Tell Your Stories: Celebrate 50 Years of Service In Manhattan

A New York Non-Profit–BEST–is partnering with RPCVs to create a historical exhibit in downtown Manhattan. The theme is “Then & Now: 50 Years of Service” and the exhibition will tell personal stories of the Peace Corps’ long-term impact on the countries where we lived and worked.  The exhibit will be displayed in the lobby of the Federal Building at 201 Varick Street where the Regional Peace Corps Recruitment Offices are located.

The group is seeking stories from RPCVs (along with accompanying photos and artifacts, when available) that illustrate the impact of their Peace Corps projects and relationships that began during their service.

The Peace Corps experience is rich in its history and full of stories and connections that have lasted longer than just two years. What do you remember? Who among your many HCNs still write letters, send emails, keep in touch?

Tell the stories of your trip back to your country of service. Tell it in words and with digital photographs.

The Peace Corps has a great story, but it is not the story of the agency, it is the story of Volunteers and their friendships. Friendships with host country nationals that have lasted over time. What happened to the projects that you began with little more than common sense?  How have the seeds of progress that you started developed and flowered? What became of your village? Tell yourt story, then and now, put it on display so others can see and learn from on this, the 50th year of the Peace Corps.

All of  your materials will be placed in secure cases under 24/7 security. (After all, this is a federal building.)

 We would love to borrow meaningful photos and artifacts through the end of the 50th anniversary year (2011).

If you live in and around the Big Apple, get in touch, get involved over the next year. If you have letters and photos and stories to tell, wherever you were in the world, get in touch with Jonathan Mann & RPCV Tony Greep.

An RPCVs interested in helping by volunteering time and energy, please give Jon or Tony a call.

 Begin by contacting: Jonathan Mann, BEST at:splitter@rcn.com

[BEST is a non-profit education resource center affiliated with New York University.  They have orchestrated various installations and programs for the past twenty years… including their proudest achievement: the largest Abraham Lincoln exhibit in the nation… down at Federal Hall in lower Manhattan to celebrate the Bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth (Feb. – July 2009); they have sponsored and created exhibits as a labor-of-love — no one is paid for these programs. ]