Topic: James Peake

James Benjamin Peake (born June 18, 1944) was United States Secretary of Veterans Affairs from 2007 to 2009. In 2004, he retired from a 42-year United States Army career. He also served as the 40th Surgeon General of the United States Army.

Peake was born in Saint Louis, Missouri. Peake grew up in a US military family. His father began as an enlisted man in the Army, and became an officer who spent most of his 30-year career in the Medical Service Corps. Dr. Peake's mother was an Army nurse, and his brother was a naval aviator.

At the age of 18, he set upon his own Army career when he was accepted to West Point. Peake received his Bachelor of Science degree from U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1966 and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army Infantry. Following service in Vietnam with the 101st Airborne Division where he was awarded the Silver Star, a Bronze Star with “V” device and the Purple Heart with oak leaf cluster, Peake entered medical school at Cornell University in New York. He was awarded a medical doctorate in 1972. He retired from the Army in 2004, as a Lieutenant General.