Five Questions
George shultz, 95, reflects on his life.
Ninety-five years ago today, George Pratt Shultz, the 60th U.S. secretary of state, recipient of the Medal of Freedom, and a civic leader in San Francisco and at Stanford, was born in New York City.
Yet the globe-trotting schedule of this natty nonagenarian, who’s at work on his next book, “Learning From Experience,” would put most Millennials to shame.
Just last month, Shultz traveled to China with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, to meet with President Xi Jinping.
Then Shultz landed in New York, receiving the World Jewish Congress’ Herzl Award. Hopping to Washington, D.C., Shultz and his Hoover colleague, Sidney Drell, were given the American Nuclear Society’s Dwight D. Eisenhower Award for their anti-nukes stance. With members of the Carbon Tax Center, Shultz, a Prius owner and advocate for a revenue-neutral carbon dioxide fee, signed a letter urging United Nations Climate Summit negotiators in Paris to implement that action to combat global warming.
His storied career — spanning academia, politics and business — initially pointed to an academic tenure track. Shultz graduated cum laude from Princeton in 1942 with an economics degree and international affairs minor. Beginning in 1948, Professor Shultz taught legions of students econ at MIT. From 1957 to 1968, he was a professor of industrial relations at the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business.
But like initials of his full name, G.P.S., Secretary Shultz nailed his mark on the global stage standing shoulder to shoulder with President Ronald Reagan, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, French President Francois Mitterrand, German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, Chinese Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev as they negotiated the Cold War’s end.
His first political appointment arrived in 1957 when Shultz served as senior staff economist on President Eisenhower’s Council of Economic Advisers. Three appointments — secretary of labor, budget office director and Treasury secretary — followed under President Nixon. In 1974, Shultz decamped to the private sector as president of the Bechtel Group, a West Coast move that also cemented his long relationship with Stanford University as both a faculty member and Distinguished Fellow with the Hoover Institution.
Shultz has five grown children with his first wife, Helena Maria O’Brien, who died after 49 years of marriage. In 1997, Shultz found love again with Protocol Chief Charlotte Mailliard. The couple, who still entertain heads of state, royalty and world leaders at their homes on the Stanford campus and atop Russian Hill, also enjoy the company of Shultz’s 11 grandchildren and four greatgrandchildren.
Via phone from his office at the Hoover Institute, Shultz admits some surprise at turning 95. However, he still hews to his lifelong motto: “Be true to yourself.” There’s a brief sense of wistfulness as Shultz points out that the world leaders he worked with and admired are long gone. Yet Shultz, still brimming with innate curiosity, continues to engage an all-ages audience.
Q: Considering you’ve traveled to many corners of the world, what’s your favorite journey?
A: I love spending time with Charlotte! We try to keep our weekends clear so we can just hang out together: We hang out in San Francisco; we hang out at our home on the Stanford campus. My parents had a retirement place in the Berkshires. It was originally a working farm. We’ve fixed it up a bit, and now it’s the Shultz Family Farm, and that’s where all the family will spend Christmas.
Q: Of all your high-level government posts, which did you most enjoy?
A: When I arrived in D.C., I didn’t know anything about politics, Washington or the press. But I learned about these things from a position of substance. Yet the thing that moves you most, always, has a human face. In the mid-’80s under President Reagan, I worked hard on the issue of Soviet Jewry — trying to win their freedom from the Soviet Union. (Eventually more than a million Soviet Jews were allowed to leave the USSR). There was one particular person I’d met in Moscow but lost track of. One day I’m in my (White House) office and the phone rings. There’s this familiar little voice on the other end and she says, “It’s Ida (Nudel), and I’m in Jerusalem.” At least one person was better off, and I had something to do with that.
Q: What are your current thoughts or goals as your 95th year dawns?
A: My main thought is about my four great-grandchildren and what I can do to make their future a better one. It’s so fun to watch them and see them react to how exciting life is — they are so curious about everything and literally run with enthusiasm. But I can’t help ask myself, ‘What kind of a world will they inherit? And is there anything I can do about it?’ They are my motivation; I’m living for their future.
Q: As a lifelong, loyal Republican in the Grand Old Party tradition, can you explain the rise of Donald Trump?
A: I guess you’d say Trump is a showman. He’s good at that, and people are responding. Yet we live in a world awash in change: Everywhere you look there are problems, big-time — ISIS being the most dangerous. When people vote to determine who will lead the United States as our next president in a turmoil-filled world, Trump becomes a very sobering question.
Q: Of all your many talents — including diplomat, deep thinker, author, negotiator — is there one skill you wish you possessed?
A: I think I’d like to be a musician and play piano in a band.
“I can’t help ask myself, ‘What kind of a world will they inherit? And is there anything I can do about it?’ They are my motivation; I’m living for their future.” George P. Shultz, speaking of his grandchildren