[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User]
Yes, Bisbee, Arizona. So we did our training, which was one of those great things. We were supposed to go to a ski resort in Pennsylvania, but they canceled the contract right before. And a woman in the national Peace Corps office, they came in and said, what are we going to do about Korea? And she said, let me call my brother, who was an attorney in Bisbee, and see if they could host it, because they're in the middle of a copper strike and they need the money. And our $10 checks for the 60 of us was the big economic, besides the other food and stuff and lodging, but the other big economic input. And again, that was significant.

We went to Bisbee, Arizona, and no relationship at all. We had 12 Koreans come over for the language training and that that was fantastic. But Bisbee had no relationship at all to South Korea in terms of.

[Assistant] Well, neither did the mountains in Pennsylvania.

[User] Neither did the mountains in Pennsylvania. But the mountains of Pennsylvania sounded exciting to me at the time, and I'm actually glad I went to Bisbee. We learned a lot. Our Peace Corps training to do, because we had a lot of teachers in our group, people with teaching backgrounds. So about ten of us formed a reader's theater group and we did Winnie the Pooh things and went to the schools to do readings for kids. We'd do a reader's theater thing on Winnie the Pooh. I was Eeyore.

[Assistant] Oh, wonderful.

[User] And that sort of thing. But that was our contribution.

[Assistant] So you were, were you a trained teacher at that point? But what was your?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Neither did the mountains in Pennsylvania. But the mountains of Pennsylvania sounded exciting to me at the time, and I'm actually glad I went to Bisbee. We learned a lot. Our Peace Corps training to do, because we had a lot of teachers in our group, people with teaching backgrounds. So about ten of us formed a reader's theater group and we did Winnie the Pooh things and went to the schools to do readings for kids. We'd do a reader's theater thing on Winnie the Pooh. I was Eeyore.

[Assistant] Oh, wonderful.

[User] And that sort of thing. But that was our contribution.

[Assistant] So you were, were you a trained teacher at that point? But what was your?

[User] Well, I had taught college for two years. I taught at Portland State for a year and Central Washington for a year. And that's where I got assigned to train teachers. And I spent time visiting teachers around the state of Washington. So I've learned a whole bunch of different approaches to teaching.

[Assistant] So what was the training like in Bisbee?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] And that sort of thing. But that was our contribution.

[Assistant] So you were, were you a trained teacher at that point? But what was your?

[User] Well, I had taught college for two years. I taught at Portland State for a year and Central Washington for a year. And that's where I got assigned to train teachers. And I spent time visiting teachers around the state of Washington. So I've learned a whole bunch of different approaches to teaching.

[Assistant] So what was the training like in Bisbee?

[User]
Training was intense. For language training, we had an hour of Korean before we had breakfast, so we started our first class at 7:00 and the last class would end at 10:00. And we were in a really weird converted whorehouse. And so, like there were four of us in one room, and they put four beds across there and there was six inches left. So that when we made our beds each week with our new linens, we'd start with the one against the wall and he'd have six inches. So the four of us had to coordinate how we made the bed so we could move it over. I was in the third bed and so there was no room there.

And that made the other sort of thing that was I found intriguing in training is that we would go from like 10:00 to 11:30 up to Jesse's Bar, and Jesse would sell beers for 25 cents for the first one and 15 cents for the second one. I corresponded with Jesse for about four years after Peace Corps. I would send him a letter and he would respond back and I'd sent him a couple of letters from Korea, and he just was fascinated. So we got community involvement in Bisbee.

[Assistant] So from 10:00 to 11:30 in the morning, this is?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, I had taught college for two years. I taught at Portland State for a year and Central Washington for a year. And that's where I got assigned to train teachers. And I spent time visiting teachers around the state of Washington. So I've learned a whole bunch of different approaches to teaching.

[Assistant] So what was the training like in Bisbee?

[User]
Training was intense. For language training, we had an hour of Korean before we had breakfast, so we started our first class at 7:00 and the last class would end at 10:00. And we were in a really weird converted whorehouse. And so, like there were four of us in one room, and they put four beds across there and there was six inches left. So that when we made our beds each week with our new linens, we'd start with the one against the wall and he'd have six inches. So the four of us had to coordinate how we made the bed so we could move it over. I was in the third bed and so there was no room there.

And that made the other sort of thing that was I found intriguing in training is that we would go from like 10:00 to 11:30 up to Jesse's Bar, and Jesse would sell beers for 25 cents for the first one and 15 cents for the second one. I corresponded with Jesse for about four years after Peace Corps. I would send him a letter and he would respond back and I'd sent him a couple of letters from Korea, and he just was fascinated. So we got community involvement in Bisbee.

[Assistant] So from 10:00 to 11:30 in the morning, this is?

[User] No, at night.

[Assistant] At night. Oh, I thought you were drinking beer early in the morning.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] So the very first week that Houk went to the United States, my family refused to have, be paid the allowance that they gave to the families that we lived with for food. They gave a food allowance to each of the families. And so the Songs refused that because she was living with my folks in the United States.

[Assistant] Uh huh.

[User] So, so that was a subsidy. The other, the other, Il, the son which was the fifth child in the family. Il means number one in the Chinese alphabet that the Koreans used. And Il most people would say is a spoiled, because four girls, other older sisters. And his grandmother lived, moved into the house and fed him until he was five years old. I mean, she was so excited that he had.

[Assistant] A son.

[User] A son. When Houk was born, Dr. Song's really close friend came over in mourning clothes because he had had four girls, and Dr. Song chased him down the street according to the story. I have no way of verifying, but it was very consistent with his theory. He was, he was yelling at them, girls are as good as boys, girls are as good as boys!

[Assistant] So he was a medical doctor?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] So, so that was a subsidy. The other, the other, Il, the son which was the fifth child in the family. Il means number one in the Chinese alphabet that the Koreans used. And Il most people would say is a spoiled, because four girls, other older sisters. And his grandmother lived, moved into the house and fed him until he was five years old. I mean, she was so excited that he had.

[Assistant] A son.

[User] A son. When Houk was born, Dr. Song's really close friend came over in mourning clothes because he had had four girls, and Dr. Song chased him down the street according to the story. I have no way of verifying, but it was very consistent with his theory. He was, he was yelling at them, girls are as good as boys, girls are as good as boys!

[Assistant] So he was a medical doctor?

[User] He was a medical doctor. And he, his clinic was in our house. And so because Korea was in a curfew, I was, I would say not a week went by that I wasn't woken up by someone knocking on the door or yelling, [speaks Korean], and trying to get the doctor. And because the curfew very, hardly any doctors except for Dr. Song, Dr. Song would go out at the risk of his life, of being shot. While I was there.

[Assistant] Why was there a curfew?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User]
Yeah, U.S. tanks going through the streets. And I immediately turned on the radio and then heard about the Pueblo affair from BBC. The U.S. ship had been taken. So there was, there was that tension that was going on. In fact, one of my favorite stories was that I got a call from Peace Corps headquarters saying that, asked me to come down so that the staff could evaluate and see visually, because if we had an evacuation and they had to evacuate, we would immediately go to Gimpo and to be evacuated. They didn't want us gathering any, just to meet, your job was figuring out how you could get to Gimpo, which is the major airport at that time in South, in Seoul. And she wanted to be able to visually identify me because I was the only volunteer who hadn't come into the main office.

I mean, after I saw where it was, I never went there. I didn't go to weekend meetings because I was having a good time in Korea. I didn't, I figured here I was here to meet Koreans, not to spend time with other American Peace Corps volunteers. And so they didn't know who I was. So they asked me to come in and be visually recognized. So it just shows you that.

