About Joseph

Ambassador Petrone was nominated by President Reagan as the US Permanent Representative to the European Office of the UN and Other International Organizations in Geneva. After Senate confirmation he served in Geneva, in an international community of Ambassadors from 128 countries, from 1987 to 1989.

Joseph was born in 1922 in Marshalltown, Iowa, and grew up on a farm.

Enlisting in the 168th Infantry of the Iowa National Guard in January 1938, he served in all noncommissioned grades until 1940, when he was accepted at West Point. His class was on an expedited schedule (no vacations) during WWII, which graduated after only 3 years-- on D-Day.

He became a regular Army officer during a military career spanning three wars (World War II, Korea and Vietnam).

After serving in WWII in Patton's Army in Europe, and assignments in Chicago, Puerto Rico and Iran, he was posted to Washington DC and served as Aide de Camp to the Quartermaster General, with extra duty as a White House Military Aide under President Eisenhower, from 1954-1956. It was here he met his future wife, Augusta, at an Embassy Ball.

Following assignments in Fontainebleau, France, Fort Hood, Texas (where his Division deployed to Georgia, preparing for a Cuban invasion, during the Missile Crisis), Washington and Korea, he was sent to Paris where he served from 1967-1970, as Assistant Military Attaché at the American Embassy. He retired with the rank of Colonel in 1970.

Ambassador Petrone was a member of the US Delegation to UNESCO (the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), in Paris. This was the Delegation that took the USA out of that organization in 1983. He was a member of the Presidential Delegation to Madagascar for the three day celebration of the 20th Anniversary of that island nation's Independence from France, in 1985.

He is the recipient of numerous awards and decorations (Departments of Army, Defense and State; Poland and France) as well as three battle stars from General Patton's 3rd Army. He is a graduate of the US Military Academy at West Point and the British Staff College at Camberley, England.

Petrone served in 1984 as Chairman of the Reagan-Bush Iowa veteran's coalition. He was a Dole delegate from New Hampshire to the 1996 Republican National Convention in San Diego, and a Bush delegate in New York City in 2004. He served as a co-chairman of the Bush-Cheney '04 Veterans Coalition in New Hampshire. He is also a former GOP County Chairman in Iowa and a town GOP Chairman in NH.

Joseph always liked to quote former and current Governor Branstad of Iowa, when he came to speak at a university here. "Why, they're just like Iowans!!"