1900–1986 · Admiral, US Navy · father of the nuclear Navy
Hyman George Rickover (27 January 1900 – 8 July 1986) directed the original development of naval nuclear propulsion and controlled its operations for three decades as head of the US Naval Reactors office, and oversaw the Shippingport Atomic Power Station, the world’s first commercial pressurized-water reactor built to generate electricity. He is one of only seven people awarded two Congressional Gold Medals. He was famous for being crusty, obsessive and merciless about accountability — which is what makes the remark Powell remembered so pointed: the man who built the most procedure-bound program in the Navy telling a room that procedure is not what does the work.