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John Watson Foster Dulles, Author and Latin American Studies Professor for Forty-Five Years at the University of Texas, Dies at the Age of 95

Business Wire, June 24, 2008

John W.F. Dulles Died at North Central Baptist Hospital, San Antonio, Monday, June 23, 2008 at Approximately 1:20 am CDT

SAN ANTONIO -- Professor Dulles was the first born son of former Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and Janet Pomeroy Avery. He was born in 1913 in Auburn, New York.

He attended St. Bernard's School in New York City and the Gunnery School in Washington, Conn. before earning a Bachelor of Arts from Princeton University in 1935. He received his MBA from Harvard University in 1937. After several years at the Bank of New York, and at Callahan Mining Co., Dulles attended the University of Arizona in Tucson, Ariz., where he earned an additional degree, a Bachelor of Science in Metallurgical Engineering in 1943, followed by an advanced degree in Metallurgical Engineering in 1951.

His mining career began at The Duquesne mine of Patagonia, Ariz. near Nogales where he mucked the roads to the mine and then advanced to underground operations.

On June 15, 1940 he married Eleanor Foster Ritter of Philadelphia. In 1943, Mr. Dulles took a position with Cia Minera de PeSoles, S.A. in Monterrey, Mexico where he became the assistant general manager from 1951 to 1959. His interest in Mexico grew, and he wrote his first book "Yesterday in Mexico: a Chronicle of the Revolution 1919 - 1936." From 1959 to 1962 he was the executive vice president of Cia Mineracao Novalimense in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. The Dulles family resided in Rio de Janeiro and once again the history of the country in which he lived opened up a new path for this historian and author. In all Dulles wrote twelve books on the political history of Brazil in the Twentieth Century.

Dulles became a full-time history professor when he returned to the United States as a professor of Latin American Studies at the University of Texas in 1962 and also the University of Arizona from 1966 to 1991. Dulles had just finished his forty-fifth year of teaching this past spring at University of Texas at Austin and was planning his fall course material.

His wife of sixty-eight years, Eleanor Ritter Dulles, died on June 19, four days before his death. His younger sister, Lillias Pomeroy (Dulles) Hinshaw, died in 1987.

His younger brother, Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J. of New York, survives him. In addition, four children (Mrs. Edith Lawlis Dulles, Dallas; John F. Dulles II, Denver; Mrs. Ellen Dulles-Coelho, San Antonio; and R. Avery Dulles, Austin, Texas), nine grandchildren and six great grandchildren survive him.

A graveside service is planned for both Dulles and his wife Eleanor on Thursday, June 26. Further information on services and wishes of the family may be obtained at www.porterloring.com.

Media note: Downloadable photos and a full bio are also available at: http://jwfdulles.blogspot.com/.>