China Builds the Bomb

John W. Lewis was born Albert Lewis Seeman in Seattle, Washington on November 16, 1930. He received bachelor's and master's degrees and a doctorate from the University of California, Los Angeles. He became an R.O.T.C. cadet the day the Korean War began and served as a Navy gunnery officer after the war. He taught at Cornell University for seven years. While a professor there, he wrote The United States in Vietnam with fellow professor George McTurnan Kahin. He started teaching at Stanford University in 1968 and became a professor emeritus in 1997. His other books included Leadership in Communist China and China Builds the Bomb written with Xue Litai. He also served as an adviser to the Defense Department and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. He died from urothelial cancer on September 4, 2017 at the age of 86.