OXONIAN: John Micklethwait of Bloomberg News

John Micklethwait

John Micklethwait was featured in The NY Times print edition today (yesterday online) as Editor in Chief of Bloomberg News. He has been in his job now for more than a year, having spanned Michael Bloomberg's 73rd and 74th birthdays.

Mr. Micklethwait was educated at Ampleforth College, an upscale English boarding school, and subsequently at the University of Oxford. He worked for Chase Manhattan Bank before switching to journalism and joining The Economist in 1987. By 2006, he was editing The Economist, famed for lively and collegial discussions at its weekly meetings – discussions that form the basis for some of its distinctive articles. If the World Economic Forum, held each year in Davos, Switzerland, decided to elect a mayor, the highly connected Mr. Micklethwait might be considered.

Micklethwait was born August 11, 1962, in London, England. At Oxford he read history at Magdalen College.

The story in The NY Times focused on the issues faced by Bloomberg News' Editor in Chief in covering the principal owner of his news medium, Michael Bloomberg, should Bloomberg decide to be a candidate for the presidency of the United States.

Oxford Birthdays

WW2: Col. Francis Pickens Miller (1895-1978), Oxonian, U.S. Intelligence Leader

Col. Francis Pickens Miller (1895-1978) was born in Kentucky on the Virginia border and studied at Washington & Lee University, in Lexington, Virginia.

After serving in the field artillery in World war I, he went on to study at Trinity College, Oxford on a Rhodes Scholarship. Helen Hill Miller, Col. Miller's wife, was the U.S. correspondent for The Economist; I met her and Col. Miller at my Dad's house in Washington in the 1960s.

My Dad, E. R. Marlin, was in the O.S.S. in Dublin and London in World War II and reported to Col. Miller.

Miller's intelligence papers are at the George C. Marshall Library and Museum, which is between Washington and Lee University, which Miller attended, and the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Va.

Thanks to Tim Sullivan for sending me the link to the following documentary, which describes the evolution of the O.S. during World War II and reviews its achievements.

This 46-minute documentary movie discusses the raison-d'être of the O.S.S., and Wild Bill Donovan's contribution to the war effort.