Climbing The Ladder
He returned to Washington, DC in September 1962. As Assistant to the Bureau's Assistant Director in Charge of the Training Division, Felt helped oversee the FBI Academy. In November 1964, he became Assistant Director of the Bureau, as Chief Inspector of the Bureau and Head of the Inspection Division. This division oversaw compliance with Bureau regulations and conducted internal investigations.
On July 1, 1971, Felt was promoted by Hoover to Deputy Associate Director, assisting Associate Director Clyde A. Tolson. Hoover's right-hand man for decades, Tolson was in failing health and no longer able to attend to his duties. Richard Gid Powers wrote that Hoover installed Felt to rein in William C. Sullivan's domestic spying operations, as Sullivan had been engaged in secret unofficial work for the White House. In his memoir, Felt quoted Hoover as having said, "I need someone who can control Sullivan. I think you know he has been getting out of hand." In his book, The Bureau, Ronald Kessler said, "Felt managed to please Hoover by being tactful with him and tough on agents." Curt Gentry called Felt "the director's latest fair-haired boy", but who had "no inherent power" in his new post, the real number three being John P. Mohr.
Read more about this topic: Mark Felt
Famous quotes containing the words climbing the, climbing and/or ladder:
“To be seventy years old is like climbing the Alps. You reach a snow-crowned summit, and see behind you the deep valley stretching miles and miles away, and before you other summits higher and whiter, which you may have strength to climb, or may not. Then you sit down and meditate and wonder which it will be.”
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882)
“Flee from the press and dwell with soothfastness;
Suffice unto thy good though it be small,
For hoard hath hate and climbing ticklishness,
Press hath envy and weal blent overall;”
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“O, when degree is shaked,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
The enterprise is sick.”
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