View source for Jacob D. Beam

{{Short description|American diplomat}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name=Jacob D. Beam
| image=JacobDBeam.jpg
| imagesize=
| order=
| ambassador_from=United States
| country=Poland
| term_start=August 9, 1957
| term_end=November 30, 1961
| predecessor= Joseph E. Jacobs
| successor= John Moors Cabot
| president=[[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]<br/>[[John F. Kennedy]]
| order2=
| ambassador_from2=United States
| country2=Czechoslovakia
| term_start2=August 31, 1966
| term_end2=March 5, 1969
| president2=Lyndon Johnson<br/>[[Richard Nixon]]
| predecessor2=Outerbridge Horsey
| successor2=[[Malcolm Toon]]
| order3=
| ambassador_from3=United States
| country3=the Soviet Union
| term_start3=April 18, 1969
| term_end3=January 24, 1973
| president3=Richard Nixon
| predecessor3=Llewellyn Thompson
| successor3=Walter J. Stoessel, Jr.
|birth_name=Jacob Dyneley Beam
| birth_date=March 24, 1908
| birth_place=Princeton, New Jersey
| death_date={{death date and age|1993|8|16|1908|3|24}}
| death_place=Rockville, Maryland
| party=
| spouse=
| profession=
| religion=
| footnotes=
}}
'''Jacob Dyneley Beam''' (March 24, 1908 &ndash; August 16, 1993) was an American diplomat.
==Life and career==
Beam was born in Princeton, New Jersey. His father was a German professor at [[Princeton University]], and the younger Beam earned a bachelor's degree in 1929 from Princeton before he joined the US Foreign Service.

His first assignment was in Geneva, where he monitored the [[League of Nations]] and served as vice counsel in Geneva from 1931 to 1934. He then moved to Berlin and served as third secretary to the US embassy from 1934 to 1940. During World War II, he served as second secretary of the embassy in London. He returned to Germany after the war.

Beam was counselor to the US embassy in [[Indonesia]] from 1949 to 1951 and to Yugoslavia from 1951 to 1952. He became the ambassador to Poland from 1957 to 1961. From 1966 to 1969 he served as Ambassador to Czechoslovakia, where he was present at the Prague Spring. He was ambassador to the Soviet Union from 1969 to 1973.

Beam's support of Senator [[Edmund Muskie]]'s visit to Moscow in January 1971 caused President [[Richard Nixon]] to remark at a meeting with [[Henry Kissinger]] and HR Haldeman to give Beam three more months in the role as ambassador to Moscow and then fire him. 

Beam died in Rockville, Maryland, of a stroke. His son is journalist Alex Beam.

==External links==
*[https://history.state.gov/departmenthistory/people/beam-jacob-dyneley Jacob Dyneley Beam (1908–1993)], Office of the Historian
*[http://arks.princeton.edu/ark:/88435/db78tc017 Jacob D. Beam paper at the Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University]
*[http://www.trumanlibrary.org/oralhist/beamjw.htm Oral History Interview with Jacob D. Beam] via Truman Library
*JACOB BEAM: OUR MAN IN MOSCOW by Central Intelligence Agency

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{{succession box|title=United States Ambassador to Poland|before=Joseph E. Jacobs|after=[[John M. Cabot]]|years=August 9, 1957 – November 30, 1961}}
{{succession box|title=United States Ambassador to Czechoslovakia|before=Outerbridge Horsey|after=[[Malcolm Toon]]|years=August 31, 1966 – March 5, 1969}}
{{succession box|title=United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union|before=Llewellyn Thompson|after=Walter J. Stoessel, Jr.|years=April 18, 1969 – January 24, 1973}}
{{s-end}}
{{US Ambassadors to Poland}}
{{US Ambassadors to Czech Republic}}
{{US Ambassadors to Russia}}

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