Renfro Lectureship Program featuring James M. Olson tickets on sale beginning Feb. 26
Former Chief of CIA Counterintelligence James M. Olson will present “A Different Kind of Career: Undercover in the CIA,” sponsored by the Carl and Carolyn Renfro Endowed Lectureship Program and Northern Oklahoma College.
Beginning at 9 a.m. Thursday, Feb. 26, tickets may be purchased on a first come, first served basis for the dinner event scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Thursday, March. 12, in the Renfro Center on the Tonkawa campus.
Individual tickets are $10 each and are limited to four tickets per family. A reserved table with seating for eight can be purchased for $300. Tickets are nonrefundable. The public is invited and encouraged to attend. Dress attire is business casual.
Tickets may be reserved by calling 580.628.6292 to purchase tickets by credit card or by purchasing tickets in person at the NOC Development Office, Vineyard Library-Administration Building, Tonkawa campus. Overflow tickets will be available at no charge for the lecture program only, which will be live streamed into Renfro Center Classroom 112.
Olson will describe his undercover career in the CIA, including his recruited, training, the risks he and his wife, also a CIA operative, faced and the effect of his undercover lifestyle on their marriage and children. He will discuss the role of the CIA in the current Global War on Terrorism and other current issues affecting the safety and security of American citizens. In conclusion, he will take the audience on an actual espionage operation he and his wife carried out in Moscow at the height of the Cold War. Time will then be allowed for questions and answers.
Born in LeMars, Iowa, Olson earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics and economics and a Juris Doctorate degree in international law from the University of Iowa. He is a member of the Iowa Bar. He served in the U.S. Navy, attaining the rank of Lieutenant Commander, USNR.
A career officer in the Directorate of Operations of the Central Intelligence Agency, he served mostly overseas in clandestine operations. He served as Chief of Counterintelligence at CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia. His overseas assignments were in the U.S.S.R., Austria and Mexico. He speaks French, German, Russian and Spanish.
Olson has experience in international affairs, economics, trade negotiations, intelligence support to the military and the law enforcement community, counterintelligence, counterterrorism, counternarcotics and technical collection systems. He has served as senior intelligence advisor to several U.S. ambassadors and as extensive liaison with the State Department, Treasury Department, FBI, Pentagon, NSC, NSA, DEA, INS and U.S. Congress.
As a senior faculty member at the Joint Military Intelligence College, Washington, D.C, in 1997 he taught courses on counterintelligence and military intelligence.
In December 1997 Olson was assigned by the CIA to the George Bush School of Government and Public Service in College Station, Texas as an officer-in-residence, teaching courses on Cold War Intelligence, U.S. National Security and International Crisis Management. He was a frequent guest lecturer at other courses, conferences and symposia and was appointed a permanent faculty member of the Bush School in August 2000.
He has authored “The Ten Commandments of Counterintelligence,” Studies in Intelligence (Unclassified Edition), Fall-Winter 2001, and Fair Play: The Moral Dilemmas of Spying (Potomac Books, September 2006).
His awards include the Intelligence Medal of Merit, the Distinguished Career Intelligence Medal, the Counterintelligence Excellence Medal, the Donovan Award and several distinguished achievement awards. He received the Silver Star Award at the Bush School for excellence in teaching.
Former Oklahoma State Regent for Higher Education Carl Renfro and the late Carolyn Renfro established the Carl and Carolyn Renfro Endowed Lectureship Program with a gift in 2006 to provide support for cultivating and enhancing the cultural and community enrichment offerings to northern Oklahoma on the Tonkawa campus and in the Ponca City area.
