nuclear-power surface vessels. He also commanded the destroyer U.S.S. William M. Wood and the destroyer tender U.S.S. Piedmont.

George Tsantes later earned a master’s degree in physics and earned the rank of captain. In Washington, D.C., he served on the staff of the Chief of Naval Operations and in the Navy Atomic Energy Office. In Athens, he was appointed head of the Joint U.S. Military Advisory Group.

On November 15, 1983, Tsantes and his driver were shot in their stopped car by members of November 17, a leftist guerilla group opposed to the American presence in Greece. Tsantes died of his wounds and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Leamon R. Hunt was born in Honston, Oklahoma. He served as the deputy chief of mission for the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and as deputy assistant secretary of state for operations. In 1981, he became the first director general of Multinational Forces and Observers in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, heading the 10-nation coalition monitoring the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty.

On February 15, 1984, Hunt was shot by members of Red Brigades, an Italian guerilla group, while heading home from work. He died of his wounds in the hospital.

Lieutenant Colonel Kenneth G. Crabtree was born in 1938. He died during a bomb explosion on April 15, 1984, while he was driving to northern Namibia to assess the withdrawal of South African army units from Angola.

Dennis Whyte Keogh was a captain in the U.S. Marine Corps, a political counselor in South Africa and the director of the U.S. Liaison Office in Windhoek, Namibia. He died during a bomb explosion on April 15, 1984, while he was driving to northern Namibia to assess the withdrawal of South African army units from Angola.

Keogh was posthumously awarded the Presidential Citizen’s Medal and the Secretary’s Award. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Albert Arthur Schaufelberger III was born in 1950. A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, he served as a U.S. Navy Seal and earned the rank of lieutenant commander. Schaufelberger later became the deputy commander of U.S. military advisers in El Salvador.

On May 25, 1983, Schaufelberger was shot at Central American University by members of the Central American Revolutionary Worker’s Party seeking revenge for American intervention in the country. He was the first member of the U.S. military killed in El Salvador following arrival of U.S. military advisors in October 1980.

Charles F. Soper was born in 1939. He served as a security engineering officer at U.S. Embassy New Delhi.

Michael Ray Wagner was born in Zebulon, North Carolina in 1954. He was a chief petty officer in the U.S. Navy and a member of the U.S. Defense Attaché Office in Beirut.

On September 20, 1984, members of the Islamic Jihad Organization attempted to crash a car carrying a bomb into the gates of the new U.S. Embassy in Beirut – relocated to the relatively sheltered suburb of Aukar after the 1983 embassy bombing. Although the driver was shot, the vehicle detonated after hitting a parked van, and the resulting explosion killed Wagner and 23 other individuals (including one other American).

Wagner was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Kenneth V. Welch was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan in 1951. He joined the U.S. Army at age 21 and served in Saigon, Brussels, Tehran, Dublin, Yaoundi and Beijing. At the time of his death he was a chief warrant officer in the U.S. Army and a member of the U.S. Defense Attaché Office in Beirut.

On September 20, 1984, members of the Islamic Jihad Organization attempted to crash a car carrying a bomb into the gates of the new U.S. Embassy in Beirut – relocated to the relatively sheltered suburb of Aukar after the 1983 embassy bombing. Although the driver was shot, the vehicle detonated after hitting a parked van, and the resulting explosion killed Welch and 23 other individuals (including one other American).

Welch was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Charles Floyd Hegna was born in 1934 and served as an auditor with USAID in Pakistan. On December 3, 1984, four terrorists hijacked the Kuwait Airways flight on which Hegna was a passenger and forced the pilot to fly to Tehran. The terrorists demanded the release of the Kuwait 17, a group of terrorists arrested for simultaneously bombing six foreign and Kuwaiti installations, in exchange for the release of the passengers.

Hegna was shot and his body dumped on the tarmac, and the remaining passengers were threatened and tortured for six days until Iranian security forces stormed the plane and successfully released them.

William L. Stanford served as an agency officer with USAID in Pakistan. On December 3, 1984, four terrorists hijacked the Kuwait Airways flight on which Stanford was a passenger and forced the pilot to fly to Tehran. The terrorists demanded the release of the Kuwait 17, a group of terrorists arrested for simultaneously bombing six foreign and Kuwaiti installations, in exchange for the release of the passengers.

Stanford was shot and his body dumped on the tarmac, and the remaining passengers were threatened and tortured for six days until Iranian security forces stormed the plane and successfully released them. He was 52 years old.

Enrique Camarena was born in Mexico in 1947. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps for two years and later joined the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) as an undercover agent.

In 1984, Camarena gave 450 Mexican soldiers the information they needed to destroy a 1,000-hectare marijuana plantation with a yearly output of roughly $8 billion. The drug lord Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo ordered a corrupt group of police officers to kidnap Camarena in retaliation.

In February 1985, Camarena was abducted, tortured for 30 hours and killed. His body was found on March 5.

Camarena posthumously received the DEA’s highest award: the Award of Honor. In 2004, his wife and son established the Enrique S. Camarena Foundation in his memory to combat violence and alcohol, tobacco and drug abuse. The annual Red Ribbon Week – a student program with similar goals – was also established in honor of Camarena.

Virginia Warfield was severely injured in a car accident in New Delhi, India, part of a motorcade accompanying then-Secretary of State George Shultz on his official visit to the country. Ms. Warfield, who was stationed in Bombay (now Mumbai) at the time, succumbed to her injuries a few days later.

Bobby Joe Dickson was born in 1957 and lived in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. He was a U.S. Marine staff sergeant. On June 19, 1985, he became one of 12 people killed during the Zone Rosa attack on a restaurant by the leftist Central American Revolutionary Worker’s Party.

Thomas T. Handwork was born in Ohio in 1960. He was a U.S. Marine staff sergeant. On June 19, 1985, he became one of 12 people killed during the Zona Rosa attack on a restaurant by the leftist Central American Revolutionary Worker’s Party.

Patrick R. Kwiatkowski was a U.S. Marine sergeant. On June 19, 1985, he became one of 12 people killed during the Zona Rosa attack on a restaurant by the leftist Central American Revolutionary Worker’s Party. He was 20 years old.

Gregory H. Weber was a U.S. Marine sergeant. On June 19, 1985, he became one of 12 people killed during the Zona Rosa attack on a restaurant by the leftist Central American Revolutionary Worker’s Party. He was 24 years old.

Laurence Adolph Steinhardt was born in New York City in 1892. He served as a sergeant in the U.S. Army during WWI, became a member of the Federation of American Zionists and the American Zion Commonwealth, practiced law and worked on the presidential campaign of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

President Roosevelt later appointed Steinhardt U.S. minister to Sweden and U.S. ambassador to Peru, USSR, Turkey, Czechoslovakia and, finally, Canada.

