Author - John Coyne

1
Mad Man Charlie Peters Comes To Washington, Part One
2
Mad Man Character Actor: Jules Pagano
3
Ken Hill Remembers Michael Sher
4
Best Writer at the Agency
5
Michael Meyer (China 1995-97) Selected As New York Public Library Fellow For 2010
6
Mad Men Novelist At The Peace Corps: Doug Kiker
7
Seeking French Speakers for Overseas Positions with Peace Corps
8
Martha Dunlop Peterson (Sierra Leone 1982-84)
9
A. Radlott (Dominican Republic 1963-65)
10
Tony D'Souza In India Reviews Paul Theroux's A Dead Hand: A Crime in Calcutta
11
Award Winning Travel Writer Mo Tejani (Thailand 1979–80)
12
Happy Easter! Two RPCV Catholics Ask Why?
13
Writing Advice/Review: J. P. Jones's A Witness in Tunis
14
Another Award Winning RPCV Writer: Chris Conlon (Botswana 1988-90)
15
Once Again My Favorite Hobby Horse: One Laptop Per Child

Mad Man Charlie Peters Comes To Washington, Part One

We all know Kennedy’s line how success has a thousand fathers, and failure is an orphan. We know, too, those of us who follow those early years of the Peace Corps, that everyone who was there at the beginning, in one way or the other, winks and whispers, ‘well, if it wasn’t for me….’ The truth is that the backbone of the Peace Corps creation was Warren Wiggins and Bill Josephson and their ‘Towering Task’. That paper gave Shriver the spear he needed to carry. Harris Wofford was the philosopher/king of the Peace Corps, with his grand vision for the agency and the Volunteers. (Charlie Peters once said to me that everyday Wofford had a thousand new ideas and 999 of them were worthless, but the one good idea left was brilliant!) We know, too, that Bill Moyers with his connection to LBJ saved the Peace Corps from being part of AID, . . .

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Mad Man Character Actor: Jules Pagano

Jules Pagano was not a Mad Man, though he could have played one on the t.v. show. Yes, he smoked. (God, they all smoked! And drank! And screwed around, but that’s another story.) No, Jules was more of a character actor than a Leading Man at the early Peace Corps and spent his years there as  Chief of the Division of Professional and Technical Affairs. (Yes, Virginia, they did have stupid titles like that back in the ’60s.) Jules had a breezy, laid-back, amusing, and charming persona. He was like great poetry: there was more than one level of meaning to Jules. And like any good union organizer (which he had been) he held his cards close to his chest. If anyone could draw to an inside straight, it was Jules Pagano. I knew Jules best for a short period in the spring of 1965 when he organized the unions . . .

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Ken Hill Remembers Michael Sher

Ken Hill has had a long and impressive history with the Peace Corps. A PCV in Turkey back in 1965-67, he was on the HQ staff in DC from 1968-74, then CD in Russia Far East, and Bulgaria, and Macedonia from 1994-98; Chief of Operation in Europe and Asia, 1999-2000. He served at HQ again in 2001 as the Chief of Staff, and was head of the National Peace Corps Association from 2004-06. Today, he is retired but spends some of his time on the Board of Directors of Friends of Turkey. In the summer of 2002 he organized the first Peace Corps Staff Reunion that honored Sarge Shriver. It was one of Sarge’s last public appearances. Here is a photograph from that event, it is Sarge speaking to the hundred of staffers who came back to the Women’s Museum to thank the man that made it all possible. One of the people . . .

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Best Writer at the Agency

While Doug Kiker might have a good claim to be ‘our’ first novelist at the Peace Corps, in my opinion, the finest writer was not all the hot-shots up on the 11th floor, in the Evaluation Division, or with the Public Information Office,  but it was William W. Warner, Executive Secretary for Shriver. Warner was one of those quiet guys who didn’t draw much attention. But in 1977, years after his Peace Corps job, Warner won the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction for his first book, Beautiful Swimmers: Watermen, Crabs and the Chesapeake Bay, which was based on his experiences living and working among crab fishermen on the Chesapeake. In many ways, he represented the sheer ‘talent’ that came to the agency in those first years. He had a first class mind, had vast experience, and a wealth of knowledge. Here in somewhat short-hand detail is Warner’s history and training when he began to work for . . .