[Assistant] So where were you stationed?

[User] I was in Korea, in Seoul.

[Assistant] Oh, you were stationed in Seoul?

[User] Yeah. So I was just part of, rode the bus actually within a block and a half of the Peace Corps office when I would go to work. But I just, you know, knew where it was. I was here to meet Koreans and work with Koreans. I didn't go down there.

[Assistant] So let's just back up to the, to the training again.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I was in Korea, in Seoul.

[Assistant] Oh, you were stationed in Seoul?

[User] Yeah. So I was just part of, rode the bus actually within a block and a half of the Peace Corps office when I would go to work. But I just, you know, knew where it was. I was here to meet Koreans and work with Koreans. I didn't go down there.

[Assistant] So let's just back up to the, to the training again.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So you had the training there. Do you think it prepared you for going overseas, the cultural training, the language training?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah. So I was just part of, rode the bus actually within a block and a half of the Peace Corps office when I would go to work. But I just, you know, knew where it was. I was here to meet Koreans and work with Koreans. I didn't go down there.

[Assistant] So let's just back up to the, to the training again.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So you had the training there. Do you think it prepared you for going overseas, the cultural training, the language training?

[User] Yeah, I have high ratings for them. I often thought, you know what, what should have they done that they didn't do? Well, nothing. They tried to serve us rice once in, we were at the Copper Queen Hotel where we had our, we had our meals, and they made rice. It was so bad the Koreans complained about it. So we never had rice again. And at that time, anybody, I was, two things. My mother would have told you that I was a finicky eater and I hated rice. And I was worried about eating rice three times a day when I got to Korea, which never was a problem. I just took to it like water. But it was so different from anything my mother had served or anything we had at the Copper Plate Hotel, which the Koreans themselves said, that's not right.

[Assistant] That's not right. So. Okay, so you finish the training. And then how many of you went overseas?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So you had the training there. Do you think it prepared you for going overseas, the cultural training, the language training?

[User] Yeah, I have high ratings for them. I often thought, you know what, what should have they done that they didn't do? Well, nothing. They tried to serve us rice once in, we were at the Copper Queen Hotel where we had our, we had our meals, and they made rice. It was so bad the Koreans complained about it. So we never had rice again. And at that time, anybody, I was, two things. My mother would have told you that I was a finicky eater and I hated rice. And I was worried about eating rice three times a day when I got to Korea, which never was a problem. I just took to it like water. But it was so different from anything my mother had served or anything we had at the Copper Plate Hotel, which the Koreans themselves said, that's not right.

[Assistant] That's not right. So. Okay, so you finish the training. And then how many of you went overseas?

[User] 40 of the 60. And we lost four people during the period of time, one was my friend Al, which was a medical leave. And another one was Kevin, who was, who was probably also one of the top five in Korean language skills. He just, he had worked in a TB thing and just felt it was, um. For example, of the thousand vaccinations that they did in that, in a six month period, he did 800 of them and there was four or five other Koreans that were part of the staff and they just were, didn't do much. And he just got disgusted and quit.

[Assistant] And just quit.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User]
Yeah, because he thought, I'm not, I'm not doing any good here. And they're not, they're just letting me do all the work and then they won't do anything when I leave. So, uh, I mean, you quickly learned that your individual thing. And like 35, or 30, 39 of them went into middle schools and I went to a government training institute that trained. COTI was set up to train civil servants. In other words, the GS people, and we focused on what would be equivalent to GS-12 and above, trying to train them. And the reason that I was there was to help the director of our institute save face because they lost the USAID contract with University of Minnesota that sent a professor of public administration.

So when the powers that be went through the things they saw, oh, he's taught college for two years. So even though it's in speech, they didn't care what it was in. Then we have him. He still has an American professor. Well, I had only a master's degree and I didn't do anything. The only thing I really did is they once had me give a lecture to 600 people on why the U.S. is in Vietnam, which was an interesting.

[Assistant] And what is it that you said to them?

[User] Well, I followed what was the rationale I could guess, get out of Time magazine. I subscribed to Time or my folks did for me for the two years, and it was my first experience with censorship. I didn't ever receive a Time that didn't have either pages ripped out or marked out in big black letter or anything that said about the Vietnam or protests of the Vietnam War. And so I had a.

[Assistant] Who was doing the censoring?

[User] The Korean government. The post office, people in the post office. Korean government.

[Assistant] Didn't want to have anybody know there were protests against the Vietnam War?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, I followed what was the rationale I could guess, get out of Time magazine. I subscribed to Time or my folks did for me for the two years, and it was my first experience with censorship. I didn't ever receive a Time that didn't have either pages ripped out or marked out in big black letter or anything that said about the Vietnam or protests of the Vietnam War. And so I had a.

[Assistant] Who was doing the censoring?

[User] The Korean government. The post office, people in the post office. Korean government.

[Assistant] Didn't want to have anybody know there were protests against the Vietnam War?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] And why is, I'm sorry, why did Korea not want to let people know about protests?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] The Korean government. The post office, people in the post office. Korean government.

[Assistant] Didn't want to have anybody know there were protests against the Vietnam War?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] And why is, I'm sorry, why did Korea not want to let people know about protests?

[User] Uh.

[Assistant] What's the connection? I don't know what's the connection between Korea and the Vietnam War.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It starts at the bust line and runs right down and then you have a top over the top of it. And, uh, and I just thought that was a curious thing. But that's part of understanding that, that Korean sense is that we never go overseas. So Vietnam is the first time a Korean troop had been in a foreign country. But they were paid a tremendous amount of money. I mean, that, that's what built the army for, for South Korea was all this extra. The soldiers still got less than $12 a month out of that $115.

[Assistant] $115 a month?

[User] Yeah. The U.S. paid for a Korean soldier. Or it's $117.

[Assistant] Something like that.

[User] Yeah. I mean, it was just.

[Assistant] A tremendous amount of money.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah. The U.S. paid for a Korean soldier. Or it's $117.

[Assistant] Something like that.

[User] Yeah. I mean, it was just.

[Assistant] A tremendous amount of money.

[User] Yeah. 90 percent of the money went into the coffers of the army.

[Assistant] Wow. So. So what is it that you actually were doing in the training institute? What?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah. I mean, it was just.

[Assistant] A tremendous amount of money.

[User] Yeah. 90 percent of the money went into the coffers of the army.

[Assistant] Wow. So. So what is it that you actually were doing in the training institute? What?

[User] Good question. I couldn't tell you at the end of two years what I was actually, you know. My official assignment was I sat in a room with six people that they hope would go overseas and get doctorates. Now, one of the six already had a doctorate from France in public administration. But he was kind of, he was my assigned mentor. And he was the one that found the Songs' house. There's two great stories there, or one great story. With what Peace Corps Korea said is whatever school you're assigned, you have to find a family to live with. So when they went to COTI, they told them that. And the director's wife said, we can't, we can't take an American because we don't have a throne toilet. We have a ceramic pit toilet, and which is very rare, I mean, because it really was nice, a very fancy sort of thing.

[Assistant] A fancy pit toilet?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, yeah. She was just a couple of years younger. I was 25. She was 22.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And then the next year, Il, the son. We spent a lot of time together. Almost every night I would come up, because you'd be home by at least 10:00, 10:30 because the curfew. But Mrs. Song, and it really wasn't, she kept her name. In Korea you don't take the man's name, but anyway, so she would bring. I always called her Mrs. Song. So she, she would bring up colas and like pears or some other fruit or something. And Il and I would talk for one or two hours.

[Assistant] Hmm.

