Leslie H. Gelb, 82, Former Diplomat and New York Times Journalist, Dies
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Leslie Howard Gelb was born on March 4, 1937, in New Rochelle, N.Y., to Max and Dorothy (Klein) Gelb, Jewish immigrants from Hungary.
“He was a poor boy with bad eyesight and a sly, full-lipped smile,” Mr. Packer wrote. “The Gelbs read no newspapers and owned two books — the Bible and ‘The Rothschilds.’ They were loving parents with the worst lives of anyone Les knew.”
He graduated from New Rochelle High School and received a bachelor’s degree in government from Tufts University in 1959 after working his way through school as a valet parking attendant and dishwasher.
“He was so poor that his bride Judy’s parents refused to bless the marriage and so smart that he got into Harvard’s graduate school in government and so badly educated that he had no idea what his teachers were talking about,” Mr. Packer wrote.
Mr. Gelb earned a master’s and a doctorate in government and developed a fervor for international affairs in graduate school, where, Mr. Packer wrote, “Prof. Henry Kissinger picked him out and Gelb began to rise.”
Mr. Kissinger, who was one of the professors reviewing Mr. Gelb’s thesis and with whom he had an on-again, off-again professional relationship during his career, said in an interview on Saturday: “I thought he had an unusual perception of the intangibles that make the difference between success and failure in foreign policy. I respected him greatly whether he supported me or criticized me.”
In 1959, Mr. Gelb married Judith Cohen, who survives him, as do their children, Adam, Caroline and Alison Gelb; and five grandsons.
Article source: http://feeds.reuters.com/~r/reuters/sportsNews/~3/OO1cb6dWBgo/osaka-gauff-clash-headlines-u-s-open-day-six-idUSKCN1VK2PA
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