William Stuart Symington III ( SY-ming-tən; June 26, 1901 – December 14, 1988) was an American businessman and Democratic politician from Missouri. He served as the first secretary of the Air Force from 1947 to 1950 and was a United States senator from Missouri from 1953 to 1976.
Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, Symington worked as an executive in his uncle's iron products company and for other companies before becoming president of Emerson Electric. He resigned from Emerson in 1945 to take various positions in the administration of President Harry S. Truman, becoming the first Secretary of the Air Force in 1947. He was elected to the Senate in 1952, defeating incumbent Republican Senator James P. Kem. He joined the United States Senate Armed Services Committee and the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and emerged as a prominent critic of McCarthyism.
Symington sought the Democratic nomination in the 1960 presidential election with the backing of former President Harry S. Truman, but the nomination went to John F. Kennedy. After the Kansas City Athletics moved to Oakland, Symington threatened to revoke Major League Baseball's antitrust exemption, which in turn encouraged the formation of the Kansas City Royals. Symington declined to seek re-election in 1976 and was succeeded by John Danforth.
Symington was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, the son of Emily Kuhn (née Harrison) and William Stuart Symington Jr. His father, who received a Ph.D in French literature, was a Romance languages professor at Stanford and Amherst College before pursuing a law career and becoming a judge in Baltimore, Maryland. His mother came from a prominent Maryland family.
Symington grew up in Baltimore, and was the oldest of his five brothers and sisters. Symington attended Roland Park Public School and the Gilman School, a private all-male preparatory school in Baltimore's Roland Park neighborhood. He graduated from Baltimore City College in 1918, and at the age of 17, Symington enlisted in the United States Army as a private first class during World War I.
Stationed in an Officer Training Program at Camp Zachary Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky, Symington was never deployed to fight in World War I, with the war ending before he could seek deployment. Symington was commissioned as a second lieutenant, becoming one of the youngest members of the Army to achieve that rank; being discharged as a second lieutenant in January 1919.
He graduated from Yale University in 1923. At Yale he was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity (Phi chapter), the Elihu senior society, and served on the board of the Yale Daily News. In 1924, he married the former Evelyn Wadsworth in a lavish ceremony attended by President Coolidge and other prominent politicians. By all accounts, the two had a very happy marriage and were known for their devotion and faithfulness to each other, both of which were not always present among the social elite. When Evelyn died in 1972, Symington was devastated, telling his biographer that "he never knew this much loneliness could be around."
In 1923, Symington went to work for an uncle in the shops of the Symington Company of Rochester, New York, manufacturers of malleable iron products. Two years later he formed Eastern Clay Products but in 1927 returned to the Symington Company as executive assistant to the president.
Symington resigned in 1930 to become President of the Colonial Radio Corporation. In January 1935, he accepted the presidency of Rustless Iron and Steel Corporation (manufacturers of stainless steel) but remained a director of Colonial Radio Corporation.
When Rustless Iron and Steel Corporation was sold to the American Rolling Mill Company in 1937, Symington resigned and in 1938 accepted the presidency of Emerson Electric Company in St. Louis, Missouri. During World War II he transformed the company into the world's largest builder of airplane gun turrets. Symington, who was an active proponent of racial justice ("All Americans should have their chance") integrated the Emerson Electric work force, which resulted in increased productivity.
First Secretary of the Air Force
He resigned from Emerson in 1945 to join the administration of fellow Missourian Harry S. Truman. His first positions were chairman of the Surplus Property Board (1945), administrator of the Property Administration (1945–1946) and Assistant Secretary of War for Air (1946–1947).
On September 18, 1947, the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force was created and Symington became the first secretary. Symington had a stormy term as he worked to win respect for the United States Air Force, which previously had been part of the Army. He had numerous public battles with Secretary of Defense James Forrestal.
Major accomplishments during Symington's term as Secretary included the Berlin Airlift and championing the United States Air Force Academy. Symington resigned in 1950 to protest lack of funding for the Air Force after the USSR detonated its first nuclear weapon. He remained in the administration as the Chairman of the National Security Resources Board (1950–1951) and the Chairman of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation Administrator (1951–1952). He was featured on the cover of Time magazine's January 19, 1948 issue.
Cancellation of the Flying Wing
During his tenure, there was a major debate and investigation into production of the Convair B-36 Peacemaker, which was the last piston-powered bomber at the beginning of the Jet Age. During his tenure, Symington had a meeting with John K. Northrop on the contract for the YB-49 Flying Wing bomber, which was well underway with seven examples manufactured. During this meeting, Symington threatened Northrop that if they refused to enter into a corporate merger with Convair (the company building the rival B-36 Peacemaker bomber) that Northrop would be, "Goddamn sorry if you don't!". This threat, later reported by Northrop, was eventually carried though when Symington cancelled the Flying Wing programme and ordered all existing aircraft destroyed.
At the urging of his father-in-law James W. Wadsworth Jr., a former Republican Speaker of the New York State Assembly and U.S. Senator from New York, Symington decided to run for the U.S. Senate.
In 1952, he was elected Senator from Missouri, taking the seat previously held by Truman and scoring a win for the Democrats in a year otherwise favorable to the Republicans. He was re-elected in 1958, 1964, and 1970.