[User] And so we really got, I mean, I noticed between the time I left his English was, he could go anywhere and be in a fluent, follow a conversation, where at the beginning we really struggled and but that.

[Assistant] All of this was in English?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, you talk about eight years.

[Assistant] Eight years?

[User] It's post, post Korean War. And then Houk never did get married.

[Assistant] Mm hmm.

[User] And she was the professor. And Young-Ja also.

[Assistant] And taught where, in Seoul?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] And she was the professor. And Young-Ja also.

[Assistant] And taught where, in Seoul?

[User] In Korea.

[Assistant] In Korea.

[User] She was head of the drama department in Korea and she has. She did a Hamlet production that was really fantastic. So she also wrote books of poetry.

[Assistant] Are you still in touch with her?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] In Korea.

[Assistant] In Korea.

[User] She was head of the drama department in Korea and she has. She did a Hamlet production that was really fantastic. So she also wrote books of poetry.

[Assistant] Are you still in touch with her?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Oh, great. That's excellent.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] She was head of the drama department in Korea and she has. She did a Hamlet production that was really fantastic. So she also wrote books of poetry.

[Assistant] Are you still in touch with her?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Oh, great. That's excellent.

[User] So both Houk and Il, you know. And what's interesting is they're both singular names. Like the others would be Young-Ja, but they both had a single name. So you don't find that very often in Korea for the first name, it's generally it's a hyphenated name.

[Assistant] Oh. That's significant?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I mean, he had that power to. First he had, he asked me to arrange a thing with Kissinger, and I had no idea how to do that. He said, I'll do it myself. So, so he did, because it was easier in one sense. Kissinger wouldn't responded to me, but would respond. But, but he then became nationally famous in Korea so.

[Assistant] Very successful.

[User] Very successful. Both of them are successes. And so I look at that as a family thing is that, the first thing. The second thing I wanted to talk about is my relationship to growing up in North Bend was part of Peace Corps. Um. I was depressed a little bit the first couple of weeks on the job because this was a no job, sitting in an office, just chatting with people from, telling them what was in Time magazine. And, you know, just like the image of huts and villages of the world just wasn't working that way.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User]
One was we were supposed to dress the way our colleagues did, which meant I had to have tailor made suits. And I mean, here's this kid from Oregon that's never had a tailor made a suit in his life and hasn't since. But I had to go to Korea and get tailor made suits. The first suit I had, the guy said something and he goes like this. And I figured it was with my pants. And he used the word whether it was, what do you want for your fly? Do you want buttons or a zipper? And I didn't know enough Korean to know the difference between the two. And I said, I just wanted to respond, I got buttons on my pants. And I thought, well, that's my grandfather. And because I had diarrhea a lot, the buttons were often a barrier, that I would be swearing to myself.

But those two suits lasted me until 1988. I mean, at least I was the same size, didn't have to deal with that. They were really well done. I had to get tailor made shoes. I mean, this is just.

[Assistant] And why was it tailor made, because mass production wasn't good?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] And so, so when we went there, we had already met her and her husband. Anyway, the other daughter, Sugi, and this daughter, they went together and they arranged to have Kathy and I go down to Jeju-do, which is the island south, off of South Korea, and which is. And we spent three days there. And Il sent two of his students to go down and rent a car and drive us around. And so but they paid for our flight down, the daughters did, at Thanksgiving. Now, Kathy and I made a book for both Houk and Il, a photo book of some of my photos. Well, the interesting thing was when the daughters, Il's daughters, saw that, they had never seen a picture of their mom and dad before they were married.

[Assistant] Oh.

[User] And here they were, you know, drinking and eating and, you know, up in my bedroom, we had always sort of did our stuff. This is amazing. This is mom and dad when they were, before they were married. Wow. Wow.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] They thought that was really cool. And we had a picture of a nephew that I got to meet and I went to a poetry reading. So we just had a wonderful two weeks in Korea.

[Assistant] So clearly the two families are joined.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] And here they were, you know, drinking and eating and, you know, up in my bedroom, we had always sort of did our stuff. This is amazing. This is mom and dad when they were, before they were married. Wow. Wow.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] They thought that was really cool. And we had a picture of a nephew that I got to meet and I went to a poetry reading. So we just had a wonderful two weeks in Korea.

[Assistant] So clearly the two families are joined.

[User] Two families are joined and that to me is a significant part of my tour. Now, the other year, I said two years. I want to go back to my other. The second year, Dr. Pak got me working with the committee in Korea that works on ports and harbors and commerce and harbors in Korea and dredging of harbors and, uh. And so if you feel that, I grew up in Coos, on Coos Bay, which is the largest port between San Francisco and Seattle, but there's a port there.

[Assistant] And what were you doing with them?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User]
But anyway, I got to spend several days with her, and I just thought that was wonderful. And my dad got back there. So again, there were three of us that, at the beginning of Peace Corps. We had had our time, wonderful time at the World's Fair together, which then had double significance. But they flew me back for that, and I made the arrangements because we had her cremated. We had a service in New York at the church she went to, and then I made arrangements. My folks went back and then I knew that they couldn't fly back with her ashes emotionally. So I made this crazy idea, I had to meet a lawyer or something, and which was my friends were lawyers. My friend in the Peace Corps was a really good lawyer.

And so I did that. And when we got to my house, I picked Jan, my first wife. We were engaged. She had, she'd actually come over in the midterm and we'd had a Korean engagement ceremony.

[Assistant] Hmm.

[User] Korean clothes.

[Assistant] Oh.

[User] Korean toasts, a whole thing, like my Korean family sponsored the engagement ceremony. So, um, it just is an important part of my life that we really like intertwined. You know, my engagement party to Jan was done by my Korean family. So that was, so we had a Korean engagement party. So I met Jan in Portland, Oregon, and drove the 4 hours down and we actually stopped and saw Ken's parents and had lunch in Eugene, Oregon. We got to my, uh, my mom walked out of the house and walked out to our car and said, we're going to the, your dad's in critical condition. So I got another two week family emergency leave because my dad almost died that night. But they operated for 5 hours, took out 12 pounds of his lower intestine. And so that gave me another. So I was gone actually a month on this trip and, uh, so that that made it really a different sort of experience for me.

[Assistant] And then you went back?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Which was fine. I just had, I was able to take advantage of the friendliness of Korean people to be able to do that. I have other really.

[Assistant] Okay.

[User] The big question is, what did it do for your life?

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And, um.

[Assistant] I was about to ask that.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] The big question is, what did it do for your life?

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And, um.

[Assistant] I was about to ask that.

[User]
Well, the personal side, you've already seen because Houk and Il became part of my family and she actually visited my, came back and visited my parents before they died when they were both in a nursing home. And I have always greatly appreciated that. But she appreciated what they did for her. They took her on family vacations for four years, so she got Pacific Northwest because they'd go out and they were retired. They didn't have any time restrictions, so they could just, they'd take her around to meet people, that my mother had a lot of friends all over sort of thing. So that was just a really great impact.

Professionally, um, I came back and immediately started my doctorate. I taught for a year at Central Washington for another year and got married in that period of time and then did my doctorate at the University of Oregon. And my doctorate with, focused on training high school teachers. Again, missing, still mad that I didn't get to go to Tonga. But by this time, the family stuff and my personal contacts were such that, so what?

[Assistant] Yeah, right, exactly.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] And so that was just a really. And so we talked for 45 minutes and then I left. And then I found out why some other people got told because I was wearing a London Fog, which is what the Social Security inspectors wear when they come up. And they're trying to catch people that are claiming too many kids. They have a feeling that one, one or three, you know, that a five year old or a six year old might be credited to seven or eight huts. And they had been trying, they were in '69 were trying to figure that out. And they figured that I had integrated that, the Peace Corps thing. But people had said, there's this guy out there and they said, well, we think you got a person. And they looked out. And then I'd walk by and they'd say, oh, no, that's Don Boileau, he's part of our group.

