On November 29, 2022, noted historian, war-game designer, and author, John Prados, died at 71. John was an early member of NYMAS, and his many presentations before our members were always interesting and informative, on the history of intelligence and military operations, particularly during the Second World War, the Vietnam War, and the Cold War.  At the time of his death, he was preparing for what would have been about his 30th presentation for NYMAS.

During his long career John wrote nearly a score of outstanding books.  His 1995 book Combined Fleet Decoded received the NYMAS Arthur Goodzeit Award and named was the Notable Naval Book of the Year by the U.S. Naval Institute.

John was also wargame designer of note, producing over three dozen notable wargames, and received the first very first Charles S. Roberts Award for best professional wargame in 1974, for his innovative Third Reich, which was followed by three more awards for best game.
John a founding member of the National Security Archive which has worked to declassify important documents to through more light of American Foreign and National Security Policy.

On a personal note, I first met John around 1972, when I was on the staff of Strategy & Tactics and he was at Columbia and working on a game for us.  That November the magazine featured his first published game, Year of the Rat, one of the first games on the Vietnam War.  Not long after, with another friend we formed The Morningside Game Project (we all lived on the Upper West Side!), and produced several games which were issued by West End Games.

John was a hard worker, a diligent researcher, an excellent writer and gamer designer, and good friend.