While in Turkey, Steinhardt assisted in the rescue of Hungarian Jews from the Bergen Belsen concentration camp and helped prominent intellectuals settle in Turkey after fleeing war-torn Europe.

Steinhardt died on March 28, 1950, while on an airplane which crashed en route to Washington, D.C. The first U.S. Ambassador killed in office, he was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

William Frank Buckley, Jr. was born in Medford, Massachusetts in 1928. He joined the U.S. Army soon after graduating high school, attending Officers Candidate School; the Engineer Officer’s Course at Fort Belvoir, Virginia; the Advanced Armor Officer's Course at Fort Knox, Kentucky; and the Intelligence School at Oberammergau, Germany. He was commissioned a second lieutenant and served in the Korean War.

Following the war, Buckley graduated from Boston University with a degree in political science, joined the CIA briefly and served in Vietnam as a senior advisor to the South Vietnamese army. Buckley later rejoined the CIA, with which he served in Vietnam, Zaire, Cambodia Egypt and Pakistan. During this time, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel.

Buckley’s final post was as a CIA station chief in Beirut with a cover as a Department of State political officer. On March 16, 1984, he was kidnapped from his apartment building by Hezbollah. His captors tortured him into revealing secret information, and he died in 1985 after about 15 months of captivity. It remains unclear if he was executed or died of a heart attack.

Buckley was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. He earned numerous awards both before and after his death, including the Silver Star, the Soldier’s Medal, the Bronze Star, the Meritorious Service Medal, the Combat Infantryman’s Badge, the Parachutist Badge, the Vietnam Cross of Gallantry (from the Army of the Republic of Vietnam), the Distinguished Intelligence Cross, an Intelligence Star, an Exceptional Service Medal and the Freedom Foundation Award.

William Edward Nordeen was born in Amery, Wisconsin in 1936. He was a captain in the U.S. Navy and a member of the U.S. Defense and Naval Attaché to U.S. Embassy in Athens, Greece. On June 28, 1988, he was killed by a car bomb detonated by the terrorist group 17 November. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

Arnold Lewis Raphel was born in Troy, New York in 1942. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Hamilton College and a master’s degree from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University.

Raphel joined the Foreign Service in 1966. He was a member of the State Department's Special Operations Group set up to free the Americans seized by Iranian militants at the U.S. Embassy in Teheran, the special and later deputy assistant to the Secretary of State and, finally, U.S. ambassador to Pakistan.

On August 17, 1988, Raphel, Pakistani President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq and 29 others died in a plane crash.

Herbert M. Wasson lived in Rockwood, Tennessee. He held a bachelor's degree in industrial arts from Western Kentucky University and a master's degree in international relations from The George Washington University. A Vietnam veteran, he was trained as an artillery and military officer in the U.S. Army. He served as chief of the U.S. Defense Representative to Pakistan, chief of staff of the 101st Airborne Division; deputy director of the Army Staff and Commander of the 528th Field Artillery Group.

At the time of his death, Wassom was a brigadier general and the head of the U.S. military aid mission to Pakistan. On August 17, 1988, he, Pakistani President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq and 29 others died in a plane crash. He was 49 years old.

Wassom’s decorations included the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star, the Defense Meritorious Service Medal, the Air Medal and the Army Commendation Medal.

Matthew Kevin Gannon was born in 1954 – the eighth of ten children – and grew up in San Juan Capistrano, California. He graduated with a degree in international relations from the University of Southern California, having spent his senior year studying in Europe and the Middle East.

Gannon joined the CIA in 1977 and quickly gained proficiency in Arabic. He was assigned to the Near East Division and spent much of his career in the Middle East, with a short post as deputy branch chief of the Counterterrorism Center in Washington, D.C.

Gannon’s final assignment took place in Beirut, Lebanon, under diplomatic cover. While returning to spend Christmas with his wife and two young children, he became one of 189 Americans killed during the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 by Abdelbaset al-Megrahi over Lockerbie, Scotland on December 21, 1988. Gannon was added to the CIA’s Book of Honor, awarded the CIA’s Intelligence Star and buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Ronald A. Lariviere was born in Holyoke, Massachusetts and lived in Alexandria, Virginia. After graduating high school, he enlisted in the U.S. Army, performed intelligence work in West Germany and earned the Soldier of the Month Award at Fort Hood, Texas. Lariviere later attended Holyoke Community College and Nichols College before entering the Foreign Service.

While serving with the Department of State, Lariviere served as a bodyguard to Secretary of State George P. Schulz and other State principals. His final post was as a diplomatic security officer at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon. While returning to spend Christmas with his wife and young daughter, Lariviere became one of 189 Americans killed during the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 by Abdelbaset al-Megrahi over Lockerbie, Scotland on December 21, 1988.

Daniel Emmett O’Connor served as a diplomatic security officer at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon. On December 21, 1988, he became one of 189 Americans killed during the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 by Abdelbaset al-Megrahi over Lockerbie, Scotland.

James Nicholas Rowe was born in McAllen, Texas in 1938. After graduating high school, he attended the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and served in the Vietnam War. Rowe was captured by the Viet Cong after only three months and spent the next five years in captivity – much of it in a tiny bamboo cage – where he posed as a draftee engineer to avoid being forced into revealing top-secret information.

Rowe eventually escaped from his captors and was rescued on December 31, 1968. He later created a class, now required for graduation from the U.S. Army Special Forces Qualification Course, based on his experiences as a POW. He also wrote the book Five Years to Freedom: The True Story of a Vietnam POW about his experiences.

Promoted to colonel, Rowe was assigned in 1987 as chief of the Army division of the Joint U.S. Military Advisory. He helped train the Armed Forces of the Philippines in counter-insurgency technique and attempted to infiltrate the New People’s Army, a communist guerilla group.

On April 21, 1989, Rowe was killed when his armored limousine was hit by gunfire from the New People’s Army. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery. During his lifetime he had earned numerous military awards, including the Silver Star, the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star, the Purple Heart, the Meritorious Service Medal and the Prisoner of War Medal.

John Angelo Butler was born in 1956. He earned a B.A. in political science from the University of San Diego and an M.P.A. from San Diego State University. In 1988, he began work as a political officer at the U.S. Embassy in St. George's, Granada.

On June 29, 1989, Butler was attending a meeting at the St. George police headquarters a when police officer Grafton Bascombe entered the room and began shooting, killing the police commissioner and injuring two high-ranking officers. Butler died attempting to subdue the shooter.

