December 18, 2018 – Peace Corps Worldwide

Review — TO SAVE AN EMPIRE by Allan R. Gall (Turkey)

Dec 18 2018

To Save an Empire: A Novel of Ottoman Allan R. Gall (Turkey 1962-64) Allan R. Gall – publisher 426 pages March, 2018 $14.99 (paperback), $7.99 (Kindle) Reviewed by Robert E. Hamilton (Ethiopia 1965–67) • If, like me, you have been unfortunate enough not to have lived in Turkey for eight years, as Dr. Allan Gall did, then you may want to supplement your reading of To Save an Empire: A Novel of Ottoman History by watching the 36 video lectures of Ottoman history (Great Courses DVD) by Professor Kenneth W. Harl of Tulane University. Or, read selected portions of Douglas Howard, The History of Turkey (second edition, 2016) and Thomas Maddan’s Istanbul (2016). All three supplements were available to me through my local library. These resources helped me understand the context of Gall’s novel, which only covers the seven-year period from 1876 to 1883. Why did Allan Gall focus . . .

Nigeria’s First Peace Corps Staff (Part Two)

Dec 18 2018

By the time John Todd arrived in November to conduct a school survey of the Eastern Region, the Michelmore incident was closed. Born in Austin, Texas, raised in Memphis, Tenn., Todd graduated from McKinley Technical High School in Washington, D.C. in 1940, just in time for the war. Trained in Texas as an aerial navigator, he flew 36 combat missions over Europe before he was sent back to Texas an athletic officer for the Central Flying Training Command, before he returned to Europe as squadron navigator for the 33rd Fighter Group (P-51s). He married his childhood sweetheart, Frances Atkinson of Washington. “The war was over. I was young with no particular plans. They were asking people to extend their terms of service so I just stayed in for another year—at Neubiberg air base outside Munich.” Later he would serve in Korea and when after that war, in 1956, he received . . .

Archive - December 18, 2018