Who is Averell Harriman from The Best and the Brightest and what is their importance?

Averell Harriman was a sixty-nine year old statesman and the son of E.H. Harriman, the founder of the Union Pacific Railroad. He attended Groton and Yale and sat on the board of the Union Pacific beginning in his senior year in college. In 1958, he opposed Nelson Rockefeller for the position of governor of New York and was badly beaten. He worked as a roving ambassador for the Kennedy administration.