Biographical Note
Richard Sharpe Patterson was born February 24, 1908, in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. From about 1944 to his retirement in 1965, he was employed by the Department of State (DOS) and, during part of his tenure, worked closely with DOS officer and treaty expert David Hunter Miller (1875-1961). An expert on the Great Seal of the United States, Patterson coauthored The Eagle and the Shield: A History of the Great Seal of the United States (DOS, 1976) with Richardson Dougall. Patterson also wrote The Secretaries of State: Portraits and Biographical Sketches (DOS, 1956) and several articles in the DOS newsletter State. Patterson married Mary Peanette Mueller on May 6, 1955. He died in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, October 13, 1976.