Claiborne de Borda Pell (November 22, 1918 – January 1, 2009) was an American politician and writer who served as a U.S. senator from Rhode Island for six terms from 1961 to 1997. He was the sponsor of the 1972 bill that reformed the Basic Educational Opportunity Grant, which provides financial aid funding to American college students; the grant was given Pell's name in 1980 in honor of his work in education legislation.
A member of the Democratic Party, Pell remains the longest serving U.S. senator from Rhode Island.
Early life and education Claiborne Pell was born on November 22, 1918, in New York City,William H. Honan, New York Times, Claiborne Pell, Ex-Senator, Dies at 90, January 1, 2009. the son of Matilda Bigelow and diplomat and congressman Herbert Pell.
Pell's family members included John Francis Hamtramck Claiborne, George Mifflin Dallas, and Nathaniel Herbert Claiborne. He was a direct descendant of English mathematician John Pell and a descendant of Senator William C. C. Claiborne.G. Wayne Miller, Providence Journal, , April 10, 2005. The Congressional Record also reports that he was a direct descendant of Wampage I, a Siwanoy chieftain.1966 Congressional Record, Volume 112, Page (January 19, 1966).
In 1927, Pell's parents divorced and his mother remarried Hugo W. Koehler of St. Louis, a commander in the United States Navy.G. Wayne Miller, An Uncommon Man: The Life & Times of Senator Claiborne Pell, 2011, pages 41–42. Following World War I, Koehler served as an Office of Naval Intelligence and State Department operative in Russia during its civil war, and later as naval attaché to Poland. Said to be the "richest officer in the Navy" during the 1920s, Koehler was rumored to be the illegitimate son of Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria and to have assisted the Romanovs to flee the Russian Empire following the Russian Revolution of 1917. Pell was close to his stepfather, who died when Pell was 22. In later years, he made a concerted effort to determine the veracity of the rumors surrounding Koehler's past, but was only partly successful.Our Man in the Crimea: Commander Hugo Koehler and the Russian Civil War. P. J. Capelotti. University of South Carolina Press. (1991) pages 9–10.A Man Apart: The Life and Times of Senator Claiborne Pell. G. Wayne Miller. UPNE. 2011. page 208.
Pell attended The Buckley School in New York City and St. George's School in Middletown, Rhode Island. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in history from Princeton University in 1940.J. Y. Smith, Washington Post, Former R.I. Senator Claiborne Pell, 90; Sponsored Grant Program, January 2, 2009.United Federation of Postal Clerks, Union Postal Clerk and the Postal Transport Journal, Volumes 60-62, 1964, p. 23. Pell's senior thesis was titled "Macaulay and the Slavery Issue." While at Princeton, he was a member of Colonial Club and the American Whig-Cliosophic Society, and played on the rugby team.Princeton Alumni Association, Princeton Alumni Weekly, Volume 74, (March 19, 1974), page 44.
Post-college life After graduating from Princeton, Pell worked as an oil field roustabout in Oklahoma. He then served as private secretary for his father, who was United States Ambassador to Portugal. At the start of World War II he was with his father, who was then United States Ambassador to Hungary. Claiborne Pell drove trucks carrying emergency supplies to prisoners of war in Germany, and was detained several times by the Nazi government.
Uniformed service Pell enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard as a seaman second class on August 12, 1941, four months before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Pell served as a ship's cook, was promoted to seaman first class on October 31, and then was commissioned as an ensign on December 17, 1941.New York Times, New Face in Politics; Claiborne deBorda Pell, September 30, 1960. During the war, Pell's ships served as North Atlantic convoy escorts, and also in amphibious warfare during the allied invasion of Sicily and the allied invasion of the Italian mainland.Ken Franckling, United Press International, Sen. Caliborne Pell -- You Let the Other Man Have Your Way, Albany (Georgia) Herald, July 22, 1981.
Pell was promoted to lieutenant (junior grade) on October 1, 1942, and then to lieutenant in May 1943. Due to his fluency in Italian, Pell was assigned as a civil affairs officer in Sicily, where he became ill from drinking unpasteurized milk. He was sent home for recuperation during the summer of 1944, but returned to active service later in the war. Pell was discharged from active duty on September 5, 1945.G. Wayne Miller, An Uncommon Man, p. 80.
After the end of World War II, he remained in the U.S. Coast Guard Reserve. He attained the rank of captain and retired in 1978.Celeste Katz, Providence Journal, Coast Guard Presence in Newport Grows, July 19, 1996.
Personal life and family In December 1944, Pell married Nuala O'Donnell, daughter of Charles Oliver O'Donnell and Josephine Hartford.Eric Pace, "Josephine Hartford Bryce, 88, Philanthropist and Sportswoman", The New York Times, June 10, 1992. They had four children: Herbert Claiborne Pell III, Christopher Thomas Hartford Pell, Nuala Dallas Pell, and Julia Lorillard Wampage Pell.Faye Zuckerman, , The Providence Journal, September 2, 2003.Jody McPhillips and Elizabeth Abbott, , The Providence Journal, June 25, 1990. Herbert (September 11, 1945 – September 24, 1999) and Julia (May 9, 1953 – April 13, 2006) predeceased their parents. His grandson Clay Pell (son of Herbert) was an unsuccessful contender in the 2014 Democratic primary for Governor of Rhode Island.
