Sherman Kent

Sherman Kent

Sherman Kent Wikipedia Page

Sherman Kent was a Yale University history professor who, during World War II and through 17 years of Cold War-era service in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), pioneered many of the methods of intelligence analysis. He is often described as "the father of intelligence analysis".

SHERMAN KENT, 82; EX-OFFICIAL OF C.I.A. AND YALE PROFESSOR

Sherman Kent, a former official of the Central Intelligence Agency who was an early member of its forerunner, the Office of Strategic Services, died Tuesday at his home. He was 82 years old.

Mr. Kent was a history professor at Yale University, where he received his undergraduate and doctoral degrees, before helping to found the O.S.S. in 1941.

He headed the Europe and Africa division and later was acting director of research and intelligence for the State Department.

He returned to Yale after World War II, and a newspaper account at the time said he had told President Truman that security was so lax in the Government that he intended to turn his Yale students loose and discover 95 percent of the nation's secrets through periodicals and daily newspapers. Key Role in C.I.A. In 1950 he joined the C.I.A. at the request of its Director, Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, and became chairman of its Board of National Estimates, which provided intelligence judgments about capacities of foreign countries. He retired in December 1967.

Mr. Kent wrote a number of books, including Strategic Intelligence for American World Policy in 1949, and Writing History in 1967.

He wrote childrens' books after retiring, including A Boy and a Pig, but Mostly Horses, in 1974.

Mr. Kent was born in Chicago but grew up in Marin County, Calif., in the town of Kentfield, named for his grandfather, a Chicago millionaire. His father, William Kent, was a Congressman and early conservationist. His mother, Elizabeth Thacher Kent, was an early suffragette who was arrested in a Washington protest in 1912.

He is survived by his wife, Elizabeth Gregory Kent, two children and seven grandsons.