Gladys D. Gilbert served in Ethiopia as a special projects officer with USAID. On October 16, 1989, she became one of 13 people killed in a plane crash in Ethiopia.

Robert W. Woods served with the CIA. While on a humanitarian mission in Ethiopia, he became one of 13 people killed in a plane crash on October 16, 1989.

Thomas J. Worrick served as acting USAID representative in Ethiopia. On October 16, 1989, he, his wife and 11 others were killed in a plane crash in Ethiopia.

Freddie Russel Woodruff was born in 1947 and lived in Oklahoma. He joined the CIA in 1978 and served in Leningrad, Turkey, Sudan and Ethiopia.

Woodruff’s final post was as CIA station chief and regional affairs officer at the U.S. Embassy in Tbilsi, Georgia. On August 8, 1993, the former Soviet soldier Anzor Sharmaidze, allegedly drunk, shot and killed him. Woodruff was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Barbara L. Schell served with the Foreign Service in Egypt, Chad, Syria, Algeria and Iran. Her final post was as political advisor to the commanding general of operation in northern Iraq. On April 14, 1994, she became one of 26 people killed when friendly fire caused the Black Hawk helicopter on which she was a passenger to crash.

Barry S. Castiglione was born in Massachusetts in 1955. A CIA officer, died on July 19, 1992, while rescuing a colleague in El Salvador.

Jacqueline K. Van Landingham was born in Camden, South Carolina. She graduated from Virginia State University with a degree in food marketing and management and joined the CIA in July 1985. She quickly began serving abroad as an operations support assistant, in charge of all communication dealing with administration, logistics, security and finance.

Landingham’s final post was in Pakistan under diplomatic cover. In March 1995, she became one of two Americans killed when gunmen fired at their van. She was 33 years old.

Gary C. Durell, a resident of Maryland, served in the Air Force for four years before joining the NSA and the Department of State. With the latter organization he served in England, Thailand and Djibouti.

Durell’s final post was as a signals intelligence intercept operator for a joint CIA-NSA organization called the Special Collection Service at the U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan. In March 1995, he became one of two Americans killed when gunmen fired at their van. He was 44 years old.

Colonel Samuel Nelson Drew was born in Wurzburg, Germany in 1948. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in political science from University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill and a Ph.D. in government and foreign affairs from the University of Virginia.

Drew taught political science and national security policy at the Air Force Academy and the National War College, respectively, and became a National Security Fellow at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. He further served as U.S. Assistant for Defense Operations and Policy for NATO in Brussels and a NATO Branch Chief in the Directorate for Strategic Plans and Policy of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Drew’s final post was as director of European Affairs for the National Security Council. On August 19, 1995, he became one of three American diplomats killed while traveling to Sarajevo to discuss peace plans in the Balkans. The armored vehicle in which he was a passenger fell off a mountainside.

Drew is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. During his lifetime, he earned the Defense Superior Service Medal, the Meritorious Service Medal and the Air Force Commendation Medal.

Robert C. Frasure was born in Morgantown, West Virginia in 1942. He earned a bachelor’s degree from West Virginia University, a master’s degree from London School of Economics and a Ph.D. from Duke University. Frasure taught at Duke and the University of the South before joining the Foreign Service in 1974.

Frasure served in Geneva, Bonn, Lagos, London, Pretoria, Addis Ababa, Estonia as the first post-Soviet ambassador and the National Security Council as the Africa director. He earned two Department of State Superior Honors for his work.

Frasure’s final post was as deputy assistant secretary of state for the Bureau of European and Canadian Affairs. On August 19, 1995, he became one of three American diplomats killed while traveling to Sarajevo to discuss peace plans in the Balkans. The armored vehicle in which he was a passenger fell off a mountainside.

Frasure was posthumously awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal for his role in Operation Solomon, the transportation of nearly 15,000 Ethiopian Jews to Israel. The Robert C. Frasure Memorial Award for commitment to peace and the alleviation of human suffering is named in his honor.

Joseph John Kruzel was born in Goldsboro, North Carolina in 1945. He graduated from the Air Force Academy and served as an intelligence officer in Vietnam, a briefing officer for the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a member of the U.S. delegation to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks in Finland.

After earning an M.P.A. and a Ph.D. from Harvard University, Kruzel worked as a special assistant to the Secretary of Defense, a legislative assistant for defense and foreign policy for Senator Edward Kennedy and a professor at Duke University and Ohio State University.

In 1993, Kruzel was appointed deputy assistant secretary of defense for European and NATO Policy. He created the Partnership for Peace in order to foster positive relations before NATO and the former Warsaw Pact countries.

On August 19, 1995, Kruzel became one of three American diplomats killed while traveling to Sarajevo to discuss peace plans in the Balkans. The armored vehicle in which he was a passenger fell off a mountainside.

Kruzel was buried at Arlington National Cemetery. A Pentagon corridor, an auditorium at the Marshall Center in Garmisch, Germany; and a wing at an Albanian military hospital have all been named in his honor.

Ronald Harmon Brown was born in Washington, D.C. in 1941 and grew up in Harlem, New York. He graduated from Middlebury College and joined the U.S. Army in 1962, serving in South Korea and Europe before earning a law degree from St. John’s University.

Brown briefly served Deputy Executive Director for Programs and Governmental Affairs of the National Urban League, a group dedicated to economic equality, before becoming the manager of Senator Edward Kennedy’s presidential campaign. He later headed Jesse L. Jackson’s convention team at the Democratic National Convention and served as chairman of the Democratic National Committee, playing a key role in Bill Clinton’s successful presidential campaign.

In 1993, President Clinton named Brown Secretary of Commerce. While on an official trade mission, Brown became one of 35 people killed when the Air Force CT-43 crashed over Croatia on April 3, 1996.

Brown was posthumously awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal. The Ron Brown Award for corporate leadership, the Ronald H. Brown American Innovator Award, the Ron Brown Business Economic Summit, the Ronald H. Brown Center for Civil Rights and Economic Development, the Ronald H. Brown fellowship and the Ron Brown Scholar Program were all established in his honor.

Lee Frazer Jackson was born in Glen Ridge, New York in 1966. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Williams College and an M.B.A. from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business. Jackson then began work as an investment banker and collector-treasurer of Boston.

Jackson later became the U.S. executive director representing his home nation in the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. While on an official trade mission, Jackson became one of 35 people killed when the Air Force CT-43 crashed over Croatia on April 3, 1996.

