McBride was Watergate prosecutor

Stanford Report, Nov. 12, 2003

BY LISA TREI

Thomas F. McBride, a former Stanford administrator who served as a Watergate prosecutor and an inspector general of the Agriculture and Labor departments, died Oct. 31 of a cerebral hemorrhage in Portland, Ore. He was 74.

McBride served as associate dean for administration in the Law School from 1982 to 1989. After the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989, he was asked to head the Department of Environmental Health and Safety (EHS), which had been at the center of controversy for several years concerning its handling of environmental and safety matters on campus.

"He gave the department a lot of leadership and vision in a time of trouble," said Harvey Chock, former EHS associate director. "He really helped calm things down. He was definitely a consensus builder."

At the Law School, McBride implemented a loan repayment assistance program for public interest law students, said Associate Dean Frank Brucato. "Tom was really devoted to public service," he said. "He was a good problem solver and a great mentor."

In 1992, McBride left campus to join his wife, Catherine Milton, founder and director of Stanford's Haas Center for Public Service, who was on leave in Washington, D.C., to head the Commission on National and Community Service. McBride spent a quarter teaching in the Stanford in Washington program before leaving the university. During his years on campus, Milton said her husband particularly enjoyed teaching undergraduates in the Human Biology program. "He loved the students," she said.

In the 1990s, McBride worked as a special counselor at the Department of Energy, working on the cleanup and closing of nuclear weapons sites. In 1997, he became special assistant to the president of Save the Children and was responsible for improving systems related to child sponsorships worldwide. He also helped resettle Kosovo refugees through the Saugatuck Congregational Church in Westport, Conn. Last year, McBride and Milton moved to Portland, Ore., where he planned to teach a course in constitutional law and current events at Portland State University.

Milton said McBride died, following a fall, just a day before he was to attend an event in Washington, D.C., marking the 30th anniversary of the "Saturday Night Massacre." On that date, President Richard M. Nixon fired Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox and abolished the prosecutor's office after Cox refused to obey the president's instructions on the handling of the Watergate tapes. Milton said she and her husband were eating dinner when they heard the news bulletin about Nixon's decision. McBride raced to his office in 10 minutes to make sure important files were removed and not destroyed.

As associate Watergate prosecutor, McBride led a task force investigating campaign contributions and the selling of ambassadorships. Milton said he was responsible for accepting guilty pleas from powerful officials, including New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and Maurice Stans, the chief fundraiser for Nixon's reelection campaign.

McBride was born in 1929 in Elgin, Ill. He earned a bachelor's degree from New York University in 1952 and a law degree from Columbia in 1956. After graduation, McBride served as a prosecutor in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office before moving to Washington, D.C., to become a trial lawyer for the Organized Crime Task Force established by U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy.

During the mid-1960s, McBride advised the government of India on an anti-corruption program and worked for the Peace Corps as deputy director for Latin America. In Washington, D.C., he helped direct the Urban Coalition and the Police Foundation. After Watergate, McBride headed the Bureau of Enforcement for the Civil Aeronautics Board and became the first inspector general of the Department of Agriculture. In the mid-1970s, he taught criminal justice management and public administration reform at George Washington University.

In March 1982, shortly before McBride moved to Stanford, President Ronald Reagan personally cited him as one of three outstanding managers in government during a talk to a national association. While McBride worked on campus, he served on the President's Commission on Organized Crime and the California Council on Mental Health.

Milton said her husband also was an active supporter of the university's Public Service Center (later named after the Haas family), established in 1985. "He supported the work of the center by getting to know the students and serving as host to countless dinners and meetings in the [family's] home where he did all the cooking," she said.

Pat Devaney, former associate dean of research, described McBride as a renaissance man. "He recreated himself with great aplomb," she said. "He did things that were of interest to him he didn't worry about money."

Devaney recalled working with McBride after he took charge of EHS. At the time, the department had experienced two recent changes in directors and was faced with implementing increasingly stringent regulatory requirements from state and federal agencies. "When Tom came, EHS was at odds with the faculty," she said. "Tom helped to turn around that attitude." Working with representatives from each school, McBride implemented the lab safety partners program. "He created a sense of partnership," Devaney said. "He was a nice guy."

McBride is survived by Milton, his wife of 28 years; a brother, Donald McBride of Independence, Mo.; a sister, Nancy Langley of Olathe, Kan.; and four children, Elizabeth Joyce of Nedrow, N.Y.; John McBride of Gaithersburg, Md.; Raphael McBride of San Francisco; and Luke McBride of Lenox, Mass. His first marriage to Margaret Olney McBride ended in divorce.

A memorial service was held in Portland. A second service will be held at 2 p.m. Dec. 6 at Saugatuck Congregational Church in Westport, Conn. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that contributions in McBride's memory be made to the Dean's Fund at Portland State University, Friends of the Children or the Mercy Corps.

Thomas F. McBride