L. Dean Brown; Served as Ambassador to Jordan

L. Dean Brown, a former ambassador to Jordan, State Department official and longtime president of the Middle East Institute, died this month. He was 80.

Brown died May 2 at Georgetown University Hospital of apparent renal failure caused by heart and lung disease.

A career diplomat, Brown was known for packing a pistol when he went on dangerous assignments like his posting in Jordan during a civil war in 1970. He also was assigned to other hot spots, including Cyprus in 1975, just after the ambassador there was slain, and to Beirut where he was greeted by mortar fire and taunts by rebel radio.

He carried the gun because he was determined not to upset U.S. policy by becoming a hostage.

“I may not be able to hit anything. . . . But if necessary, I do expect to shoot and make some noise,” he once told a reporter.

In 1973, Brown was named deputy undersecretary for management at the State Department. He was considered one of then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s “diplomatic dozen,” a group that presided over a reorganization of the State Department.

Brown was a native of New York. He received a bachelor’s degree from Wesleyan University in 1942. He served in the European theater during World War II and began his career in the foreign service in 1946. Survivors include a son and a granddaughter.