Peter F. Carpenter (born 1940) is an American philanthropist and former business executive. Born in San Francisco, Carpenter lived in Florida during his high school years, joining a volunteer fire department. While attending Harvard University for a degree in chemistry, he spent the summers as a smokejumper for the United States Forest Service. After graduating from Harvard in 1962, he became an officer in the United States Air Force. In the 1960s and 70s, he worked for various employers, including Lockheed, Stanford University, and the US Price Commission. He started working for the ALZA Corporation, a pharmaceutical company, in 1976. In 1990, he left his executive vice president position to work in nonprofit leadership. From 2001 to 2018, he served several terms on the board of the Menlo Park Fire District. Carpenter has been on the board of several nonprofits, including the American Foundation for AIDS Research (1985–1991), Annual Reviews (1994–present), and Village Enterprise Fund (1997–2009). Early life and education Peter F. Carpenter was born in San Francisco, California in 1940. Carpenter's father was in the Navy during World War II. He was part of the Boy Scouts of America, becoming an Eagle Scout in 1955. During his high school years, Carpenter lived in rural north Florida, where he was a volunteer firefighter; he helped with both structural and wildland fires. Carpenter graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in chemistry from Harvard University in 1962. His family had the expectation that he would enlist in the armed forces, so he participated in the ROTC at Harvard. He then attended the University of Chicago, graduating with an MBA in 1965. Career From 1959–1961, Carpenter was a smokejumper for the United States Forest Service in Redding, California during his summer breaks from Harvard. After his graduation in 1962, he was commissioned as an officer in the United States Air Force, where he had an assignment as a test parachutist because of his smokejumping experience. From 1966–1968, he was the Vietnam program manager for the Advanced Research Projects Agency and served as the Air Force Aide to the White House. In 1969, he was a consultant for Lockheed, where he developed marketing strategies for its Airborne System Division. From 1968–1970, he was assistant director of the Stanford University Center for Materials Research. He worked as deputy executive director at the US Price Commission from 1971 to 1973, where he investigated illegal price inflation