Stephen C. Kaminski was born in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, he served with the Department of Commerce for 21 years in Dusseldorf, Hamburg and Tokyo. In 1994, Kaminski received the Department’s Gold Medal Award for his role in a settlement that opened the Japanese public works market to American businesses. In his free time, he volunteered at Loyola High School and Johns Hopkins University and housed foreign exchange students.

Kaminski’s final post was as counselor for Commercial Affairs to the U.S. Embassy in Vienna, Austria. While on an official trade mission, Kaminski became one of 35 people killed when the Air Force CT-43 crashed over Croatia on April 3, 1996. He was 41 years old.

Leslianne Shedd was born in Binghamton, New York in 1968 and grew up in Washington. She attended the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington and served as a CIA agent under diplomatic cover at the U.S. Embassies at Abidjan, Ivory Coast and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Shedd was among 123 people who died on November 24, 1966, when a drunken group hijacked the plane on which they were passengers and flew it until there was no more fuel. According to survivors, she comforted passengers as the plane was crashing. The Leslianne Shedd Internship Fund for international studies or public health majors was established in her memory.

Jesse Nathan Aliganga was born in Oakland, California in 1976. He enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps soon after graduating high school and attended training at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, the Marine Air Ground Combat Center and Keesler Air Force Base. Aliganga later served in Okinawa, Japan with the 3rd Marine Division and Camp Pendleton with the first Foreign Service Support Group.

In January 1998, Aliganga – now a sergeant – began training at the Marine Security Guard School. His first assignment was at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. On August 7, 1998, he and 11 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda.

Julian Leotis Bartley, Sr. was raised in Queens, New York. A career Foreign Service officer, he served in Santo Domingo, Bogotá, Madrid, Tel Aviv and Seoul.

Bartley’s final post was as U.S. consul general at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi. On August 7, 1998, he, his son (an intern at the embassy) and 10 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda.

Molly Huckaby Hardy resided in Valdosta, Georgia. She served with the CIA under diplomatic cover as a financial officer at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi. On August 7, 1998, she and 11 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda. She was 51 years old and a new grandmother.

Kenneth R. Hobson II resided in Nevada, Missouri. He enlisted in the U.S. Army in July 1989, serving in the Persian Gulf War and Germany. He earned the Army Commendation Medal, the Army Achievement Medal, three Good Conduct Medals, the National Defense Service Medal, the Army Service Ribbon, the Overseas Service Ribbon, the Air Assault Badge and the Expert Marksmanship Badge for his service.

A staff sergeant, Hobson served on the Defense Attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. On August 7, 1998, he and 11 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda. He was 27 years old.

Prabhi Guptara Kavaler was born in India. She joined the Foreign Service in 1990 and served in Israel, Pakistan, the Philippines, France and Kenya.

Kavaler’s final post was as a consular officer at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi. On August 7, 1998, she and 11 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda. Her husband, also a Foreign Service officer in Nairobi, had left the embassy only a few minutes earlier to collect information about schools for their two daughters.

Kavaler is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Ann Michelle Deney O’Connor was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. She served at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi. On August 7, 1998, she and 11 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda.

Sherry Lynn Olds was born in Panama City Bay County, Florida in 1958. She graduated from the University of South Carolina and joined the U.S. Air Force, serving for 20 years in Korea, Saudi Arabia and Tyndall Air Force Base.

Olds later became a senior master sergeant. Her final post was at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi. On August 7, 1998, she and 11 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda.

Uttamlal Tom Shah was born in Chicago, Illinois. He graduated from the Berklee College of Music and Ball State University School of Music and served as an undercover CIA agent in Cairo and Damascus.

Shah’s final post was at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi. On August 7, 1998, he and 11 other Americans were killed in the bombing of the embassy by Al Qaeda. He was 38 years old.

Seth John Foti served as a U.S. diplomatic courier. On August 23, 2000, Foti and 142 others died in the crash of Gulf Air Flight 72. He was 31 years old.

Philip Thomas Lincoln, Jr., was born in 1942. He graduated from the College of Literature, Science and the Arts at the University of Michigan, earned two graduate degrees from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and performed graduate work in economics and Chinese studies at the University of Michigan.

Lincoln served in the Foreign Service from 1966 until his death. His final post was as U.S. consul general in Canton, China. On December 2, 1996, Lincoln died in a car accident in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. The Lincoln Fellowship for graduate research in Asia was established in his memory.

J. Kirby Simon was born in 1970. He spent three years in Taiwan with the Foreign Service and died of carbon monoxide poisoning in April 1995 due to a faulty heater in his apartment. The J. Kirby Simon Foreign Service Trust, which devotes itself to community service among Foreign Service personnel, was established in his memory.

Nancy Ferebee Lewis served with USAID in Egypt. She died at the health clinic at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo on Christmas day in 1993 – only a few days after her apartment was treated with a toxic pesticide illegal for residential use in the U.S.

Pasqual Martinez was born in Calexico, California in 1936. He served at the U.S. Embassy in Helsinki, Finland. On February 23, 1991, he was killed in a fire at the Leningrad Hotel in Leningrad, Russia.

Robert B. Hebb served with USAID. October 22, 1989, he became one of 131 people killed in a plane crash in Honduras.

Edward R. Cheney was born in 1927. He served as chief of the Economic Section at the U.S. Embassy in Manila, Philippines. In September 1976, his plane crashed en route to inspect the Bicol River basin project in Naga City. He and seven others were found dead almost two weeks later.

Garnett A. Zimmerly was born in 1928 and lived in Hope, Arkansas. He served with the U.S. Navy in WWII and, later, as USAID mission director in the Philippines. In September 1976, his plane crashed en route to inspect the Bicol River basin project in Naga City. He and seven others were found dead almost two weeks later.

Bruce O’Bailey was born in San Diego, California in 1929. He served as a USAID social welfare advisor and died on December 1, 1971, while en route to a refugee camp.

Luther A. McLendon, Jr., was born in 1919. A captain in the U.S. Marine Corps, he served with USAID and died on December 1, 1972, while aboard a plane that exploded on the ground in Phu Yen Province in Vietnam.

Livingston Lord Satterthwaite was born in 1909 and lived in Ambler, Pennsylvania. He served as deputy chief of mission in Copenhagen, Denmark. On August 29, 1959, while on Greenland on official business, Satterthwaite and six others died during a helicopter crash after returning an Inuit woman to her village following surgery at the Thule Air Force Base. The crash occurred minutes before the crew would have landed back at Thule, Greenland.

William Dale Fisher was born in 1919. He served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Navy before becoming an economics officer in Ethiopia. On September 15, 1961, he died in a plane crash during a charter survey flight for the American Conorada Petroleum Corp. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Gustav Crane Hertz was born in Queens, New York in 1918. He served with USAID in Vietnam. On February 2, 1965, he was captured by the Viet Cong northeast of Saigon. He spent the next two and a half years as a prisoner of war, eventually succumbing to malaria.

