Drew Lewis, Reagan transport secretary during strike, dies


              File- This Aug. 9, 1981, file photo shows Secretary of transportation Drew Lewis on TV's "Face the Nation". Lewis, a businessman who served as U.S. transportation secretary under President Ronald Reagan during the 1981 air traffic controllers’ strike, has died. He was 84. His son, Andy Lewis, says Lewis died Wednesday in Arizona of complications from pneumonia. Lewis lived on a farm in the Philadelphia suburbs. (AP Photo/Scott Applewhite, File)
File- This Aug. 9, 1981, file photo shows Secretary of transportation Drew Lewis on TV's "Face the Nation". Lewis, a businessman who served as U.S. transportation secretary under President Ronald Reagan during the 1981 air traffic controllers’ strike, has died. He was 84. His son, Andy Lewis, says Lewis died Wednesday in Arizona of complications from pneumonia. Lewis lived on a farm in the Philadelphia suburbs. (AP Photo/Scott Applewhite, File)

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - A businessman who served as U.S. transportation secretary under President Ronald Reagan during the 1981 air traffic controllers' strike has died. Drew Lewis lived on a farm in the Philadelphia suburbs and was 84 years old.

His son, Andy Lewis, says he died Wednesday in Prescott, Arizona, of complications from pneumonia.

In August 1981, Reagan's Republican administration fired more than 11,000 members of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization for violating their no-strike oath and breaking the law. Lewis was transportation secretary from 1981 to 1983 and was the administration's chief representative in the dispute.

Lewis later became CEO of Omaha, Nebraska-based transportation company Union Pacific Corp., guiding its merger with the Southern Pacific and the Chicago and North Western railroads.

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