Susan Johnson retired in 2015 as a member of the Senior Foreign Service and has served as President of ADST since 2016. Over 35 years, she held a broad range of bilateral and multilateral assignments, including Deputy High Representative and Supervisor of Brcko District in Bosnia, Senior Advisor to the Iraqi Foreign Ministry in Baghdad, Deputy Chief of Mission and ChargĆ© dāAffaires in Romania and Mauritius, and IESC Director for Central Asia in Kazakhstan, as well as roles in Russia, Cuba, Pakistan, the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, the State Department, Capitol Hill, and the National Endowment for Democracy.
Tom Selinger served 27 years in the Foreign Service, most recently as executive director of ADST. His overseas tours included Kyrgyzstan, Denmark, Croatia, Albania, and Trinidad and Tobago. His portfolios cover issues ranging from security cooperation to American citizen services. In Washington he worked in the Bureaus of European and Eurasian Affairs and Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor and at the Center for the Study of the Conduct of Diplomacy as well as Georgetown Universityās Institute for the Study of Diplomacy. Prior to the Foreign Service, Tom was an intelligence officer in the U.S. Army and worked as a locally employed political specialist at the Canadian Consulate General in Minnesota.
Patrick Gaffney previously worked for the US government as an economic specialist at the US Embassy in Berlin and the US Consulate in Ho Chi Minh City. Previously, he was the part-time CFO of Oasis Community Partners, a non-profit seeking to improve food access and community health in underserved urban food deserts. Patrick has extensive experience in financial reporting and management, and in the consumer goods and business service sectors. He graduated from Wharton with a master’s in business administration with a focus on finance and was a Fulbright scholar in Jordan.
Fran focuses on the U.S. Foreign Service Commemorative Coin Act, Library of Congressā Teaching with Primary Sources Program, educational outreach, and leading ADSTās internship program. Concurrently, he is an experienced oral history interviewer and also leads ADSTās Dayton Peace Accords oral history project, which commemorates the 30th anniversary of the negotiations that ended the war in the Balkans. Fran holds a B.A. degree, cum laude, from the University of Puget Sound and a Master of International Affairs from George H. W. Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University.
Heather joined ADST in February of 2019. She has a M.A. from George Washington University in Museum Studies, with a focus in collections management and interpretation. She received her B.A. from Skidmore College in History and Art History. Heather has worked with local historical societies, the Workhouse Prison Museum in Lorton, VA and interned at the Ichthyology Department at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Heather also held a position as an Asian Art Specialist and Cataloger at Oakridge Auction Gallery previous to joining ADST.
Mark joined ADST as a staff Oral Historian in January 2016. He completed a career in the U.S. Foreign Service in 2013 divided evenly between political affairs and public diplomacy. As a Political Officer, Mark worked on refugee issues in Central America, conventional arms control in Europe at the OSCE, and in Armenia, on the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute. In Public Diplomacy, Mark received Meritorious Honor Awards for his work as a Cultural Officer in Romania and Hungary. Before joining the staff of ADST, Mark received his teaching certification from the Commonwealth of Virginia in 2014 and served as a volunteer instructor with the Literacy Council of Northern Virginia.
Monica joined ADST in February of 2020 as a volunteer and in September of 2020 as our Oral History Program Assistant. Monicaās formative work years were as an Accounting Technician and then Administrative Assistant for a U.S. Navy command in Naples, Italy. Shortly after marrying a U.S. Navy engineer, Monica moved to the United States where she lived and worked in several locations on the East and Gulf Coasts. As a military spouse, Monica worked in several different positions including Program Specialist for HUD, Reports Analyst for the FEC, legal secretary for an attorney, and Personnel Relations Assistant for the GA Ports Authority. Monica has a B.A. in Political Science and speaks Italian fluently.
Olivette D. Smith, MBA, is a seasoned Budget and Financial Management Analyst with extensive experience supporting U.S. diplomatic missions. She has managed complex budgets and financial operations for embassies and consulates across Australia, Nigeria, and Vietnam, and has served as a Financial Management Analyst, grant officer, economic analyst, and general services officer. With expertise in data analysis, compliance, and resource allocation, Olivette is recognized for her commitment to fiscal transparency, process improvement, and cross-cultural collaboration. She holds an MBA, and multiple certifications in grants and financial management.
