Background
Sargent Shriver was born in Westminster, Maryland, on November 9, 1915.
Sargent Shriver was born in Westminster, Maryland, on November 9, 1915.
He received a law degree from Yale Law School in 1941.
During World War II he served as a naval officer in the Pacific. After the war Shriver became acquainted with Joseph P. Kennedy, a multimillionaire businessman and financier, who hired Shriver to help manage the huge Merchandise Mart office building in Chicago. In 1960 he played an active role in the presidential campaign of his brother-in-law, Senator John F. Kennedy. In 1961 Shriver was appointed by President Kennedy to serve as director of the newly authorized Peace Corps. Shriver was also appointed in 1964 by President Lyndon B. Johnson to be the first director of the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO), which was to direct the Johnson administration's war-on-poverty program. In 1968 Shriver was appointed by Johnson to be U. S. ambassador to France. In July 1972 the Democratic National Convention selected Senator George S. McGovern of South Dakota as its presidential candidate and Senator Thomas F. Eagleton of Missouri as its nominee for vice-president. In early August, however, Eagleton withdrew as a result of controversy caused by the disclosure that he had undergone psychiatric treatment. After receiving declinations from a few other leading Democrats, McGovern chose Shriver to be his running mate. During the campaign Shriver was an eloquent and aggressive spokesman for the ticket. Shriver died on January 18, 2011, in Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, Maryland, at age 95.
Quotations:
"Peace requires the simple but powerful recognition that what we have in common as human beings is more important and crucial than what divides us. "
"The Peace Corps represents some, if not all, of the best virtues in this society. It stands for everything that America has ever stood for. It stands for everything we believe in and hope to achieve in the world. "
"What can change the world today is the same thing that has changed it in the past-an idea and the service of dedicated, committed individuals to that idea. "
"The most important thing that I know about living is love. Nothing surpasses the benefits received by a human being who makes compassion and love the objective of his or her life. For it is only by compassion and love that anyone fulfills successfully their own life’s journey. Nothing equals love. "
"It is not what you get out of life that counts. It's what you give and what is given from the heart. "
Shriver was a founding member of the America First Committee.
In 1953 Shriver married one of Kennedy's daughters, Eunice Mary.