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Michael Meyer (China 1995-97) Selected As New York Public Library Fellow For 2010

The New York Public Library’s Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers this month selected its twelfth class of Fellows: fourteen exceptional creative writers, independent scholars, and academics. The Fellows, will have full access to the unparalleled research collections and online resources of The New York Public Library’s landmark Stephen A. Schwarzman Building at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street. They will be in residence at the Center from September 2010 through May 2011, pursuing a wide range of book projects that will make extensive use of the Library’s holdings. One of the Fellows is our own Mike Meyer (China 1995-97) winner of the Paul Cowan Non-Fiction Award in 2009 for his first book The Last Days of Old Beijing: Life in the Vanishing Backstreets of a City Transformed which depicts the capital’s oldest neighborhood as the city remade itself for the 2008 Olympics. Also a Lowell Thomas Award winner for travel . . .

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Mad Men Novelist At The Peace Corps: Doug Kiker

If there was one HQ staffer who could have walk straight onto the set of the current hit, Mad Men, is was Doug Kiker of Griffin, Georgia. Kiker was the original “mad man”  in his brief time at the Peace Corps during those early days when he was chief of the division of public information. He would leave the Peace Corps in 1963 for the New York Herald Tribune, and on his first week on that job, he was  riding in the press bus in the motorcade with JFK when the president was assassinated.  By 1966, he was with NBC News as an on-air reporter and he would remain with that network for the rest of his life. He died of a heart attack in 1991 at the age of 61. Kiker came from the south, from Presbyterian College in Clinton, South Carolina, majoring in English and wanting to be a writer. His first . . .

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Seeking French Speakers for Overseas Positions with Peace Corps

 [A good friend forwarded this announcement that came to his wife’s listserv. (She speaks French; he only knows Amharic!) The announcement was in the newsletter of  Alliance Francaise in Washington, D.C.  I thought some of the ‘French speaking RPCVs’ would want to know about it. [An aside: One nagging complaint that I always have is the Peace Corps agency still continues to not use the article ‘the’ for ‘Peace Corps’….I think it goes back to the Nixon years when the Republicans were attempting to show that they could save money by eliminating articles from proper government names. Not sure about that; just a guess. Aaron, do us all a favor, put the “the” back in THE Peace Corps!] April 5, 2010   Peace Corps is one of the most successful and respected service agencies in the world. Established in 1961 by President Kennedy, nearly 200,000 Volunteers have served in 139 countries since its inception. . . .

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Martha Dunlop Peterson (Sierra Leone 1982-84)

  Monday, November 21 4:39 pm Martha Dunlop Peterson and her husband, John, served in Bo and Freetown, Sierra Leone, both were music teachers. They also taught in the School for the Blind, teaching all subjects, as well as taught at the Milton Margai Teachers College. She read from a letter home to her father dated February 6, 1984. It is excerpted here. Dear Pa, I’ve met a missionary who has a library so I’m plowing through her books. I feel like a slouch after reading about David Livingstone in Africa – missionary, discoverer, geologist, botanist and surgeon. In my small way I’m throwing out some good vibrations. I’m feeling OK. Despite sore throat, sore feet, stiff arm, sore stomach, I just “keep on truckin’” as this too shall pass. I’m coaching a lovely school teacher in advanced piano. She’d like a scholarship to study in America so I wrote . . .

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A. Radlott (Dominican Republic 1963-65)

Monday, November 21 4:42 pm In the spring of  1963 while a senior at the University of Wisconsin – Madison, I joined the Peace Corps. Your vision of the future, words of encouragement and faith in the ability of volunteers like myself presented too great a challenge to pass up. I was part of D.R. VII, the first Urban Community Development group in the Dominican Republic. Training, which began in July, was to end in October, but was extended until mid-November due to a military coup and resultant uncertainty about that country’s readiness for a seventh volunteer group. On the Friday of the first week home between training and leaving the United States I head: “President Kennedy has just been shot in Dallas,” as I prepared to shop for things I was told I’d need in Santo Domingo. In retrospect, the shock and national tragedy of that fatal event underscored . . .

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Tony D'Souza In India Reviews Paul Theroux's A Dead Hand: A Crime in Calcutta

Reviewer Tony D’Souza’s novel, Whiteman, received the Peace Corps Writers Maria Thomas Prize for Fiction, and is loosely based on his Peace Corps service in an Ivory Coast headed for civil war. His second novel, The Konkans, is loosely based on his mother’s Peace Corps service in India from 1969 to 1970 where she met and married his father. Tony has contributed fiction and essays to The New Yorker, Playboy, Esquire, Outside, Granta, McSweeney’s, the O. Henry Awards, and Best American Fantasy, and is the recipient of two NEA Awards, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and gold and silver medals from the Florida Book Awards. He lives in Sarasota, FL, with his wife Jessyka and two young children, Gwen, 18 months, and Rohan, 6 months. The D’Souzas are spending the next few months traveling in India. Here, Tony reviews Paul Theroux’s A Dead Hand: A Crime in Calcutta. • A Dead Hand: . . .

