Geoffrey Swaebe (March 23, 1911 – February 18, 1997) was a British-born American department store executive and diplomat who served as the U.S. Ambassador to

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

Life and career

Swaebe was born in London on March 23, 1911. He came to the United States, settling in Boston, when he was 12. Instead of going to college, he worked for

Florsheim Shoes Florsheim Shoes is a shoe brand in the United States. History Florsheim & Co. was founded in 1892 by Milton S. Florsheim. He and his father Sigmund Florsheim made the first shoes in Chicago. Eventually, some stores were owned by and selling on ...

. He worked his way up to executive positions not just with Florsheim but I. Miller & Sons in Chicago, Thalheimers Department Store in

Richmond, Virginia (Thus do we reach the stars) , image_map = , mapsize = 250 px , map_caption = Location within Virginia , pushpin_map = Virginia#USA , pushpin_label = Richmond , pushpin_m ...

Pizitz Pizitz was a major regional department store chain in Alabama, with its flagship store in downtown Birmingham. At its peak it operated 12 other stores, mostly in the Birmingham area with several locations in Huntsville and other Alabama cities. T ...

Department Store in

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% fr ...

and, from 1950 to 1962, with the Hecht Company in Baltimore. When the May Company took over Hecht's, Swaebe moved to Los Angeles in 1962 to president and chairman of its regional operations. In 1972, he left to set up his own management consulting company. For a short time, he moved to New York to be chief executive of Abercrombie & Fitch during the store's bankruptcy proceedings. In 1981,

Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician, actor, and union leader who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 ...

appointed him United States' representative at the United Nations in Geneva. While Ambassador to Belgium, he needed to negotiate with the Belgians to not back out of an agreement to accept American

cruise missile A cruise missile is a guided missile used against terrestrial or naval targets that remains in the atmosphere and flies the major portion of its flight path at approximately constant speed. Cruise missiles are designed to deliver a large warhe ...

s on Belgian soil as part of a

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two No ...

strategy.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Swaebe, Geoffrey 1911 births 1997 deaths Ambassadors of the United States to Belgium People from Boston British emigrants to the United States American retail chief executives