BEP Directors

James Conlon was born and raised in New York City.  He joined the BEP in 1942 as an apprentice plate printer and, after military service in World War II, served in increasingly higher positions of responsibility, including head of the Quality Control Branch, Assistant Chief and later Chief of the Office of Currency and Stamp Manufacturing, Assistant Director of the BEP, and then Deputy Director until his appointment as Director in 1967.  During Conlon’s decade-long tenure as Director, significant improvements were made in BEP production methods, such as the procurement of high-speed, sheet-fed currency presses; installation of prototype currency overprinting and processing equipment; and the acquisition of advanced gravure, intaglio, and gravure/intaglio combination presses for printing multicolor postage stamps.  Conlon entered the private sector upon retirement from government service in 1977.  He died in 2000 at the age of 79.