In Memoriam Herbert York
Photo reprinted with permission from UCSD.
Grateful for his many years of dedicated advocacy and all that he has meant to the arms control movement and to the Council, we regret to announce that Dr. Herbert York passed away at the age of 87 on May 19, 2009.
For those who would like to make a donation in memory of Dr. Herbert York, Council for a Livable World welcomes contributions in his honor for our campaign for ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, a campaign Dr. York helped lead almost 30 years ago and a goal we’re working to realize in the next two years. To contribute to this fund in his honor, please click here or call Jason Pantaleo at 202.543.4100, ext. 2102.
Dr. York was a scientist on the Manhattan Project and later became a dedicated arms control advocate and expert, a passion that would include serving on the National Advisory Board of Council for a Livable World.
He was a pioneer in many of the capacities in which he worked, first as a physicist on the Manhattan Project from 1943 to 1945 and then as the first director of the Lawrence Livermore Lab. He joined the Office of the Secretary of Defense as its first chief scientist for the Advanced Research Projects Agency in 1958 and later, at the appointment of President Dwight Eisenhower, became the first and director of the Defense Department Research and Engineering.
There is no such thing as a good nuclear weapons system. There is no way to achieve, in the sound sense, national security through nuclear weapons.
--Herbert York
According to University of California at San Diego news sources, “It was during these duties in the 1950s that York’s belief that ending a war was done most effectively by not starting one sharpened, and turned him emphatically to arms control and to a nuclear test ban as a first step.”
York later stated, “I was the only senior official who thought it (arms control and nuclear test ban) was a great idea. Others were tolerant of it, but the majority thought it was really dumb.”
Dr. York leaves behind a strong arms control legacy through his various positions in science, academia, and government, which included servicing as a science and arms control advisor to six presidents. He was a member of the General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and Disarmament from 1961-69 and chief negotiator for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty between 1978 and 1981.
Herbert York with Marye Anne Fox, chancellor of the University of California, San Diego. Photo reprinted with permission from UCSD.
Dr. York was the founding chancellor of the University of California, San Diego, and later became the founder and Director Emeritus of the UCSD Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. He held numerous posts at the university and taught both graduate and undergraduate students for years.
His published works are extensive and include Arms Congrol; Arms and the Physicist; Race to Oblivion: A Participant’s View of the Arms Race; Oppenheimer, Teller and the Superbomb; A Shield in Space? Technology, Politics and the Strategic Defense Initiative; Making Weapons, Talking Peace: A Physicist’s Journey from Hiroshima to Geneva in addition to numerous articles on nuclear disarmament.
Dr. York passed away on May 19, 2009 in San Diego and leaves behind his wife Sybil, three children, Rachel York, Dr. Cynthia York, and David Winters, and four grandchildren.
For those who would like to make a donation in memory of Dr. Herbert York, Council for a Livable World welcomes contributions in his honor for our campaign for ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, a campaign Dr. York helped lead almost 30 years ago and a goal we’re working to realize in the next two years. To contribute to this fund in his honor, please click here or call Jason Pantaleo at 202.543.4100, ext. 2102.
In addition, his family has suggested donations to the “Herb York Memorial Fund” at University of California, San Diego.