[Assistant] So how did you find that out?

[User] From other volunteers because they came up to me and said, I heard about you. People would tell them that they thought that they weren't quite trustworthy, that Peace Corps was trying to let this.

[Assistant] Non-verbal communication.

[User] Non-verbal communication with them. So it was a, to me it was just a really interesting. And then I didn't mind, but boy was I cold all day long. It was just, the wind was up there and it was something else.

[Assistant] So. So one more question before we end. So you've talked about the impact on you and your family. You've talked about the impact of Peace Corps on Korea, English, as well as friendships. What do you think has been the impact of Peace Corps on the United States, or has there been any?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I'm on the board. You just kind of do those things. And I look at, Peace Corps is verified. It's not that what we've changed the world like we thought we were going to do to help the huts and villages. It's that we changed the world by coming back and, and doing things and, uh, I. Saturday night at a party, I met a couple that were Peace Corps volunteers in Nigeria, and they spent 51 years in Saint Croix helping them try to develop economically, as economic advisers. But they'll tell you the same thing that I just said, that it's what they did when they came back. Saint Croix is part of the Virgin Islands, you know, that are part of the U.S.

[Assistant] Mm hmm.

[User] And so you just do those things.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And some are more direct, you know, like Phil with his camps and stuff that have a really direct, some are indirect like myself. But it's, but it's your whole lifetime of being able to, to do that.

[Assistant] That's great. So thank you.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes, and they were all extremely competent people.

[Assistant] During these two positions, the schedule of flights was pretty intense.

[User] Yes, it was. They were all different.

[Assistant] Can you share with us about how you were able to be debriefing one, doing one, and planning the other ones? And with all the payloads being different, you also brought in another Shuttle on board, on flights?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Give us an idea of what all was going on and how you were able manage all of that at one time.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It didn’t change. Everybody said we were we’re operational, and it was never that. People kept declaring we’re operational, but we were doing the same flight readiness reviews, all the analysis, and continuing to test at Stennis. Really nothing changed. We didn’t reduce manpower because we recognized this vehicle was so complex, we have got to stay on top of it. So we never changed that as long as I was on the program. It was just extremely challenging, and we recognized that. There was no difference operationally that I ever recall. We looked at ways to improve processing at the Cape [Canaveral, Florida] reducing the timelines, and as I recall there really wasn’t a lot we were able to do.

[Assistant] Did you provide any assistance at the Cape for launch? Was that one of your responsibilities?

[User] On the SSME, I was always in the Huntsville Operations Support Center and not at the Cape. We were monitoring all the information from consoles and the chief engineer was at the Cape. On the SRB, I was monitoring the consoles in the Launch Control Center (LCC).

[Assistant] We haven’t heard about this Huntsville Operations Support Center before. Can you tell us about that?

[User] We had all the consoles set up, monitoring all the systems: the tank, the engine, the boosters. We had a large support group in this Huntsville Operations Support Center that was monitoring what was happening at the Cape. We’d have a planeload of people fly to the Cape and be there at the consoles, but we had the support group in Huntsville. Contractors were tied in during the missions and doing their own monitoring. We had a very elaborate system monitoring the vehicle during the launch.

[Assistant] Did you ever do any sort of sims [simulations] like they might do at Mission Control?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] They did have more of a, they had a devotion and, you know, wanted to serve, but maybe not quite as gung-ho I found as the people that I met recently at the, uh, who had served in the early to mid sixties, I think.

[Assistant] So some of that may change over time as well as they tell their stories. So I think it was a total, being from the sixties, let me tell you, people wanted to see the world. They wanted to escape Vietnam. There were many reasons people joined, including not liking whatever they were studying and trying to do a reset.

[User] And of course, when you've only got two to 300 of the 220,000 volunteers, you've got the really enthusiastic people who come to the national meeting. And many of them seem to come every year or many years when they can. So it isn't probably everybody.

[Assistant] Don't feel bad.

[User] A good sampling. No, I don't. I didn't, I didn't feel bad about it. I just, I think most of us and some of them had actually done a program, a teaching program, ahead of time and had planned to do it. So I think most of us really, really wanted to work hard and things. But I think coming in, I was too young, but coming in in the sixties would have been interesting. And, you know, with the Kennedy development of the program and his speeches about what we were going to do, I think you really probably came in a little more, more gung ho. And by the seventies, it was kind of there, I won't say passé, but a little bit more of a, just an important thing to do, but maybe not quite as changing overall that Kennedy had sold.

[Assistant] OK. But you were still inspired by him.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] And of course, when you've only got two to 300 of the 220,000 volunteers, you've got the really enthusiastic people who come to the national meeting. And many of them seem to come every year or many years when they can. So it isn't probably everybody.

[Assistant] Don't feel bad.

[User] A good sampling. No, I don't. I didn't, I didn't feel bad about it. I just, I think most of us and some of them had actually done a program, a teaching program, ahead of time and had planned to do it. So I think most of us really, really wanted to work hard and things. But I think coming in, I was too young, but coming in in the sixties would have been interesting. And, you know, with the Kennedy development of the program and his speeches about what we were going to do, I think you really probably came in a little more, more gung ho. And by the seventies, it was kind of there, I won't say passé, but a little bit more of a, just an important thing to do, but maybe not quite as changing overall that Kennedy had sold.

[Assistant] OK. But you were still inspired by him.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So how old were you when you were, when you went in?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] A good sampling. No, I don't. I didn't, I didn't feel bad about it. I just, I think most of us and some of them had actually done a program, a teaching program, ahead of time and had planned to do it. So I think most of us really, really wanted to work hard and things. But I think coming in, I was too young, but coming in in the sixties would have been interesting. And, you know, with the Kennedy development of the program and his speeches about what we were going to do, I think you really probably came in a little more, more gung ho. And by the seventies, it was kind of there, I won't say passé, but a little bit more of a, just an important thing to do, but maybe not quite as changing overall that Kennedy had sold.

[Assistant] OK. But you were still inspired by him.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So how old were you when you were, when you went in?

[User] Good question. I was. I just turned 26, I believe, and I was out by 28. And at the time I was 28, I did two years.

[Assistant] And where did you grow up?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So how old were you when you were, when you went in?

[User] Good question. I was. I just turned 26, I believe, and I was out by 28. And at the time I was 28, I did two years.

[Assistant] And where did you grow up?

[User] I grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Went to school, went to college at Purdue. The Indiana Purdue campus in Fort Wayne for three years, went to the main campus for one year, then went to graduate school at the University of Wisconsin in Madison for three years.

[Assistant] So definitely Midwest. Had you traveled at all?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Good question. I was. I just turned 26, I believe, and I was out by 28. And at the time I was 28, I did two years.

[Assistant] And where did you grow up?

[User] I grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Went to school, went to college at Purdue. The Indiana Purdue campus in Fort Wayne for three years, went to the main campus for one year, then went to graduate school at the University of Wisconsin in Madison for three years.

[Assistant] So definitely Midwest. Had you traveled at all?

[User] Not a lot. I'd been to Montreal for the World's Fair, been to Florida with my parents to see my uncle. Went to New York on the way back from Montreal. But, you know.

[Assistant] No international travel.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Went to school, went to college at Purdue. The Indiana Purdue campus in Fort Wayne for three years, went to the main campus for one year, then went to graduate school at the University of Wisconsin in Madison for three years.

[Assistant] So definitely Midwest. Had you traveled at all?

