John Pomeroy Bradford was born (May 15, 1904) and reared in St. Paul (Minn.), graduating from St. Paul Central High School (1922), Lake Forest Academy (1924), and Princeton University (1928). He set out upon a career in film editing and production, producing educational films for the University Film Foundation at Harvard University (1928-1931), producing travel films (1931-1933) for various clients in Haiti, Italy, the South Pacific, and Africa, and editing the March of Time newsreel series (1934-1941) for Time, Inc., in New York (N.Y.).
He joined the U.S. Army Signal Corps with a Captain's commission in 1941, producing army training films in the Training Film Production Laboratory at Wright Field (Dayton, Ohio) for the next two years. In 1943 Bradford was accepted into the army's School of Military Government at the University of Virginia (Charlottesville). After working in 1944 in London and Shrivenham, England, Bradford became deputy military governor of Aachen (Germany) in early 1945, served in the military government of Wurzburg (1945), and then became part of the Office of the Land Commissioner in the military government of Bavaria (1946-1952).
Bradford joined the United Nations field staff in 1952, serving in several administrative field positions in: the Korean Reconstruction Agency (1952-1956), the Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (1956-1964), and the World Food Program in India, Nepal, and Ceylon (1965-1969). He retired from the UN staff in 1969 and joined the Peace Corps the following year, serving in Liberia until he retired from the program in 1972, following which he returned to the United States.
From the guide to the John P. Bradford papers., 1862-1864, 1928-1978., (Minnesota Historical Society)
