Jack Brennan

John Vincent Brennan (August 16, 1937 – October 20, 2023) was a United States Marine Corps officer and political aide. He is best known as being President Richard Nixon's post-resignation chief of staff.

Early life and education Brennan was born on August 16, 1937, in Fall River, Massachusetts, He served with the United States Marine Corps during the Vietnam War, where he earned a Bronze Star Medal and Purple Heart Medal at the Battle of Khe Sanh.

Career Marine Corps Aide to the President In 1969, then-Major Brennan was appointed a Marine Corps Aide to President Nixon; during that time he rose to Colonel. When Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein released their 1976 book, The Final Days, Brennan felt that it did not correspond with his own time with the former president, but he stated "as a fictitious novel, it reads well." Those interviews became the basis for a 2006 Tony Award-winning play, entitled Frost/Nixon, which itself was turned into a 2008 Academy Award-nominated movie of the same name. Brennan felt Frost's own book about the interviews, which served as writer Peter Morgan's basis for the play and movie, was "fairly accurate"; however, he felt Morgan's scripts were "a complete fiction" based on actual events.

Personal life and death Brennan resided in Palm Springs, California, and spent summers in Little Compton, Rhode Island. He was a booster for the Providence College Friars and donated his papers from his work for Nixon to the school's archives. At his request, a Friars basketball jersey was placed in his office set in the film Frost/Nixon, but it was not visible in the film.

Awards and decorations