[User] Not a lot. I'd been to Montreal for the World's Fair, been to Florida with my parents to see my uncle. Went to New York on the way back from Montreal. But, you know.

[Assistant] No international travel.

[User] Didn't see the world.

[Assistant] And Montreal's international.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Didn't see the world.

[Assistant] And Montreal's international.

[User] Actually during graduate school, we took a road trip to the Grand Canyon. So I'd never been, other than Canada, I'd never been out of the country. In fact, this is kind of off the topic, but I think it was kind of interesting when I went to Canada. It was, and now it's so much different than nowadays. I had never really met somebody that didn't speak English as a primary or secondary language, and really there were probably others, but I can remember only one. And we had an exchange student when I was in grade school who was from a foreign country. I mean, in Fort Wayne, there probably just weren't that many, many foreigners. Now, you can go anywhere in small towns in Minnesota and, you know, you go to a grocery store and some are speaking Spanish, some are speaking German. It's, it's, it's, uh.

[Assistant] Very different.

[User] Amazing change.

[Assistant] So that's all part of it. What did your parents think about your joining the Peace Corps, your friends?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Actually during graduate school, we took a road trip to the Grand Canyon. So I'd never been, other than Canada, I'd never been out of the country. In fact, this is kind of off the topic, but I think it was kind of interesting when I went to Canada. It was, and now it's so much different than nowadays. I had never really met somebody that didn't speak English as a primary or secondary language, and really there were probably others, but I can remember only one. And we had an exchange student when I was in grade school who was from a foreign country. I mean, in Fort Wayne, there probably just weren't that many, many foreigners. Now, you can go anywhere in small towns in Minnesota and, you know, you go to a grocery store and some are speaking Spanish, some are speaking German. It's, it's, it's, uh.

[Assistant] Very different.

[User] Amazing change.

[Assistant] So that's all part of it. What did your parents think about your joining the Peace Corps, your friends?

[User] Hmm. My dad thought I should go to work and get a job and prepare for retirement. Maybe in retrospect, he was right. And my mother. I had had a lot of illnesses when I was young between almost kindergarten through high school. I had had a lot of pulmonary lung and lung problems and had missed almost half of my freshman year of high school with pneumonia and a kidney infection. Finally, the doctor, after I got pneumonia the second time, the doctor said stay home until it gets warm. So my mother thought I was going to get sick. Although through from college, you know, from freshman year of college on, I didn't really, wasn't really ill. My health had kind of turned around. I'd had every illness I think that was possible. So I was immune to a lot of things. And so she was worried that I'd get sick and die.

[Assistant] It's a good thing for a mother to worry about.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Amazing change.

[Assistant] So that's all part of it. What did your parents think about your joining the Peace Corps, your friends?

[User] Hmm. My dad thought I should go to work and get a job and prepare for retirement. Maybe in retrospect, he was right. And my mother. I had had a lot of illnesses when I was young between almost kindergarten through high school. I had had a lot of pulmonary lung and lung problems and had missed almost half of my freshman year of high school with pneumonia and a kidney infection. Finally, the doctor, after I got pneumonia the second time, the doctor said stay home until it gets warm. So my mother thought I was going to get sick. Although through from college, you know, from freshman year of college on, I didn't really, wasn't really ill. My health had kind of turned around. I'd had every illness I think that was possible. So I was immune to a lot of things. And so she was worried that I'd get sick and die.

[Assistant] It's a good thing for a mother to worry about.

[User] Yeah, well, she was worried. As it turned out, I made it through most of the time. I think the worst thing I had was I think I got food poisoning one time at one of the better restaurants in Ghana. I ate off the street and things, but then never got sick. But ate at a good Chinese restaurant and I got sick, so I don't know whether I had probably a food poisoning from pork or something that I had.

[Assistant] So we'll get, we'll get to that later.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Hmm. My dad thought I should go to work and get a job and prepare for retirement. Maybe in retrospect, he was right. And my mother. I had had a lot of illnesses when I was young between almost kindergarten through high school. I had had a lot of pulmonary lung and lung problems and had missed almost half of my freshman year of high school with pneumonia and a kidney infection. Finally, the doctor, after I got pneumonia the second time, the doctor said stay home until it gets warm. So my mother thought I was going to get sick. Although through from college, you know, from freshman year of college on, I didn't really, wasn't really ill. My health had kind of turned around. I'd had every illness I think that was possible. So I was immune to a lot of things. And so she was worried that I'd get sick and die.

[Assistant] It's a good thing for a mother to worry about.

[User] Yeah, well, she was worried. As it turned out, I made it through most of the time. I think the worst thing I had was I think I got food poisoning one time at one of the better restaurants in Ghana. I ate off the street and things, but then never got sick. But ate at a good Chinese restaurant and I got sick, so I don't know whether I had probably a food poisoning from pork or something that I had.

[Assistant] So we'll get, we'll get to that later.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So you applied. How did you even know about the Peace Corps?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, well, she was worried. As it turned out, I made it through most of the time. I think the worst thing I had was I think I got food poisoning one time at one of the better restaurants in Ghana. I ate off the street and things, but then never got sick. But ate at a good Chinese restaurant and I got sick, so I don't know whether I had probably a food poisoning from pork or something that I had.

[Assistant] So we'll get, we'll get to that later.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So you applied. How did you even know about the Peace Corps?

[User] Good question. That I'm having a hard time, you know, I just.

[Assistant] You just knew.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] So you applied. How did you even know about the Peace Corps?

[User] Good question. That I'm having a hard time, you know, I just.

[Assistant] You just knew.

[User] I just heard about it, I mean, there was so much out from the Kennedy.

[Assistant] There wasn't a recruiter who recruited you?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Good question. That I'm having a hard time, you know, I just.

[Assistant] You just knew.

[User] I just heard about it, I mean, there was so much out from the Kennedy.

[Assistant] There wasn't a recruiter who recruited you?

[User] I don't think I ever met a recruiter. I just, you know, wrote for probably an application, filled out the application, and didn't know if I was going to get called.

[Assistant] How long did it take for you to hear back? Was it a long time?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I just heard about it, I mean, there was so much out from the Kennedy.

[Assistant] There wasn't a recruiter who recruited you?

[User] I don't think I ever met a recruiter. I just, you know, wrote for probably an application, filled out the application, and didn't know if I was going to get called.

[Assistant] How long did it take for you to hear back? Was it a long time?

[User] I don't. I would think I applied in like February and found out in like April of the year.

[Assistant] Oh, so it was pretty fast.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I don't think I ever met a recruiter. I just, you know, wrote for probably an application, filled out the application, and didn't know if I was going to get called.

[Assistant] How long did it take for you to hear back? Was it a long time?

[User] I don't. I would think I applied in like February and found out in like April of the year.

[Assistant] Oh, so it was pretty fast.

[User] It wasn't too long. They needed science teachers. And I was a chemistry teacher and could teach math.

[Assistant] So did you apply for a specific part of the world?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I don't. I would think I applied in like February and found out in like April of the year.

[Assistant] Oh, so it was pretty fast.

[User] It wasn't too long. They needed science teachers. And I was a chemistry teacher and could teach math.

[Assistant] So did you apply for a specific part of the world?

[User] That was just, we were talking about this this morning on our way up and before you came. And I guess I put in places, but I really didn't know much. I think I put in like South America first, which probably wasn't a good choice for me. I may have thrown in Africa as a secondary choice, but it was, you know, in the end, I realized it was more logical to send me to a place like Ghana, which was English speaking, and where I could teach chemistry easily. It would not have been easy in a Spanish speaking country.

