Barbara Barrett, 25th Secretary of the Air Force, was instrumental in establishing the U.S. Space Force.
Barrett chairs the USS Arizona Legacy Foundation supporting the new Virginia-class submarine under construction, whose name will honor the battleship lost at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.
Barrett is vice chair of the Smithsonian Board of Regents and vice chair of California Institute of Technology (Caltech). She chairs Caltech’s governance body overseeing NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
In past business roles, Barrett chaired The Aerospace Corporation for four terms and was founding chairman of Valley Bank of Arizona. She also served on governing boards of RAND Corporation, Raytheon, Mayo Clinic, and the Space Foundation. She was an executive at two global Fortune 500 companies and interim CEO of the both the American Management Association and Thunderbird school of global management.
In President George W Bush’s Administration, Barrett served as U.S. Ambassador to Finland. During the Reagan Administration, she was Deputy Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration and Vice Chairman of the Civil Aeronautics Board. She served as a civilian advisor to a dozen Secretaries of Defense.
An instrument-rated pilot, she is also spaceflight qualified. The daughter of an Arizona cowboy, Barbara and Craig Barrett own Triple Creek Guest Ranch, a Montana ranch resort where they raise cattle and bison.
