Claude Brinegar

Claude Stout Brinegar ( born December 16, 1926 in Rockport, Mendocino County, California, † March 13, 2009 in Palo Alto, California ) was an American businessman and politician who under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, the Office of the Minister of Transport held.

Career

Claude Brinegar served from 1945 to 1947 in the U.S. Air Force and then began studies at Stanford University. He graduated in 1950 with a Bachelor in Economics from 1951 as a master in mathematics and statistics as well as a Ph.D. in 1953 in economic research. At Stanford, he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa student community. During his studies he worked as a research assistant at the Food Research Institute at Stanford University and as an economic consultant for the Emporium Capwell - Corporation in San Francisco.

In 1953, Brinegar a job as a business analyst at the Union Oil Company. He got into this business on continuously until he was elected in 1965 to his vice president. After the merger with the Pure Oil Company in the same year he took over the presidency of the Pure Oil Company segment. Later he served on the Board of Directors of Union Oil.

Richard Nixon appointed Brinegar on 2 February 1973 as a successor to Transport Minister John Volpe in his cabinet. After Nixon's resignation, he held the post of first under his successor, Gerald Ford. In Brinegars tenure, the oil crisis was in 1973. He suggested reforms which had made ​​it necessary in the northeastern U.S., the collapse of several railroad companies, and made ​​an effort to revitalize the Federal Highway Program. On 1 February 1975, he resigned from his post after President Ford had declared that he would seek re-election. Brinegar wanted to stay in the office only until the end of term and prematurely made ​​now the way for his successor, William Thaddeus Coleman free.

Brinegar returned to Union Oil. In 1980 he was again politically active when he headed the transition team of the Republicans in the field of Transport Ministry after the election of Ronald Reagan. After his resignation in the meantime had become too Unocal oil company he was still in the governing body of the railroad company Conrail operates.