[Assistant] So you applied to be a teacher and a chemist?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It wasn't too long. They needed science teachers. And I was a chemistry teacher and could teach math.

[Assistant] So did you apply for a specific part of the world?

[User] That was just, we were talking about this this morning on our way up and before you came. And I guess I put in places, but I really didn't know much. I think I put in like South America first, which probably wasn't a good choice for me. I may have thrown in Africa as a secondary choice, but it was, you know, in the end, I realized it was more logical to send me to a place like Ghana, which was English speaking, and where I could teach chemistry easily. It would not have been easy in a Spanish speaking country.

[Assistant] So you applied to be a teacher and a chemist?

[User] Yeah, I believe my main interest was in teaching so.

[Assistant] OK, so you got the letter and then where did you have your training?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] That was just, we were talking about this this morning on our way up and before you came. And I guess I put in places, but I really didn't know much. I think I put in like South America first, which probably wasn't a good choice for me. I may have thrown in Africa as a secondary choice, but it was, you know, in the end, I realized it was more logical to send me to a place like Ghana, which was English speaking, and where I could teach chemistry easily. It would not have been easy in a Spanish speaking country.

[Assistant] So you applied to be a teacher and a chemist?

[User] Yeah, I believe my main interest was in teaching so.

[Assistant] OK, so you got the letter and then where did you have your training?

[User] We went to Philadelphia for about three days, and then there were people from four countries I think. Maybe it was, I know it was Ghana, Togo, and maybe Dahomey, which is, there are two very thin countries next to Ghana, between Ghana and Nigeria. And then the others went to Uganda, flew off to Uganda afterwards. There might have been another East African country that they went to.

[Assistant] So it was really just getting shots and things like that.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] We went to Philadelphia for about three days, and then there were people from four countries I think. Maybe it was, I know it was Ghana, Togo, and maybe Dahomey, which is, there are two very thin countries next to Ghana, between Ghana and Nigeria. And then the others went to Uganda, flew off to Uganda afterwards. There might have been another East African country that they went to.

[Assistant] So it was really just getting shots and things like that.

[User] Yeah, then we did our training basically in country. Went to, uh, about, after our first thing we went, I think we went out to a relatively small village and did some language training.

[Assistant] In country?

[User] In country.

[Assistant] So you met in Philadelphia, you were there three or four days, and then you flew off.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, then we did our training basically in country. Went to, uh, about, after our first thing we went, I think we went out to a relatively small village and did some language training.

[Assistant] In country?

[User] In country.

[Assistant] So you met in Philadelphia, you were there three or four days, and then you flew off.

[User] Flew off.

[Assistant] How big was your group?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] In country.

[Assistant] So you met in Philadelphia, you were there three or four days, and then you flew off.

[User] Flew off.

[Assistant] How big was your group?

[User] There were well over 200 going to all the countries.

[Assistant] So all the countries.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Flew off.

[Assistant] How big was your group?

[User] There were well over 200 going to all the countries.

[Assistant] So all the countries.

[User] I would say, and I really don't know, 60 to 80 maybe in Ghana, a lot of them teachers. Ghana needed teachers at that time. In fact, Ghana was the very first country. There's some argument, but Ghana was a very first country to, I think, have volunteers in the country. Several people are fighting over who was, uh, who was the first. I believe the Philippines was maybe the first to sign the document. And Ghana was the first to have volunteers.

[Assistant] And then there are some people that say Nigeria as well. So maybe they were all at the same time.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] There were well over 200 going to all the countries.

[Assistant] So all the countries.

[User] I would say, and I really don't know, 60 to 80 maybe in Ghana, a lot of them teachers. Ghana needed teachers at that time. In fact, Ghana was the very first country. There's some argument, but Ghana was a very first country to, I think, have volunteers in the country. Several people are fighting over who was, uh, who was the first. I believe the Philippines was maybe the first to sign the document. And Ghana was the first to have volunteers.

[Assistant] And then there are some people that say Nigeria as well. So maybe they were all at the same time.

[User] Yeah, they, in '62, I believe, '61, '62, they went to several different places and I don't know. I think boots on the ground they were in Ghana first, but other people did some training in the United States before the Ghana thing started. So it gets to be kind of.

[Assistant] So you had been on a plane before because you had gone to Montreal?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I would say, and I really don't know, 60 to 80 maybe in Ghana, a lot of them teachers. Ghana needed teachers at that time. In fact, Ghana was the very first country. There's some argument, but Ghana was a very first country to, I think, have volunteers in the country. Several people are fighting over who was, uh, who was the first. I believe the Philippines was maybe the first to sign the document. And Ghana was the first to have volunteers.

[Assistant] And then there are some people that say Nigeria as well. So maybe they were all at the same time.

[User] Yeah, they, in '62, I believe, '61, '62, they went to several different places and I don't know. I think boots on the ground they were in Ghana first, but other people did some training in the United States before the Ghana thing started. So it gets to be kind of.

[Assistant] So you had been on a plane before because you had gone to Montreal?

[User] Yeah. Well, Montreal. Had ever been on a plane?

[Assistant] Well, maybe you hadn't.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, they, in '62, I believe, '61, '62, they went to several different places and I don't know. I think boots on the ground they were in Ghana first, but other people did some training in the United States before the Ghana thing started. So it gets to be kind of.

[Assistant] So you had been on a plane before because you had gone to Montreal?

[User] Yeah. Well, Montreal. Had ever been on a plane?

[Assistant] Well, maybe you hadn't.

[User] Yeah, I'd been on a plane to Montreal. I don't know if I'd ever done any other flying. Maybe once or twice.

[Assistant] So you flew from Philadelphia to somewhere in Europe, I assume. And then?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah. Well, Montreal. Had ever been on a plane?

[Assistant] Well, maybe you hadn't.

[User] Yeah, I'd been on a plane to Montreal. I don't know if I'd ever done any other flying. Maybe once or twice.

[Assistant] So you flew from Philadelphia to somewhere in Europe, I assume. And then?

[User] No, we flew to the Canary Islands.

[Assistant] Oh, to the Canary Islands.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, I'd been on a plane to Montreal. I don't know if I'd ever done any other flying. Maybe once or twice.

[Assistant] So you flew from Philadelphia to somewhere in Europe, I assume. And then?

[User] No, we flew to the Canary Islands.

[Assistant] Oh, to the Canary Islands.

[User] So that was our stop, I guess, gas up spot. And then we flew to Ghana from there.

[Assistant] And what was your impression when you got off the plane?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] No, we flew to the Canary Islands.

[Assistant] Oh, to the Canary Islands.

[User] So that was our stop, I guess, gas up spot. And then we flew to Ghana from there.

[Assistant] And what was your impression when you got off the plane?

[User] Well, we were in the airport first. And, you know, a lot of, a lot of people there.

[Assistant] Did it look like the Philadelphia airport?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, we were in the airport first. And, you know, a lot of, a lot of people there.

[Assistant] Did it look like the Philadelphia airport?

[User] At first they didn't want to let us in because we hadn't had all our shots. But they, the staff, the in-country staff, managed to get us through and we got additional shots the next morning. So they kind of cut corners a little bit. Um, Accra was a fairly big airport, but nothing like Philadelphia maybe. I'm from Fort Wayne, Indiana, maybe somewhere between Fort Wayne and Philadelphia. Nothing like a huge airport like Philadelphia.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] But, uh, not in those days, although it's gotten bigger now.