Robin began interviewing for ADST in 2020 and has worked with interviewees from all levels and specialties. She retired from the U.S. Senior Foreign Service in 2022 after 35 years. Her overseas tours included economic, commercial, and consular tours in Mexico, Costa Rica, Russia, Honduras, and Iraq. She served as Deputy Chief of Mission and ChargĆ© dāAffaires in Montevideo and San Jose, and Principal Officer in Guadalajara, and briefly as ChargĆ© in Curacao. Her Washington tours had her working on trade, development, commercial advocacy, Caspian oil policy, counternarcotics and security cooperation.
Margery directs ADSTās book-related programs, advises diplomats and others on editing and publishing matters, and coordinates the ADST-DACOR Diplomats and Diplomacy Series. Before joining ADST in 1995, she was director of publications and editor at the Georgetown University Institute for the Study of Diplomacy (ISD) from 1980 to 1994. At ISD she was co-editor and compiler (with Smith Simpson) of Education in Diplomacy: An Instructional Guide (ISD/University Press of America, 1987) and editor of As Others See Us: United States Diplomacy Viewed from Abroad (ISD, 1989) and Beacons: Great Teachers of the Georgetown School of Foreign Service (SFS/Georgetown University, 1994).
The late Charles Stuart Kennedy was director of the Foreign Affairs Oral History Program since its inception in 1985. A career officer in the US Foreign Service from 1955 to 1985, he retired with the rank of Minister Counselor. Mr. Kennedy was consul general in Naples, Italy (1979-81), Seoul, South Korea (1976-79), Athens, Greece (1970-74) and Saigon, South Vietnam (1969-70). He was educated at Williams College (BA) and Boston University (MA). He is the author of The American Consul: A History of the United States Consular Service 1776-1914, and co-author of The U.S. Consul at Work and American Ambassadors in a Troubled World. He was awarded the Foreign Service Cup from the Director General of the Foreign Service in 1997 for his work as an oral historian.
In June 2014, the American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) gave him the Award for Lifetime Contributions to American Diplomacy in recognition of his distinguished Foreign Service career and a lifetime of public service. Previous recipients of this prestigious award include George H.W. Bush, Lawrence Eagleburger, Cyrus Vance, Thomas Pickering, George Shultz, and Richard Lugar. In 1986, after retiring from the Foreign Service, Stu became managing director of The George Washington Universityās Foreign Service History Center. There he created the Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection and began recording the insights and experiences of American diplomats. The program moved to Georgetown University and then, in 1988, to ADST. In that capacity, he personally interviewed more than 1,000 retired American diplomats, some of whose careers date back to the 1920s.
ADST Presidents
Susan R. Johnson, 2016-
Chris Sibilla, 2015-2016
The Honorable Kenneth L. Brown, 2001-2014
The Honorable Edward M. Rowell, 1997-2001
The Honorable Stephen Low, 1992-1997
The Honorable Thomas Boyatt, 1989-1992
The Honorable Richard B. Parker, 1986-1989
ADST Executive Directors
- Tom Selinger, 2024-2025
- Judith Moore, 2024-2024
- Tom Selinger 2023-2024
- Dan Tikvart, 2022-2023
- Ben Reames, 2021-2022
- Jeremy Beer, 2020-2021
- Salvatore A. Amodeo, 2019-2020
- Nathan Holt, 2017-2019
- Judith Baroody, 2015-2017
- Chris Sibilla, 2012-2015
- James Warren, 2011ā2012
- John Naland, 2010-2011
- Vicente Valle, 2009-2010
- Les McBee, 2007-2009
- Dan Whitman, 2006-2007
- Marilyn Bruno, 2006
- Jack Zetkulic, 2004-2006
- Veda Engel, 2002-2004
- LW Koengeter, 2000-2002
- John Miller, 1999-2000
- Richard Jackson 1998-1999
- Dennis Kux 1993-1994
- Eugene Bovis 1987-1988