Search Results For -shriver

Joanne Roll (Colombia 1963-65) who blogs on our site, and who knows more than all of us about the agency, sent me the following note and interesting links at the JFK’s library in Boston. Joanne writes: “The JFK Presidential Library works hard to protect the history and legacy of the Kennedy administration. The Peace Corps is an important part of that history.  Here is an example of how important preserving and protecting that history can be. “Since the beginning, Peace Corps Volunteers have long fought the myth that somehow Volunteers were intelligence agents in disguise. A telephone conversation between President Kennedy and Sargent Shriver on April 2, 1963 documents that Kennedy and Shriver were strongly determined to protect the Peace Corps from the CIA. “This telephone conversation was recorded in the White House and the JFK Library has now digitized the recording and is making them available on its website. . . .

A good friend from Boston (not an RPCV!) sent me this short clip of Mark Shriver on Colbert last night talking about his father and his book on his Dad, A Good Man. It is a informative five minutes about Sarge, his place in history, and how well he is remembered. Check it out. http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/417499/august-07-2012/mark-shriver

By Reeve Lindbergh, Published: July 13, Washington Post Mark Shriver’s moving and thoughtful book about his father, Sargent Shriver, who died in 2011, is both an homage and an exploration. In writing it, Mark discovered that the key to his father’s life was not so much the man’s acknowledged greatness as his underlying goodness, sustained by an abiding faith. Sargent Shriver, who married into the Kennedy family, served in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. “My life in a famous and often star-crossed American clan,” the younger Shriver writes, “would not be without its trials and disappointments, but I had as my father a man who not only was faith-filled and disciplined, but who also insisted, in large part because of his faith, on the grace and joy in life.” Even those Americans who remember the 1960 presidential campaign may have forgotten how controversial John F. Kennedy’s religion was for a portion . . .

This afternoon while having lunch I caught Andrea Mitchell’s program on MSNBC. Around 1:45 EST she was interviewing Mark Shriver on his book about his Dad, A Good Man. Early in this interview, they started to talk about Sarge and his friendship with Martin Luther King back in Chicago when Shriver was head of the Board of Education for the City. Next, they shifted to Kennedy nomination and the famous spontaneous phone call that JFK made to Coretta King on the day her husband had been tossed into a jail for a civil rights protest. It was a politically risky telephone call by Kennedy, and any one his advisers would have stopped it, had they been in the room. It turned out to be a key political gesture by Kennedy and turned the Black Vote for him that November. Andrea Mitchell directed the MSNBC conversation this afternoon and Mark went . . .

Mark Shriver book about his father–A Good Man Rediscovering My Father, Sargent Shriver– will be official published on June 5, 2012. Mark will be everywhere talking about the book and his father, beginning with the Today Show on Monday, June 4. As he wrote me recently, ” I am nervous but excited — excited, really, to share Dad’s story of a strong faith that demanded acts of hope and love.  And those acts were the work of his life — the Peace Corps, Head Start, Job Corps, and Legal Services, to name a few; his efforts alongside my mom to spread Special Olympics around the world; and, most importantly, his role as father and grandfather.” Tom Brokaw of NBC has said of the book, “This is a deeply touching story of a famous family and the private joys and trials that came with it. Mark’s love letter to his Dad . . .

Mark Shriver writes in A Good Man — out this June from Henry Holt — that he applied to the Peace Corps in his senior year at Holy Cross College.  “After waiting months to hear — no one [in our family] from my generation had yet been accepted into the program — I learned that I would serve as an English teacher in Paraguay.” He then went with his Dad to the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Peace Corps held under a enormous tent on the Mall in Washington, D.C.. This was the famous reunion organized by the Returned Volunteer of Washington, not by any national group of RPCVs, nor by the Peace Corps agency. The Peace Corps, as we know, never organizes anything for RPCVs. “Dad . . . gave a terrific speech with a rousing finale,” Mark writes.”I was sitting in the front row, proud of him and motivated to serve.” Mark goes on to . . .

Last week marked the first anniversary of the passing of Sarge Shriver.  His son, Mark Shriver, was invited by Director Williams to be one of the speakers in the Loret Miller Ruppe Series of talks given at the agency. Here are Mark’s comments if you were not at the Peace Corps, or have not read them. • WHEN MY FATHER DIED, my siblings asked me to give the eulogy at his funeral. At the time, I didn’t really want to be drafted into that role, but I was, and it has turned out to be a blessing for me. Because before I wrote that eulogy, I thought I knew my father. Of course I did know him — as any son knows his father. But as I was preparing the eulogy, I began to get to know him as a man in his own terms — not just as a . . .