[Assistant] So you all hopped on a bus and then you went to this training site. Is that how it worked?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] At first they didn't want to let us in because we hadn't had all our shots. But they, the staff, the in-country staff, managed to get us through and we got additional shots the next morning. So they kind of cut corners a little bit. Um, Accra was a fairly big airport, but nothing like Philadelphia maybe. I'm from Fort Wayne, Indiana, maybe somewhere between Fort Wayne and Philadelphia. Nothing like a huge airport like Philadelphia.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] But, uh, not in those days, although it's gotten bigger now.

[Assistant] So you all hopped on a bus and then you went to this training site. Is that how it worked?

[User] Yeah, I guess. I guess we got there on a bus. And then what was interesting is the people, and this was the middle of the night, we got started late at about 2:00 and then we didn't get there until pretty late in the evening. I don't even remember what time. But then the poor people who went to Togo had to hop on another bus and go, I don't know, another hour or two to Togo. So it was a challenge. I was glad I was getting Ghana.

[Assistant] OK. And what kind of training site was this? Was it a college or do you know? But was it in the, it wasn't in Accra?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, I guess. I guess we got there on a bus. And then what was interesting is the people, and this was the middle of the night, we got started late at about 2:00 and then we didn't get there until pretty late in the evening. I don't even remember what time. But then the poor people who went to Togo had to hop on another bus and go, I don't know, another hour or two to Togo. So it was a challenge. I was glad I was getting Ghana.

[Assistant] OK. And what kind of training site was this? Was it a college or do you know? But was it in the, it wasn't in Accra?

[User] Yeah, I think it was near Accra. But I don't really. We weren't there very long. We were only there a couple of days. I don't know.

[Assistant] Oh really?

[User] You know, that part of it, I don't. I can't recall.

[Assistant] OK, so what happened? So what happened in this training site? Language instruction?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] But I can't. But we were there and then we were in maybe, maybe school dormitories. I guess they're out of school during the summer. And there were at least two guys and one girl. And it wasn't really all that near the place. And I'm just trying to think. The girl went up north where, but if we all learned the language of Twi, which is T-W- I, and I don't learn. I'm very good at writing languages, but I'm not very good at, uh.

[Assistant] Speaking?

[User]
At speaking them, which got me through well in high school Latin where we didn't have to speak it much, but it was tough. It was tough for me. So anyway, mostly language training. We had Ghanaian trainers who got us oriented to the culture and things and people in town and a little bit. I particularly met a boy who was, I can't think of his name. Michael. Michael Ageymang, I don't know how to spell it. A-G-E- Y-M-A-N-G, something like that. And he was crippled on crutches and things and we became kind of good friends, although I didn't follow up much with him afterwards, although he followed up with some of my sister's friends and things and managed to talk them into sending him watches and things of that nature. But that was okay. They liked it, I guess they enjoyed doing it and they had the money to do it.

So but anyway, that training lasted, oh, maybe four weeks. And then we went to a university, Cape Coast, which is a teaching, which a teacher's university, and did a little bit more of the orientation into what the teaching was going to be like. Although I can't remember learning a whole lot from that time.

[Assistant] Did you do practice teaching?

[User] Really not. I had, uh, I had been a teaching assistant at the University of Wisconsin teaching chemistry. So I, you know, I had a pretty good idea.

[Assistant] So you knew what you were doing.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Really not. I had, uh, I had been a teaching assistant at the University of Wisconsin teaching chemistry. So I, you know, I had a pretty good idea.

[Assistant] So you knew what you were doing.

[User]
Pretty good, as much as you, you know, I mean, you're usually following a professor's lead that's there and trying to guess what he's going to put on the test. So anything that happens in college. And so I wasn't too nervous about the teaching, although in, unlike the United States, you have to pass tests after you take so many years. And I was in a school that had both ordinary, which is sort of middle school, to high school. And then it had an advanced level, which is sort of a junior college. So you had five years of the middle high school, ordinary level, and you had two years of the advanced level. And after each of those, after the grade school actually, to get into the ordinary level, you have to take an exam. How you do determines whether you go back on the farm and use your machete, or whether you go on to ordinary school.

It also determines whether you get into a good ordinary school or not. After the ordinary five years, you take another test to get into the advanced level. And after the advanced level, you take a test to get into college. And these are very important tests. So it was a lot of, a lot of pressure on me, unlike in high schools, which are important here in the United States, but they don't test quite as well, although now there are, now a lot of these states are doing that.

[Assistant] But so were you teaching at the high school level? What level were you teaching?

[User] It kind of ran, it was a seven year program. It kind of ran from junior high, you know, like seventh, eighth grade, to high school.

[Assistant] Oh, that's where you were teaching. What was the name of the school?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It kind of ran, it was a seven year program. It kind of ran from junior high, you know, like seventh, eighth grade, to high school.

[Assistant] Oh, that's where you were teaching. What was the name of the school?

[User] St. Peter's. And the town was Nkwatia, N-K-W-A-T-I-A.

[Assistant] N-K-W.

[User] A-T-I-A. And it was in the Kwahu region. That's K-W-A-H-U. And it was a mission, actually a mission school run by the Divine Word Order. And the principal was a priest named Father. He was German named Father William Glossel, G-A.

[Assistant] Well, you can tell me that.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, all right, want me to tell you that later, after the thing?

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] All right. And the vice principal was an Irish layperson, meaning he wasn't a priest or.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] But so it was a mission school, which made it actually, not always the mission schools were this way, but a lot of times they were this way. It was away from the village, a mile away from our village. So in some ways the experience was good and it was a very good school and I had good students. In some ways it was not as good because a lot of my friends, you know, just had a house in the middle of the village and actually learned the language a lot better and got to live in a village.

[Assistant] Did you live at the school?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] All right. And the vice principal was an Irish layperson, meaning he wasn't a priest or.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] But so it was a mission school, which made it actually, not always the mission schools were this way, but a lot of times they were this way. It was away from the village, a mile away from our village. So in some ways the experience was good and it was a very good school and I had good students. In some ways it was not as good because a lot of my friends, you know, just had a house in the middle of the village and actually learned the language a lot better and got to live in a village.

[Assistant] Did you live at the school?

[User] I lived, yeah. They had houses at the school that we got. And so the first year I had a house alone and in the second year, two more volunteers came and we got a bigger house together so.

[Assistant] So were you the first Peace Corps volunteer there or had there been others before?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] But so it was a mission school, which made it actually, not always the mission schools were this way, but a lot of times they were this way. It was away from the village, a mile away from our village. So in some ways the experience was good and it was a very good school and I had good students. In some ways it was not as good because a lot of my friends, you know, just had a house in the middle of the village and actually learned the language a lot better and got to live in a village.

[Assistant] Did you live at the school?

[User] I lived, yeah. They had houses at the school that we got. And so the first year I had a house alone and in the second year, two more volunteers came and we got a bigger house together so.

[Assistant] So were you the first Peace Corps volunteer there or had there been others before?

[User] No, not at all. The person that who had been there the year before named Dennis White had a PhD in chemistry, and he was stolen, as they might say, by the University of Cape Coast. And he moved on there and then I took his place. In fact, the while I was at Cape Coast, the head of the chemistry department wanted to steal me too, because they needed teachers there, but they wouldn't let him steal me in addition, because I had a master's degree so looked good. But and there had been Peace Corps volunteers before.

[Assistant] So they were used to having Peace Corps volunteers?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I lived, yeah. They had houses at the school that we got. And so the first year I had a house alone and in the second year, two more volunteers came and we got a bigger house together so.

[Assistant] So were you the first Peace Corps volunteer there or had there been others before?

[User] No, not at all. The person that who had been there the year before named Dennis White had a PhD in chemistry, and he was stolen, as they might say, by the University of Cape Coast. And he moved on there and then I took his place. In fact, the while I was at Cape Coast, the head of the chemistry department wanted to steal me too, because they needed teachers there, but they wouldn't let him steal me in addition, because I had a master's degree so looked good. But and there had been Peace Corps volunteers before.