Rose Marie Orlich was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1936. She served as a staff officer at the U.S. Embassy in Managua, Nicaragua. On December 23, 1972, she died while trapped inside the embassy during an earthquake.

Richard Aitken served with USAID.

Philip Robert Hanson was born in Minnesota in 1946. He worked with the Peace Corps in Cote d’Ivoire and Morocco and served as general services officer in Ouagadougou, Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso). While on a plane to Lome, Togo, to being his TDY, his plane crashed and killed all on board.

James David Marill was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1960. He was a general services officer at the U.S. Embassy in N'Djamena, Chad. On April 12, 1986, he died in a car accident while traveling in Cameroon.

Marie D. Burke, a resident of New Jersey, joined the Foreign Service in 1971 – a year before her husband, Robert T. Burke, died while serving as deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Gambia. Burke served in Gambia, Kenya, Barbados, Florence and the Consular Affairs Office in the State Department.

Burke’s final post was as second secretary in the consular section of the U.S. Embassy in London. On May 25, 1989, she was stabbed to death in her apartment in Paddington. Burke was 63 years old.

Thomas P. Doubleday, Jr., was born in New York City in 1942. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Yale University and a master’s degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.

Doubleday joined the Foreign Service in 1965. He served in Bangkok, Saigon, Luanda, Lagos, the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, the Bureau of International Organizational Affairs, the Bureau of African Affairs, the Bureau of Personnel and the Bureau of Refugee Programs.

Doubleday’s final post was as a political counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Monrovia, Liberia. He died of a heart attack on February 8, 1993. During his lifetime, he received the Meritorious Honor Award.

James T. Lederman was killed in an automobile accident in Cairo, Egypt, on March 1, 1994.

Barbara J. Green was born in 1962 and lived in Maryland. She served in the Human Resources Center at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan. On March 17, 2002, she and her teenage daughter were killed when attackers threw grenades inside the city’s Protestant International Church.

Laurence M. Foley was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1942. He graduated from the University of Massachusetts and San Francisco State University and served with the Peace Corps as both a volunteer in India and an associate director in the Philippines.

In 1998, after working as director of administration at the Rehabilitation Services of Northern California, Foley joined USAID. He served in Bolivia, Peru, Zimbabwe and finally Jordan as supervisory executive officer. On October 28, 2002, Foley was killed by gunmen with terror connections outside his Jordan home.

Richard Arthur Coulter was born in Oregon in 1945. He served at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran, and died on July 1, 1974.

Howard V. Funk, Jr., was born in New York in 1929. He served as first secretary at the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, Kenya, and died on April 9, 1971.

Oscar C. Holder served as a program inspector with USAID. He died in the crash of a Royal Nepal airlines plane in the Himalayas.

Sidney B. Jaques served as a program inspector with USAID. He died in the crash of a Royal Nepal airlines plane in the Himalayas.

James Mollen was born in Birmingham, New York. He worked in the 2000 election campaign for President George Bush before joining the Department of State in 2002 by heading the Global Technology Corps in the Bureau of International Information Programs. His final post was as U.S. special advisor to Iraq’s Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research. At post, he assembled a medical technology program for Iraqi medical students and was working to develop graduate business schools and executive management education programs.

On November 24, 2004, Mollen was killed by a gunman near the fortified sector of central Baghdad.

Edward J. Seitz was born in Parma, Ohio. He graduated from Baldwin-Wallace College and served as a police officer in Cleveland Heights, Ohio before joining the Foreign Service. During 16 years of service, he worked on the Joint Terrorism Task Force and in Washington, Chicago, Detroit, Denver, Shenyang, and Sanaa.

Seitz’s last post was as a diplomatic security special agent and assistant regional security officer to the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq. Seitz was killed on October 24, 2004 in a mortar attack on Camp Victory. He was 41 years old.

During his lifetime, Seitz received a group superior honor award for his role in the response to the terrorist bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, a group meritorious honor award for his service on the protective detail for Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and a meritorious service increase for exemplary performance as a diplomatic courier.

John Francis O’Grady was born in Massachusetts in 1920. He served as U.S. consul in Brisbane, Australia. On June 10, 1960, O’Grady died in a plane crash off the coast of Queensland. He was on an official tour of the consular district at the time.

Barbara C. Heald was born in 1944 and lived in Falls Church, Virginia. She served as a U.S. Air Force captain before joining the Army's Project and Contracting Office for the Department of Defense as a civilian.

Heald died on January 29, 2005 when a rocket hit the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq. She was buried in Arlington National Cemetery, and the Barbara C. Heald Deployed Civilian Award was named in her honor.

Keith Edward Taylor was born in Tucson, Arizona in 1957 and lived in Irvine, California. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy after graduating high school and reached the rank of lieutenant commander with tours in Haiti, Bosnia and Kosovo.

Taylor died on January 29, 2005 when a rocket hit the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq. It was two months before he was scheduled to return home to his family.

Stephen Eric Sullivan was born and raised in Westborough, Massachusetts. After graduating from high school in 1983, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps, where he served as a field radio operator. In 1992 he earned a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice, and the following year joined the Navy, where he served as a hospital corpsman. Sullivan also worked with at-risk youth and children with special needs. He joined the Diplomatic Security branch of the Foreign Service in 2002.

Assigned to Baghdad, Sullivan was on temporary duty as acting regional security officer in Mosul when a suicide car bomber crashed into his vehicle September 19, 2005.

David E. Foy resided in Fayetteville, North Carolina. He served as a facilities maintenance officer at the U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan. On March 2, 2006, he was killed by a suicide bomber outside the consulate. The David E. Foy Memorial Award for excellence in facility management is named in his honor.

Margaret Ruth Alexander graduated from Bryn Mawr College with a degree in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology, performed graduate work at Columbia University’s Department of Art History and Archaeology and earned a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Alexander worked as a law clerk for the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware before joining USAID in 1987 as a legal officer for the Office of the General Counsel. She later served as senior regional legal advisor in East and Central Africa, the Caribbean and Western and Central Africa; assistant general counsel for the Europe and Eurasia Bureau; and chief of the regional legal office in Southern Africa.

Alexander’s final post was at deputy mission director in Kathmandu, Nepal. She died on a helicopter crash there on September 24, 2006. She was 56 years old and a recipient of USAID superior honor award.

