D. A. Henderson, a public health expert who led the effort to wipe out smallpox in the late 1960s and 1970s, said: "The general feeling was this is someone who may be here because of political reasons, but this is a dedicated person who has the interests of the country at heart." Dr. Henderson, who joined HHS after September 11, 2001, and left in 2002, says Mr. Simonson was instrumental in helping him do everything from finding office space to working on an early HHS purchase of smallpox vaccine ("Wall Street Journal", December 12, 2005). In his recent book, Dr. Henderson described Simonson's role in launching the post-9/11 public health preparedness program at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: "Another important figure was Stewart Simonson, special counsel and long-time confidante of the secretary. He was comparatively young and new to government but a quick learner and determined to allow neither bureaucracy nor red tape to stand in the way of getting the job done. Little would have been achieved without both of them" (referring to Simonson and Dr. William Raub) D. A. Henderson, MD, "Smallpox: The Death of a Disease", Prometheus Books (2009), Page 191.