James David Watkins Bio/Wiki, Net Worth, Married 2018
James Watkins was born on March 7, 1927 in Alhambra, California, USA as James David Watkins. He was married to Janet Tobin and Sheila Jo McKinney. He died on July 26, 2012 in Alexandria, Virginia, USA.
Had 11 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
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By the late 1970s, Watkins was commander of the 6th Fleet and in the early 1980s served as commander in chief of the Pacific Fleet.
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After receiving a bachelor's degree from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1949, Watkins served on submarines during the Korean and Vietnam wars. In 1958, he earned a master's degree in mechanical engineering from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey.
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In 1938 his mother Louise unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for Senate.
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His grandfather George Clinton Ward was president of Southern California Edison in the early 1930s, and his father, Edward Francis Watkins, owned the Southern California Winery Co. and grew grapes in what is now San Marino.
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The sixth of seven children.
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During his 37-year naval career, he rose to chief naval officer and was known for developing a maritime strategy for dealing with the Soviet Union and for improving the lives of those serving in the Navy and their families.
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At the Energy Department, Watkins also developed a 10-point plan to strengthen environmental protection and waste management activities in the agency, and instituted policy designed to decrease American dependence on foreign oil. He left the post in 1993.
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After taking charge of the Energy Department in 1989, Watkins launched the first program to clean up pollution at the nation's nuclear plants and spearheaded the administration's energy legislation.
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In 2001, Watkins began chairing another presidential commission, with a mandate to establish a comprehensive national ocean policy.
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Watkins was a deeply religious Roman Catholic father of six who had once called the military's ban on homosexuals "a sound policy.".
At the United States Naval Academy, Watkins was one class behind Jimmy Carter, who sometimes hazed him by forcing him to sing while standing on a chair in the mess hall.
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Secretary of Energy under President George Bush, Watkins was a career naval officer with experience in nuclear technology and member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Earlier, in 1987, had been appointed by President Ronald Reagan to the Presidential Commission on the Human Immunodeficiency Virus Epidemic to examine the AIDS crisis, and contributed to Reagan's controversial Strategic Defense Initiative.