Doris Knittle was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. A graduate of Temple University's School of Nursing, she was part of the university hospital staff for eight years and later went overseas to work as a nurse in Algiers. In 1967, Knittle joined the Foreign Service and began working as supervisor of the dispensary at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul. She was murdered on August 25, 1970 at age 35.

Henry William Antheil, Jr. was born in Trenton, New Jersey in 1912. He served as a skilled cipher clerk in the U.S. Legation in Helsinki, Finland and worked for Ambassador William Christian Bullitt in Germany and Moscow. He was killed on June 14, 1940 – the day the Soviet blockade of Estonia began.

Antheil was a passenger aboard the Finnish airplane Kaleva when Soviet bombers shot it down over the Gulf of Finland. He was carrying several diplomatic pouches and codes at the time of his death, some of which may have included vital information regarding the Soviet Union’s plans in the Baltic region.

Steven Thomas Stefani IV was born in Lakewood, California in 1978. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Nevada - Reno and worked with the U.S. Forest Service as a rangeland management specialist in Northeast Nevada on the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest.

Stefani later joined the Foreign Agricultural Service. In the Ghazni province of Afghanistan, he worked with the director of agriculture to create plans for a poultry rearing facility, and taught local farmers how to renew their wasted soul and replant bare hillsides with trees and helped with the creation of a cold storage facility so farmers could preserve their produce.

On October 4, 2007, Stefani was killed by a roadside bomb that impacted his convoy. His goal of building a playground for Ghazni children was completed after his death.

John Michael Granville was born in Buffalo, New York in 1974. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Fordham University and a master’s degree in international development and social change from Clark University before studying as a Fulbright Fellow in Africa. He later volunteered in Cameroon with the Peace Corps.

Granville worked with USAID in Kenya and Sudan. During the latter assignment, he headed a program to give 75,000 solar-power radios to South Sudanese citizens.

On January 1, 2008, Granville and his driver were killed by a gunman from the terrorist group Ansar al-Tawhid on the way home after a new year’s party at the British Embassy in Khartoum, Sudan.

Brian Daniel Adkins was born in Columbus, Ohio in 1983. After earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees from The George Washington University, he began work with the Foreign Service in 2007 as a consular officer in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A talented linguist, he spoke seven languages and had previously served as a Pickering Fellow with the State Department in Tunisia. Adkins was stabbed to death in his Ethiopia home on January 31, 2009.

Felix Russell Engdahl was born in 1907. He joined the Foreign Service in 1930 and served as U.S. vice consul to Port-au-Prince, Calcutta and Shanghai. While serving at the latter post, Engdahl journeyed to Hong Kong on courier duty before its fall to the Japanese in December 1941.

Engdahl was subsequently captured and taken to the Stanley Internment Camp, where he died on May 14, 1942, after falling down a flight of stairs and suffering a skull fracture. His death occurred only a few months before all the Americans in the camp were repatriated.

Thomas Westbrook Waldron was in Dover, New Hampshire in 1814. The youngest of eight children, he joined one of his older brothers on the Wilkes expedition, which explored the Antarctic Coast (Waldron Glacier is named in his honor), several Pacific islands and the coast of what was to become Washington State.

President John Tyler appointed Waldron as the first U.S. consul to Hong Kong in 1843. While traveling to nearby Macau for official duties, he died of cholera.

Edmund Roberts was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire in 1784. He was a ship-owner and merchant sailor before becoming U.S. consul to Demerara in modern-day Guyana in 1823.

President Andrew Jackson named Roberts the first U.S. envoy to the Far East. He traveled on the U.S.S. Peacock and negotiated the Siamese-American Treaty of Amity and Commerce with Thailand and the Omanti Treaty of 1834 with the Sultan of Muscat.

In 1836, Roberts returned to East Asia to ratify the two treaties and reach an agreement with Cochinchina in modern-day Vietnam. However, he died of dysentery in Macau before he could accomplish these feats. An account of his missions was published posthumously.

Victoria J. Delong was born in 1959. She enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1973 before earning a bachelor’s degree from National University. Delong joined Foreign Service in 1983 and served in El Salvador, Costa Rica, Papua New Guinea, Germany, Australia, Kuala Lumpur, the Philippines, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Mauritius.

Delong’s final post was at Port-au-Prince as a cultural affairs officer. She died in an earthquake in Haiti on January 24, 2010.

Dale J. Gredler was born in in 1967 and grew up in Wenatchee, Washington. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Eastern Washington University and a master’s degree in political science and public administration from Illinois State University before volunteering with the Peace Corps in the Philippines. A graduate of the Presidential Management Program, he served as an emergency management program specialist with the Federal Emergency Management Agency before joining USAID as a financial management specialist in 2001.

Gredler served as an NEP contracting officer in Jakarta, Indonesia, where he helped with reconstruction efforts after a devastating Tsunami, and Almaty, Kazakhstan. He died on January 27, 2010 while en route to the U.S. via London.

Gredler had earned the USAID Meritorious Service Awards twice during his lifetime.

Terrence L. Barnich was born in 1953 and lived in Chicago, Illinois. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Georgetown University and a law degree from Fordham University. Barnich was general consul to former Governor James of Illinois, chair of the Illinois Commerce Commission and co-founder of the consulting firm New Paradigm Resources Group, Inc. before joining the State Department. He served as deputy director of the Iraq Transition Assistance Office at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq.

During his time in Baghdad, Barnich played a key role in advising the Iraqi Electricity Ministry and working out an electricity deal with GE to provide power to millions of homes. He was killed by a roadside bomb in Fallujah, Iraq on May 25, 2009.

Eugene F. Sullivan was born in Greenfield, Massachusetts in 1924. He served in the U.S. Navy in WWII after attending the Navy College Training Program at Tufts University. The Navy later sent him to the University of Colorado Navy Chinese Language School after recognizing his linguistic talents.

Sullivan began work at the Navy Department in Washington, D.C. as a Chinese translator. He graduated from The George Washington University with a degree in chemical engineering in 1949 and later began working for the CIA and NSA in Seoul.

Sullivan returned to Seoul as a chemical engineer with the USAID predecessor agencies (OEC & USOM) before working in Taiwan and Manila as an industry officer, Thailand as a private development officer and Ethiopia as a private enterprise officer. He caught a rare form of malaria, black water fever, while at the latter post. He died of the disease in a hospital in Asmara, Eritrea on January 21, 1972.

Sullivan was fluent in 13 languages at the time of his death.

Sharon Sue Weiand Clark was born in Royal Center, Indiana in 1953. Clark was valedictorian of Pioneer High School and briefly attended Purdue University before choosing to pursue a family instead of a career in pharmacology.

