Archive - 2013

It started as a newsletter in November 1961. It was edited by three women: Betty Harris, Sally Bowles, and ET PCV Margery Michelmore who had famously put the Peace Corps on the front pages of every newspaper in the U.S. with her postcard written from the University College at Ibadan while she was still in training for Nigeria. The Volunteer newsletter quickly became a monthly that went to all PCVs, and as a magazine it was edited by Kellogg Smith for two years. Smith had come to the Peace Corps in September, 1962, after serving with the Democratic National Committee. He was for six years a copy editor with the San Francisco News-Call Bulletin, and before that spent seven years on the desk of the Cleveland Press. He also co-authored two textbooks on English grammar, and was a graduate of Williams College. At the Peace Corps, in December of ’64 . . .

The staff orientation instruction booklet for Charlotte Amalie, Virgin Islands, back in 1968 when the Peace Corps Training was done on St. Croix and St. Thomas, has an interesting piece of instruction for incoming training staff. One paragraph in the 9-page orientation pamphlet, which is mimeographed and stapled together, reads: LIVING ACCOMMODATIONS AT THE VITC The living accommodations at the VITC are not luxurious by any standards. Housing for married couples is not available unless specifically stated in writing by the Director of the VITC. Housing for single staff members is generally shared quarters. A single room provided with two beds, two chairs, one dresser, one standing wardrobe rack. Linen is distributed once weekly. Toilet and shower facilities are located in a separate building. There is no hot water at the St. Croix Camp and no flush toilets. The St. Thomas Camp is equipped with flush toilets, and in some . . .

[A couple weeks ago I posted what Jon Ebeling (Ethiopia 1962-64) had to say about Shriver visiting his town of Debra Marcus, and then seeing Shriver a few years later at the State Department in Washington. Here’s Shriver again talking about that visit to Debra Marcus, and quoting from a letter written by another PCV in that town, Dick Lipez (Ethiopia 1962-64). Sargent Shriver gave the one hundred Sixty-fifth Commencement of Georgetown University in early June of 1964. He talked, of course, about the Peace Corps, telling the graduates and their families that he had been at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand and was awarded an honorary degree to honor the Peace Corps and the 265 Volunteers serving in Thailand. Three of those Volunteers, he said, graduated from Georgetown. Then he went onto talk about eight Volunteers who had trained at Georgetown for the Peace Corps in the summer of ’62.] . . .

“Eye on the Sixties: The Iconic Photography of Rowland Scherman” Guests: Rowland Scherman and Edith Lee Payne Date: Sunday, August 25, 2013 at 2:30 PM Location: Documentary Theater, Washington, D.C. Newseum Note: A Q&A with Scherman and Payne will follow the program. The Newseum presents a special screening of the new documentary “Eye on the Sixties: The Iconic Photography of Rowland Scherman.” The film is an intimate portrait of Scherman and documents his work during the 1960s, one of the country’s most transformational eras. Among his many assignments, Scherman was the primary photographer of the 1963 March on Washington, which he shot for the United States Information Agency. The Newseum screening takes place just three days before the 50th anniversary of the march. One of Scherman’s most iconic photographs from the march is of 11-year-old Edith Lee Payne. Payne will be part of a panel discussion following the film to . . .

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WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama has nominated the deputy director of the Peace Corps to be the agency’s director. The White House on Thursday announced the nomination of Carolyn Hessler Radelet to the top Peace Corps post. She was a Peace Corps volunteer in Western Samoa in the early 1980s and held various positions with a public health management firm, John Snow Inc., before becoming the agency’s deputy director in 2010.

Charlene Duline (Peru 1962-64) had just moved to Paris in 1969 and Christmas was approaching when she read in the newspapers about a Christmas Eve Mass that the new Ambassador was having in the ancient Sainte Chappelle Church. Well, why don’t I let Charlene tell her story of meeting up with Sarge once again, this time in Paris. The Ambassador Will Vouch For Me It was 1969 and Christmas was approaching. I was settling into life in Paris, France after moving there two months previously. I saw an article in the newspaper about a Christmas Eve Mass Sargent Shriver, U.S. Ambassador to France, was having in the tiny, ancient Sainte Chappelle church and inviting diplomats, friends and family. It was going to be an intimate and elegant affair, and I decided that I would like to attend. A friend who was a volunteer in Morocco was coming to spend Christmas . . .

Jon Ebeling (Ethiopia 1962-64) spent five years with the Peace Corps as a PCV and APCD in Ethiopia. Upon returning he entered the Ph.D. program at the University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public and International where he earned his Ph.D. in Economic and Social Development. As he graduated from the University, he came down with a severe case of juvenile diabetes and could not return to Africa. He taught statistics and public finance in the Department of Political Science at CSU, Chico for 32 years while directing over 200 master’s degree thesis until his retirement. He has done extensive consulting with governments and private industry in the area. He specializes in revenue forecasting, evaluation research, and public opinion research. He has taught off and on in the Economics Department as needed since the early 1970’s. Jon and his wife, Frederica Shockley, Chair of the Economics Department now have a . . .

Watching the event this afternoon, Monday, July 15, 2013, where the President and  former president George Bush, honored an Iowa couple as part of Point of Light Awards, I was struck again how the Peace Corps has been cast aside by the current cast of characters in Washington. Obama wouldn’t even meet with RPCVs during the 50th celebration, and here we have been ‘volunteering’ for 50 years, way before 1989 when George H.W. Bush talked about “points of light” in his inaugural address. Bush said he wanted citizens who make a difference through their volunteer work. Hello! What about us? RPCVs, some 220,000, have been volunteering since 1961, and continue to ‘do good’  in the world, as well as at home, fulfilling the Third Goal of the Peace Corps Act. One reason Marian and I wanted to focus part of  www.peacecorpsworldwide.org website on Third Goal Projects is because RPCV projects . . .