Diplomatic work, further education From 1945 to 1952, he served in the United States Department of State as a Foreign Service Officer in Czechoslovakia, Italy, and Washington, D.C. He was fluent in French, Italian, and Portuguese.Providence Journal, , November 29, 1989.
In 1945, Pell was a participant in the United Nations Conference on International Organization in San Francisco that drafted the United Nations Charter.Warren Christopher, In the Stream of History: Shaping Foreign Policy for a New Era, 1998, p. 15.
In 1946 he completed graduate studies in International Relations at Columbia University and received a Master of Arts degree.M. Charles Bakst, Providence Journal, , December 8, 1996.
Post-diplomatic career In 1954, Pell was appointed vice president and member of the board of directors of the International Fiscal Corporation. He also served as a vice president and director of the North American Newspaper Alliance.Princeton Alumni Association, Princeton Alumni Weekly, Volume 55, April 15, 1955, p. 24. He was also a director of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Foundation, Fort Ticonderoga Association, and General Rochambeau Commission of Rhode Island.Newport Daily News, Pell Named Director, May 15, 1954. He also served as a fundraiser and consultant for the Democratic National Committee.Joseph M. Siracusa, The Kennedy Years, 2004, p. 376. He served as Vice President of the International Rescue Committee. Stationed in Austria, he was responsible for assisting refugees from the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 to leave the country and resettle.University of Rhode Island, Register to the Senatorial Papers of Claiborne Pell: Biography, uri.edu; accessed May 21, 2019.
During Pell's diplomatic career and other international activities in the 1940s and 1950s, he was arrested and jailed at least six times, including detentions by both fascist and communist governments.University of Rhode Island, Senator Claiborne deBorda Pell (1918–2009), uri.edu; accessed May 21, 2019.
Political career
In 1960, Pell won the seat of retiring U.S. Senator Theodore Francis Green, defeating former Governor Dennis J. Roberts and former Governor and U.S. Senator J. Howard McGrath in the Democratic primary,New York Times, Newcomer Wins Senate Primary; Pell Defeats Two Former Rhode Island Governors Seeking Green's Seat, September 28, 1960. and former Rhode Island Republican Party Chairman Raoul Archambault in the general election.Hendersonville (North Carolina), Times-News, Democrats' Clutch on Congress Holds, November 4, 1960.
Despite being called "the least electable man in America" by John F. Kennedy because of his many odd habits and beliefs,Scott MacKay, Rhode Island Public Radio, The Life and Times of an Uncommon Man: Sen. Claiborne Pell, October 20, 2011. Pell proved a durable politician. He won reelection five times, including victories over Ruth M. Briggs in 1966, John Chafee in 1972, James G. Reynolds in 1978, Barbara Leonard in 1984, and Claudine Schneider in 1990.
Often considered by his opponents to be too easygoing, Pell demonstrated his effectiveness as a campaigner. During his first campaign, when he was accused of carpetbagging, Pell published newspaper advertisements featuring a photograph of his grand-uncle Duncan Pell, who had served as Lieutenant Governor of Rhode Island during the 1860s, thus demonstrating Pell's association with the state. When Briggs called him a "creampuff" during their 1966 campaign, Pell turned that to his advantage and mocked Briggs by obtaining an endorsement from a local baker's union.
During his first campaign, Pell also used his foreign experience to great advantage, impressing some largely immigrant audiences in person and on the radio by campaigning in their native languages.Richard F. Fenno Jr., Senators on the Campaign Trail: The Politics of Representation, 1998, p. 243.
Personality and beliefs Pell was known for unusual beliefs and behaviors, including wearing threadbare suits, using public transportation and purchasing cheap used automobiles despite his wealth, and an interest in the paranormal.Scott McKay, Providence Journal, , June 26, 1990. His interest in the paranormal was critiqued by author Martin Gardner: "In my opinion, however, no one in Washington has rivaled Senator Pell in combining of science with extreme gullibility toward the performances of psychics." He also wore his father's belt as a memento, despite the fact that Herbert Pell was stouter than the rail-thin Claiborne Pell, requiring Claiborne Pell to wrap the belt around his waist twice to make it fit.Mark Patinkin, Providence Journal, , October 8, 1996. Pell would also wear unique clothing while jogging, including a tweed suit jacket. According to another story about Pell's eccentricities, at the conclusion of a meeting with Fidel Castro, Pell took Castro's cigar because he thought it was a gift for him.
Arrest allegation In 1972's The Washington Pay-Off, author and former lobbyist Robert N. Winter-Berger wrote about Pell's alleged arrest during a raid on a Greenwich Village homosexual bar in 1964. Pell denied the allegation and there were no police records, witness statements or other sources to corroborate Winter-Berger.Arnold A. Hutschnecker, The Drive for Power, 1974, p. 25.Robert Trowbridge Hartmann, Palace Politics: An Inside Account of the Ford Years, 1980, p. 57. Despite legal advice to sue for defamation, Pell declined, deciding that it would draw undue publicity to the allegations.
Senate career
Pell voted in favor of the 24th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Medicare program, the Civil Rights Act of 1968, and the confirmation of Thurgood Marshall to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Early in his Senate tenure, Pell was a major legislative sponsor of the National Sea Grant College Program in 1965 and 1966 that served to support marine research, and develop maritime industries. The Sea Grant program supported considerable growth of the oceanography and other marine science disciplines during the mid-20th Century.