Clark later worked in the Johnson County Public Library and earned an associate’s degree in business from the Johnson County Community College. In 2008, she joined the Foreign Service. Clark’s first assignment was two years at the Regional Security Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Abuja, Nigeria. She died at post on December 26, 2010.

Francis J. Savage was born in Blandsburg, Maryland in 1928. He served in the U.S. Navy during the tail end of WWII and joined the Department of State, where he served in Iceland, Greece, France, Trinidad and Libya.

Savage later switched to USAID, where he worked as a general services officer in Mogadishu, Somalia and a provincial representative in Vietnam. He died from wounds suffered by a bombing at the My Cahn Restaurant in Saigon and was posthumously awarded the Secretary’s Award by President Lyndon B. Johnson.

Joseph Fandino was born in New York City in 1932. He briefly attended Iona College before joining the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War. Fandino later became one of the first Hispanic American Foreign Service officers. Abroad, he served in the Dominican Republic, Spain and Canada. Domestically, he worked with Cuban refugees and visiting dignitaries at the Miami Reception Center and served as Cuban desk officer at the Department of State.

In 1971, Fandino joined USAID’s civil operations and revolutionary development support program in Vietnam as an ethnic affairs officer. He died there on June 27, 1972.

Ragaei Said Abdelfattah was born in Egypt in 1969. After moving the U.S., he worked with the U.N. Development Program in Egypt and the Maryland-National Capital Parks and Planning Commission. At the time of his death, he was pursuing a Ph.D. in planning, governance and globalization at Virginia Technical University.

Abdelfattah joined USAID in 2011 and served two tours in Afghanistan as a field program officer in economic growth. There, he was helping the Afghan government to develop an industrial park in Nangarhar province. Abdelfattah died on August 8, 2012, during a suicide bombing in Kunar province, Afghanistan.

Glen Anthony Doherty was born in 1970 and grew up in Winchester, Massachusetts. He trained as a pilot at Embry–Riddle Aeronautical University and later enlisted as a Navy SEAL, with which he attended the 18 Delta Special Forces Combat Medical School and served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He retired a petty officer first class and worked as a security and intelligence specialist with the U.S. government in Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, Kenya and Libya before becoming a contractor with the Department of State.

Doherty was killed in the September 11, 2012 terrorist attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi.

Tyrone Snowden Woods was born in Imperial Beach, Oregon in 1971. He joined the Navy SEALS after graduating high school, with which led 12 direct action raids and 10 reconnaissance missions leading to the capture of 34 enemy insurgents in the Al Anbar province of Iraq. He received the Bronze Star Medal and retired as a senior chief petty officer before becoming a Foreign Service security specialist in 2010.

Woods was killed in the September 11, 2012 terrorist attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi.

Sean Patrick Smith was born in San Diego, California in 1978. After graduating from high school, he enlisted in the Air Force as a ground radio maintenance specialist, attained the rank of staff sergeant and received the Air Force Commendation Medal for his service. Smith later worked with the Foreign Service as an information management officer in Baghdad, Pretoria, Montreal and The Hague.

Smith was briefly visiting the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi to set up IT systems when he died on the September 11, 2012 terrorist attacks. He was posthumously awarded the Thomas Jefferson Star for Foreign Service.

John Christopher Stevens was born in Grass Valley, California in 1960. He earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of California – Berkley, a J.D. from the University of California’s Hastings College of the Law and a master’s degree from the National War College. He spent two years teaching English in Morocco with the Peace Corps and briefly practiced law before entering the Foreign Service in 1991.

Stevens served abroad in Jerusalem, Damascus, Cairo and Riyadh and domestically as director of the Office of Multilateral Nuclear and Security Affairs, Pearson Fellow with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, special assistant to the Under Secretary for Political Affairs, Iran desk officer and staff assistant in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. In May 2012, he became the U.S. ambassador to Libya, where he had previously served as deputy chief of mission and special representative to the National Transitional Council.

Stevens was killed in the September 11, 2012 terrorist attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi.

Anne Smedinghoff was born in 1987 and grew up in River Forest, Illinois. In 2008, she graduated from Johns Hopkins University with degrees in international studies and Spanish.

Smedinghoff joined the Foreign Service two years later as a public diplomacy-coned officer. She worked as an assistant information officer in the Public Affairs Section of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, where she helped to support Afghan women and children through sports, music and education and to build positive relationships between Afghans and Americans. She was learning Arabic for future assignments in Cairo and Algeria.

On April 6, 2013, Smedinghoff became one of five Americans killed in a suicide bomb attack in Qalat, Zabul Province.

Antoinette Beaumont Tomasek was born in Manhattan Beach, California in 1972. She earned a bachelor’s degree in environmental engineering from California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo and a master’s degree in sociology from American University and volunteered with the Peace Corps in Paraguay.

Tomasek worked with USAID as a community health specialist focusing on water, sanitation and education. She served as a development leadership officer in Indonesia, where she established a program to work with local organizations to prevent and treat tuberculosis, before becoming a health services team leader in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

David Eugene Collins lived in Iowa and held degrees from Central Bible College and Southwestern Assemblies of God University. As an ordained minister, he served in the Assemblies of God and Compassion Ministries Convoy of Hope in Brussels, Belgium before working with the Foreign Service as a financial management officer in Pretoria, South Africa and Lagos, Nigeria.

On April 28, 2013, Collins and his wife were swimming at the beach when they were both caught in an undertow. Collins rescued his wife and escaped the water himself, but died during a 90-minute wait for emergency care. He was 54 years old.

Rayda Nadal joined the Foreign Service in 2008 and served as an office management specialist in Kuwait City, Kabul, Nassau and New Delhi and worked for Ambassador Capricia Marshall at the Office of Protocol in Washington, D.C. Her final post was at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow.

On May 22, 2014, Nadal was injured in a gas explosion in her apartment. She died of her injuries four days later in a hospital in Linköping, Sweden. She was 37 years old.

A native of Oklahoma, Steven Farley was raised in a family in which military had been a way of life for generations. Service to our nation was something that came naturally for him.

Steven began his own life of service as a young Army recruit in 1970. Stationed in Korea, he served alternatively alongside his brother, David, and his father, Noel. And after returning home to complete college and ultimately to receive an MBA, he re-entered military life upon being commissioned as an officer in the U.S Navy in 1980. It was that Navy career that would ultimately lead him to make the final sacrifice of service in Iraq in 2008.

After leaving active duty in 1984, Steven was hand-picked for the pre-commissioning crew of the Mobile Inshore Undersea Warfare (MIUW) Unit 113 where he served sequential department head tours which were followed by a tour as Executive Officer and ultimately Commanding Officer.

