Robert Seamans

Robert Channing Seamans Jr. (October 30, 1918 – June 28, 2008) was an MIT professor who served as NASA Deputy Administrator and 9th United States Secretary of the Air Force. Birth and education He was born in Salem, Massachusetts, to Pauline and Robert Channing Seamans. His great-great-grandfather was Otis Tufts. Seamans attended Lenox School, in Lenox, Massachusetts; earned a Bachelor of Science degree in engineering from Harvard University in 1939 or 1940; a Master of Science degree in aeronautics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1942; and a Doctor of Science degree in instrumentation from MIT in 1951. Seamans also received the following honorary degrees: Doctor of Science from Rollins College (1962) and from New York University (1967); Doctor of Engineering from the Norwich Academy (1971), from the University of Notre Dame (1974), and from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in 1974. Early career From 1941 to 1955 he held teaching and project positions at MIT during which time he worked on aeronautical problems, including instrumentation and control of airplanes and missiles. Positions that he held at MIT included: Instructor (1941–1945), Assistant Professor (1945–1950), and Associate Professor (1950–1955), Department of Aeronautical Engineering; Project Engineer, Instrumentation Laboratory; Chief Engineer, Project Meteor; and Director, Flight Control Laboratory.