Busted Halo is a blog that I check weekly because I find it interesting, and also it relates to my job as a communication director at a small Catholic college. The blog is a media and ministry outreach to Catholics in their twenties and thirties created by the Paulist Fathers. The discussions are based on the belief that all God’s children are “saints in the making,” and that everyone is called to aspire toward the holiness and selflessness of a Mother Teresa or Saint Francis. At the end of 2011, Busted Halo looked back and remembered important figures who had died during the year. Included was a piece about Sargent Shriver that I read — because it was about Sarge. It was written by Joe Williams, an RPCV from South Africa, who is the head art, graphics and video producer for Busted Halo. After graduating from Texas Christian University with a degree . . .

By Maryann Yin on June 10, 2011 2:52 PM from GalleyCat website Politician Mark K. Shriver has signed a deal with Henry Holt & Company to pen a tome about his father, sargent Robert “Sarge” Shriver. The book will be titled A Good Man: Rediscovering My Father, Sarge Shriver. Publisher Stephen Rubin acquired North American and audio rights in the deal. Executive editor Gillian Blake will edit the book. Here’s more from the press release: “After he eulogized him in January, Mark wanted to know what made his father ‘tick.’ He found the answers in the simple and poignant gestures over a lifetime – in the frequent notes and daily talks, trips and prayers together – all based in Sarge’s unwavering devotion to his family (he and Eunice were married for 56 years); his devout Catholicism, which included attending daily Mass; his innate sense of duty and service to his . . .

The famous “Mayflower Gang” created the Peace Corps in 30 days in two rooms of the Mayflower Hotel on Connecticut Avenue several blocks from the White House in February 1961. The ‘Gang’ was led by Shriver, Harris Wofford, Warren Wiggins, Bill Josephson and a half dozen others giving suggestions and making their points. These were ‘advisors’ like the Secretary of State Dean Rush; Father Hesburgh, President of Notre Dame;  Gordon Boyce, President of the Experiment in International Living; Albert Sims of the Institute of International Education; George Carter, a campaign worker on civil rights issues; Franklin Williams, an organizer of the campaign for black voter registration and a student of African affairs; Adam Yarmolinsky, a foundation executive. These advisers came from all corners (if not both rooms in the suite) and most of them wanted one clear statement of what the Peace Corps would be, but Sarge Shriver held the position that Peace — not Development . . .

[I got this email the other night from Jon Ebeling. Jon and I served together in Ethiopia (1962-64) and Jon wanted me to post it, as being an academic type, trying to post something on this blog is a little too complex for him. However, since I still owe Jon a few beers from the old days in Addis, I am including his great story about Sarge. As for Jon, well, after our tour in Ethiopia, Jon finished his Ph.D. at the University of Pittsburg, and later returned to Ethiopia as an APCD. He taught Political Science at California State University Chico until he retired a few years ago, and now he writes and publishes articles and books in his field of political science. Here is Jon’s story of meeting Sarge in a remote southern town in Ethiopia where he taught as a PCV.] “During the Cuban missile crisis in October of 1962, I was . . .

On the afternoon of Saturday, June 20, 1981, Sarge Shriver spoke at the second National Conference of former Peace Corps Volunteers and Staff at Howard University in Washington, D.C. It was the 20th anniversary of the Peace Corps and it was a wonderful weekend, mostly because of Sarge. He bought the house down late in the afternoon in one terrific speech delivered at the close of the long weekend. When Shriver rose to speak so did the packed house of RPCVs who rose to cheer him. These were mostly “his Volunteers,” and they loved him. They were also cheering themselves, cheering the memory of who they were and what they once had done in the development world. Some say the applause went on for twenty minutes. No, it was closer to ten minutes, but it was warm and rich with memory. It brought tears to many eyes as Shriver tried . . .

Congressman Garamendi Joins 13 Colleagues Introducing Resolution Honoring Life and Legacy of Sargent Shriver WASHINGTON, DC – Congressman John Garamendi (D-Walnut Creek, CA), who served as a Peace Corps volunteer with his wife Patti Garamendi in Ethiopia, introduced a resolution honoring the life and legacy of Sargent Shriver, the first director of the Peace Corps. House Resolution 64 is supported by 13 original co-sponsors: Budget Committee Ranking Member Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking Member Howard Berman (D-CA), Education and Workforce Committee Ranking Member George Miller (D-CA), Natural Resources Ranking Member Edward Markey (D-MA), Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Sander Levin (D-MI), Congressman Sam Farr (D-CA), Congresswoman Madeleine Bordallo (D-GU), Congressman James Langevin (D-RI), Congresswoman Betty McCollum (D-MN), Congressman Jim Moran (D-VA), Congressman David Price (D-NC), Congressman Jose Serrano (D-NY), and Congressman Jim McGovern (D-MA). “Sargent Shriver was a true American hero, a selfless humanitarian, and a . . .