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Award Winning Travel Writer Mo Tejani (Thailand 1979–80)

Mohezin Tejani (Thailand 1979-80) is the author of  A Chameleon’s Tale: True Stories of a Global Refugee, and one of those hardy band of RPCVs writers who lives and works [mostly as travel writers] around the world, publishing on-line and in many travel magazines. He is also an award winning writer. For example.    The Solas Awards and BestTravelWriting.com were created by Travelers’ Tales,  a division of Solas House, Inc., a publisher of travel literature in Palo Alto, California. In 2004 they published their first collection of Best Travel Writing and in 2005 added The Best Women’s Travel Writing. In 2006 they launched the Solas Awards and BestTravelWriting.com to honor fine writing from the great travel storytellers.   Extraordinary stories about travel has been the cornerstones of their books since 1993. With the Solas Awards they honor writers whose work inspires others to explore. They look for the best stories about travel and the . . .

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Happy Easter! Two RPCV Catholics Ask Why?

The Catholic Church must confess By Chris Matthews (Swaziland 1968-70) MSNBC (Remarks delivered on the air Wednesday evening.) Let me finish tonight with the thoughts of a layman on the problem under which the Roman Catholic Church is now suffering. The tragedy begins with the molestation of children. It does not end there. Young boys who were sent to Catholic school, who will become altar boys, serve under the authority of the church. They are subject to taking orders. Every minute, they are in a school or in a sacristy. This is more than a secular discipline. It is empowered by the authority of God. Priests stand before these young boys as representatives of God, with all the august authority that comes with it. In this case, to a young child being brought up with the fullest belief in God, and what he come to firmly believe is his church. . . .

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Writing Advice/Review: J. P. Jones's A Witness in Tunis

Reviewer Tony D’Souza’s first novel, Whiteman, received the Peace Corps Writers Maria Thomas Prize for Fiction, and is loosely based on his Peace Corps service in an Ivory Coast headed for civil war. His second novel, The Konkans, is loosely based on his mother’s Peace Corps service in India from 1969 to 1970 where she met and married his father. Tony has contributed fiction and essays to The New Yorker, Playboy, Esquire, Outside, Granta, McSweeney’s, the O. Henry Awards, and Best American Fantasy, and is the recipient of two NEA Awards, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and gold and silver medals from the Florida Book Awards. He lives in Sarasota, FL, with his wife Jessyka and two young children, Gwen, 18 months, and Rohan, 6 months. The D’Souzas are spending the next few months traveling in India. Here, Tony uses J.P. Jones’s novel A Witness in Tunis to offer advice to RPCVs . . .

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Another Award Winning RPCV Writer: Chris Conlon (Botswana 1988-90)

He Is Legend, the anthology of short stories honoring author and screen writer Richard Matheson, edited by Christopher Conlon (Botswana 1988-90) has won the 2009 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in Anthology. The book (which features stories by Stephen King, Joe Hill, Joe R. Lansdale, Whitley Strieber, F.Paul Wilson and many more) was available as a limited edition from Gauntlet Press and is now sold out — until the TOR hardcover trade edition comes out September 2010. HE IS LEGEND Edited by Christopher Conlon (Botswana 1988-90) Tor $25.99 352 pages September 2010

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Once Again My Favorite Hobby Horse: One Laptop Per Child

I was watching Worldfocus this evening and they are running a series on Africa and the final segment was on Rwanda and the program of  One Laptop per child that the President Paul Kagame began. There are 2,3 million primary kids and he wants to use them to make his country first in Africa with these $100 computers. He was the leader after the 1994 genocide where 800,000 were killed. It is a surprisingly positive story after so much tragedy and without books, materials, etc., these computers are giving children an edge of all of the students in Africa. Kagame is a genius. Why the Peace Corps doesn’t work out an arrangement with the MIT folks who developed this inexpensive computer is beyong me. Do any of you have any ideas how we might make this leap forward in the thinking of the agency? Meanwhile, check out www.worldfocus.org You can see . . .

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