Miscellany

Brian Cummins (Dominican Republic 1990-92) served in a small business program as a PCV.  After stints as a trainer for a DR program in ’93 and a Latvia program later that year he was hired as Admin. Officer (AO) for the Russian Far East (1994-97), then transferred to Moldova (1997-90) as AO.  He is currently on the Cleveland City Council.  He and his RPCV wife, Gayle have two daughters. Ken Hill, Country Director in the Russian Far East (1994-96) recalls that Brian’s work at the challenging RFE post was “extraordinary and impressive, resulting in major improvements to post operations and volunteer support”. Ward 14 Councilman Brian Cummins was re-elected to Cleveland City Council for a thrid term in 2013 and represents the communities of Clark Fulton, Stockyard, and portions of Brooklyn Centre, Tremont and West Boulevard neighborhoods. Councilman Cummins previously represented the community of Brooklyn Centre and parts of Old . . .

Alan Toth (South Africa 2010-12) started Posh Corps Shorts as a companion series for his feature film Posh Corps. He was inspired to create the companion series based on his conversations with RPCVs from countries like Morocco and Cambodia. Despite the fact that they did not serve in South Africa, Alan said, “they understood immediately that the film was intended to demonstrate that the availability of first-world amenities does not make Peace Corps service posh. I wanted to help these fellow posh corps volunteers tell their stories.” Posh Corps Shorts was also an opportunity for Alan to achieve, in some degree, his original vision for Posh Corps. When he first started pre-production for the film he was finishing up his Peace Corps service. His vision for the film was to interview Volunteers in posh corps countries around the world. He even traveled to Cambodia for his COS trip to research the . . .

TO:                  Peace Corps Global FROM:            Carrie Hessler-Radelet, Director SUBJECT:      Peace Corps Ranks Third in Best Places to Work in the Federal Government I’m thrilled to share with you that the results of the annual survey of 2014 Best Places to Work in the Federal Government are in. The Peace Corps is ranked third among 30 small agencies-up from fourth place last year. Our employee satisfaction and commitment score is 82.8 out of 100, placing the Peace Corps in the very top of all small agencies. This is the fifth year in a row that the Peace Corps ranked in the top five agencies and we’ve only been participating for five years. Our employee satisfaction and commitment score improved by 4.6 points since last year. The government-wide satisfaction and commitment score is 56.9, down 0.9 points from last year. That places our 2014 score 25.9 points higher than the government-wide score. . . .

FOLLOWING HIS TWO U.S. OPEN WINS, Johnny McDermott, our first “homebred” U. S. Open winner, entered the 1914 British Open, but because of travel delays he arrived too late to tee off. Returning home to the States his ship, the Kaiser Wilhelm II, collided with an English ship and sank. He drifted in a lifeboat in the middle of the Atlantic for over 24 hours before being rescued. When he did reach America, he learned he had been wiped out financially because of bad Wall Street investments and needed to take a job as the golf pro at the Atlantic City Country Club. He was then 23 years old and he quit playing tournament golf. Within a few years players couldn’t even recall his name or what he had won. Still a young man, McDermott began to suffer mental breakdowns and his family had him committed to the Norristown Hospital . . .

Thanks to an alert from Kitty Thuermer (Mali 1977-79) I’ve learned that David Hapgood, one of the legendary early evaluators of the Peace Corps has passed away in New York. Hapgood co-authored the first inside Peace Corps books on the agency, Agents of Change: A Close Look at the Peace Corps. It was written with another evaluator, Meridan Bennett. In their acknowledgments they state that: “This book is anything but official,” and then go onto praise their boss, Charlie Peters, who headed the Peace Corps Division of Evaluation from 1962 to the spring of 1968. As they write, “The unique process of self-criticism known in the Peace Corps as evaluation would never have existed without Charlie Peters’ courage and imagination.” Hapgood and Bennett’s book was published by Little, Brown & Company in 1968. I always enjoyed that the book was dedicated to “H.C.N. Without whom this book would never have . . .

The United States had dominated the Ryder Cup since the beginning in 1927, but in 1969, the English team, led by Tony Jacklin, fought to a historic draw.  The outcome was not decided until the last two men on the golf course arrived at the final green encircled by their 22 teammates, two captains and thousands of excited spectators. It was then that Jack Nicklaus conceded a short but miss-able putt to Tony Jacklin that resulted in the first tie in the 42-year history of the event. Draw In The Dunes is the complete untold story of a thrilling Ryder Cup and why a conceded putt became a part of golf and sports lore. Draw In The Dunes was written by golf writer Neil Sagebiel. Neil is the founder and editor of Armchair Golf Blog, one of top golf blogs on the internet.  A former copywriter for a Seattle advertising agency and . . .

Peace Corps service is a risk worth taking Gordon Radley July 30, 2014 | Updated: July 30, 2014 10:57pm Max Whittaker, New York Times Nicholas Castle, a UC Berkeley graduate from Brentwood, was honored in April for his service as a volunteer in the Peace Corps in rural China, where he died from a sudden illness last year. Peace Corps service is not without risk. I know that firsthand because my only brother was the first Peace Corps volunteer to die in service. He was killed in an airplane crash in 1962 along with another volunteer and 36 Colombians on a remote mountaintop in the jungles of Colombia. His remains lie there today along with those of all of the other passengers. The death from a sudden illness last year of Nick Castle of Brentwood, a Peace Corps volunteer in rural China, reminds us that even after the service of nearly 215,000 . . .

Carrie Hessler-Radelet Sworn In as 19th Director of the Peace Corps Hessler-Radelet committed to using the tools, technologies and opportunities of the 21st century to strengthen the Peace Corps today WASHINGTON, D.C., June 25, 2014 – Carrie Hessler-Radelet was sworn in as the 19th Director of the Peace Corps Wednesday at a ceremony at Peace Corps headquarters in Washington, D.C. Hessler-Radelet comes from a four-generation Peace Corps family and served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Western Samoa with her husband from 1981-1983. Since 2010, she served as the agency’s deputy director and acting director. “Everywhere I go in the Peace Corps world, I hear testimonies of the impact volunteers have had on their communities,” Hessler-Radelet said. “Peace Corps volunteers are special people – they come with the tools of the 21st century but the heart and soul of a timeless Peace Corps. Serving as Peace Corps director is truly the great . . .

Saturday, (6/14/14) issue of The New York Times carried a short editorial entitled, “Peace Corps Volunteers Deserve Fairness.” The lead sentence read: “Women make up more than 60 percent of the Peace Corps, volunteers who are often put in situations where safe and reliable medical care is difficult to find and where they face the risk of sexual assault.” The editorial was drawing attention to the fact that this week’s subcommittees in both the House and Senate will begin to work on a Peace Corps budget for the next fiscal year and how the current federal law (written in 1979) does not allow abortion coverage in the volunteers’ health care program, even in cases of rape or incest, or when a pregnancy endangers a woman’s life. The Times writes: “All women should be allowed comprehensive reproductive health care coverage. Women taking risks to advance the country’s interests by serving in . . .