 After retiring from the Navy, he worked for the Central Intelligence Agency.Cheek graduated from the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1911.As a lieutenant commander at the outbreak of World War II, in September 1942 he received the Navy Cross "For distinguished service in the line of his profession as Intelligence Officer of the Sixteenth Naval District in the city of Manila" during which he volunteered for a number of assignments which brought him under enemy fire.