During his annual active duty training in the Naval Reserve, he became qualified a battle watch officer of US Commanding 2nd Fleet and later US Commanding 7th Fleet. It was his experience with the 7th Fleet and after 9/11, that lead to his first recall to active duty. After one month of returning from a one-year recall, he was ask to voluntarily return to the 7th Fleet Flag Ship USS Blue Ridge as the Assistant Chief of Staff for the Force Protection of the United States.

In March 2007 as U.S. Navy Captain, Steven was recalled for the third time to active duty, this time as a key component in The Surge operation in Iraq, embedded in the 82nd Airborne as the Provincial Reconstruction Team (EPRT). He returned to Iraq in April 2008 with the Department of State as the Senior Advisor in the Governance Directorate in the Communities of Adnamijah and Sadr City comprising more than 3.5 million people, about 50% of Baghdad’s population.

During that operation in 2007 and 2008, Steven was tasked with leading U.S. military and State Department efforts to rebuild war-torn Sadr City and to assist local leaders in the beginning stages of forming self-government.

In February of 2008 he hosted a majority of the Sadr City District Council members on a trip to the U.S. to witness self-government and the fruits of freedom firsthand. He wanted them to see what they were working toward and help them cast a vision of freedom for their people. Returning to Iraq, he and the councilmen set about the task of implementing what they had learned along with taking advantage of critical U.S. funds to rebuild their communities and restore pride and confidence in the Iraqi people.

Steven was convinced his team’s efforts would start a cascading effect that would result in rapid rebuilding, growth, and finally sustainable self-government in Sadr City and in Iraq. On morning of June 24, 2008, an IED was detonated just before the meeting to launch those efforts was to begin. According to reports, Steven, two American soldiers, and a DOD official took the majority of the shrapnel sparing the lives of many of the council members, including the Deputy Chairman who was later to be elected as the new Chairman to continue what they had started.

Selena Nelson-Salcedo, age 38, passed away suddenly on June 4, 2017 in Bratislava, Slovakia, where she was the Consular Chief of the U.S. Embassy. Selena was an exceptional human being who had a huge heart, endless empathy, unlimited compassion, as well as being brilliant and accomplished. Selena earned an undergraduate degree from the University of Wisconsin and a Master’s degree from the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. She joined the U.S. State Department as a Foreign Service Officer in 2008, a job that took her to the Dominican Republic, Malaysia and Slovakia. During her tenure with the State Department, she earned many awards and accolades. One of her many passions was learning languages and exploring cultures. When her young life was cut short too soon, she spoke five languages fluently. She was passionate about civil rights and social justice, and spent much of her career working to improve the lives of the poor and disenfranchised around the world. Selena was a dedicated wife and mother. She traveled extensively with her husband, Jorge and their immediate family, and rarely missed an opportunity to live life to the fullest. She will be missed by family and friends with the same ferocity with which she lived and loved life.

Selena is survived by the love of her life, Jorge, and daughters Antonella and Gaia; her parents, Janice Hobbs and Don Nelson, stepmother Mary Kaye Perrin and mother-in-law Consuelo Barbosa; her siblings, Jenna, Jeremy (Clara), Micah (Lindsay) and Simone (John); six nieces and nephews (Henry, Diego, Emma, Max, Homer and Nelson); as well as countless aunts, uncles and cousins.

Selena Nelson-Salcedo was a wonderful and caring mother and friend with endless heart, empathy, and compassion for everyone around her. Selena joined the Department of State as a Foreign Service Officer in 2008 and traveled to the Dominican Republic, Malaysia and Slovakia. Selena spoke five languages fluently and traveled extensively with her husband, Jorge, and their two daughters. She rarely missed an opportunity to live life to the fullest, which for her meant living and loving heart-first. She loved to advocate for civil rights and social justice and worked for much of her career to improve the lives of the poor and disenfranchised worldwide. She will be deeply missed by her family and friends with the same ferocity with which she lived and loved life.

Michael AC “Andy” Jordan was serving as an Information Resource Manager at the U.S. Department of State mission in Juba, South Sudan when he died on Sunday, December 18, 2016. He was 43.

Throughout his career, Andy served with distinction at embassies in Baghdad, Brussels, Karachi, Tel Aviv, Lusaka, Tbilisi, and Nairobi. Andy’s unflappable demeanor, innate kindness and ingenuity proved invaluable in Juba and posts worldwide, not just in technical areas, but in morale as well.

Most recently, Andy’s technical skills and creative problem solving have been credited with helping keep the US embassy in Juba operating during this chaotic time in the young country’s history. The US embassy remaining open facilitated many organizations’ ability to communicate and stay in the country to support its vulnerable population. Andy’s humble nature never boasted of this accomplishment or its impact - the US embassy is feeding two million people per month, providing water and sanitation to 250,000 people living in the UN Protection of Civilian camps, and more. None of this would happen if the US embassy in Juba were to shutter. Andy would take no credit or accept attention for himself, rather, he would only cast the light onto others who were part of the solution and credit the team.

Andy was also part of an Ultimate Frisbee team that was composed of a mix of people in Africa. This team went on to play at the Africa Ultimate Frisbee Competition, and his team won the competition.

Despite his numerous professional achievements, Andy’s greatest delight was the family he created. He had no greater pride of accomplishment than his family, and his allegiance to and fierce protection of his wife Deborah and his daughters Madison and Helena.

Andy continually demonstrated admiration for the woman with whom he chose to build a life. He respected Deb’s judgment, experience and resiliency, admired her ability to love and nurture others, and delighted in her ability to bring humor to any situation. He supported and encouraged her with tenderness, respect and honor.

As a father, Andy demonstrated his love not only in time together and strong hugs, but in wise counsel paired with thoughtful consideration and gentle delivery. Andy shared his enjoyment of knowledge, abstract concepts and cultural exploration with Madi and Helena to expand their world and their thought processes. Similarly, Andy demonstrated a keen interest in what the girls found to be important. He frequently wore t-shirts from Helena’s regattas, and he decorated his space with art that Madi had created. Andy cherished each of his daughters just as she is - Madi’s loving heart and artistic view on the human condition and Helena’s warrior heart and steady compass.

Andy and Deb’s teamwork and devotion to their family created a bond that held their little family unit tightly together during difficult times. One only had to have a personal conversation with Andy or see him around his family to know they were his entire world, as he is theirs. This intense love provided strength for Andy as he served in hardship.

If one had the pleasure of seeing Andy’s eyes light with joy and crinkle in the corners, you had the privilege of seeing past the gifted mind, the dedicated professional, the steadfast coworker and into the heart of a kind, selfless, loyal friend.