William J. Casey (1913-1987) former CIA director, Casey is most known for his involvement in the Iran-contra affair.

William J. Casey was director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 1981 to 1987. Basically a throwback to an earlier era of the Cold War, Casey attempted to revitalize the CIA from the torpor it had been in since the early 1970s. He played a murky role in the Iran-contra affair, President Ronald Reagan's greatest foreign policy debacle.

William Joseph Casey had a colorful background that easily made him the most interesting person in the Reagan cabinet. He was born on 13 March 1913 in Elmhurst, New York, in a middle-class Irish-Catholic family. He received degrees at Fordham University in 1934 and Saint John's University Law School in 1937. Rather than practice law, Casey went to work for a company that published digests of federal regulatory and tax matters. He proved to have a natural...