[Assistant] So they were used to having Peace Corps volunteers?

[User] They were used to having Peace Corps.

[Assistant] Did the other teachers speak English?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] They were used to having Peace Corps.

[Assistant] Did the other teachers speak English?

[User] Yes. It's a, I guess the official language is English. The, um, the language in. There's probably at least four or five languages in different parts of the country. So it, um. Educated, you know, students who had been to school spoke English although somewhat of a Ghanaian English. Use the word aluminum and they used a lot of British pronunciation and they, you know, had spellings and had some of their own, um.

[Assistant] Words.

[User] Words that were, you know, Ghanaian of origin. And they spoke with a little bit of a Ghanaian accent that you had to get used to.

[Assistant] But you basically got by on English.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yes. It's a, I guess the official language is English. The, um, the language in. There's probably at least four or five languages in different parts of the country. So it, um. Educated, you know, students who had been to school spoke English although somewhat of a Ghanaian English. Use the word aluminum and they used a lot of British pronunciation and they, you know, had spellings and had some of their own, um.

[Assistant] Words.

[User] Words that were, you know, Ghanaian of origin. And they spoke with a little bit of a Ghanaian accent that you had to get used to.

[Assistant] But you basically got by on English.

[User] Basically, no. Basically, by the time they were out of, um, out of elementary school, they were supposed to know English pretty well.

[Assistant] So how was your teaching experience in Ghana different than your teaching experience in the United States?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Words that were, you know, Ghanaian of origin. And they spoke with a little bit of a Ghanaian accent that you had to get used to.

[Assistant] But you basically got by on English.

[User] Basically, no. Basically, by the time they were out of, um, out of elementary school, they were supposed to know English pretty well.

[Assistant] So how was your teaching experience in Ghana different than your teaching experience in the United States?

[User] Well, I was only taught in college in the United States, and I only taught as a.

[Assistant] You were basically in middle school, right?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, I was only taught in college in the United States, and I only taught as a.

[Assistant] You were basically in middle school, right?

[User] Yeah. Well.

[Assistant] Advanced?

[User] I was all the way.

[Assistant] Oh, you did all of that.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah. Well.

[Assistant] Advanced?

[User] I was all the way.

[Assistant] Oh, you did all of that.

[User] All of it. I had been, I've done, um, from, this was like junior college. I did a little bit of first year. I did some third year. They threw me in in math because they were short on math teachers. I did third year math. I did. And then I took over. It's a five year program. I took over when I came fourth year chemistry and then the next year I did fifth year because that was when they were taking the exams. So I took the kids through that and then I did first year junior college or advanced level the first year, and then I did the second year to take them through the test the second year. And sometimes it'd be in a year I'd have, you know, I'd have 27 or 28, 40 minute periods or so because teachers didn't show up. They tried to avoid going. This was awful in the bushes. They all wanted to teach in the big cities. So they tried to avoid coming after their assignments. And so we'd start the year short on teachers and they'd throw you in.

[Assistant] So let's spend a little bit of time. So where, where were you? Which part of the country was this in?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I was all the way.

[Assistant] Oh, you did all of that.

[User] All of it. I had been, I've done, um, from, this was like junior college. I did a little bit of first year. I did some third year. They threw me in in math because they were short on math teachers. I did third year math. I did. And then I took over. It's a five year program. I took over when I came fourth year chemistry and then the next year I did fifth year because that was when they were taking the exams. So I took the kids through that and then I did first year junior college or advanced level the first year, and then I did the second year to take them through the test the second year. And sometimes it'd be in a year I'd have, you know, I'd have 27 or 28, 40 minute periods or so because teachers didn't show up. They tried to avoid going. This was awful in the bushes. They all wanted to teach in the big cities. So they tried to avoid coming after their assignments. And so we'd start the year short on teachers and they'd throw you in.

[Assistant] So let's spend a little bit of time. So where, where were you? Which part of the country was this in?

[User] Oh, I was in the. I was about probably 40 to 50 miles north of the capital, Accra, which is on the, uh, I've got to think direction, east end of the country, on the ocean. And I was north and a little bit east of Ghana, which I would say is in the far southwest of Accra. Which is in the far southwest of the country.

[Assistant] How big was the town?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I didn't really get a population figure.

[Assistant] No, but.

[User] I'd say.

[Assistant] Tiny?

[User] Relatively small, probably under probably 1,000 people or so.

[Assistant] And what was life like in 1972 in this small city, small town?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I'd say.

[Assistant] Tiny?

[User] Relatively small, probably under probably 1,000 people or so.

[Assistant] And what was life like in 1972 in this small city, small town?

[User] Well, as I say, I wasn't in the town. I was on the campus. I didn't. I had a nice cement house and a shower and.

[Assistant] Oh you did?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Relatively small, probably under probably 1,000 people or so.

[Assistant] And what was life like in 1972 in this small city, small town?

[User] Well, as I say, I wasn't in the town. I was on the campus. I didn't. I had a nice cement house and a shower and.

[Assistant] Oh you did?

[User] I had showers. And although I tended. We had, in a second house I had. I can't remember if I did in the first house. Second year we had, uh, maybe the first year too. We had a, we collected the water off the roof of the house and it went under the house and the second year I had about 6,000 gallon water tank of rainwater, basically. So the water was very hard, rusty. And so for showers, I used to warm it up and use a bucket for showers because the other water would make you feel dirtier than.

[Assistant] Yeah, yeah. So the first year, were there are other teachers, other Peace Corps there the first year?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] They had that feel. But I never asked, I thought it was none of my business. And while they were there, they had a daughter, and the British couple had about a five or six year old son. And then the French couple were young and were serving like they're doing their service much like the Peace Corps. I think they had to do service somewhere. So.

[Assistant] So was that your social group?

[User] Yeah, that was. I don't know if I've said this before, but that was kind of the difficulty of the school too. The administration considered you part of the overall staff. The staff kind of considered you a part of the administration because you're white. And so it was. Maybe it was me, but I think generally we tended to, tended to, you know, group together and didn't have strong relationships with the other staff other than on an academic, you know, point of view. We were pretty much together, although I was basically the only chemistry teacher. We had a biology, basically had a biology teacher. And although what, I guess we did have. I did have a second and we did have a second chemistry teacher. But a lot of times, you know, they went off to their house, they had families.

[Assistant] So you really didn't interact that much?

[User] Didn't interact too much.

[Assistant] Did you stay in touch with the British or Irish or French couples?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, that was. I don't know if I've said this before, but that was kind of the difficulty of the school too. The administration considered you part of the overall staff. The staff kind of considered you a part of the administration because you're white. And so it was. Maybe it was me, but I think generally we tended to, tended to, you know, group together and didn't have strong relationships with the other staff other than on an academic, you know, point of view. We were pretty much together, although I was basically the only chemistry teacher. We had a biology, basically had a biology teacher. And although what, I guess we did have. I did have a second and we did have a second chemistry teacher. But a lot of times, you know, they went off to their house, they had families.

[Assistant] So you really didn't interact that much?

[User] Didn't interact too much.

[Assistant] Did you stay in touch with the British or Irish or French couples?

[User] Well, actually, I visited the French and Irish couple on my way back, but didn't keep contact with them. I think a couple of times I wrote and I don't know, I can't remember whether they didn't write or write back or what but.

[Assistant] And what were your students like? Did you spend a lot of time with the students?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Didn't interact too much.

[Assistant] Did you stay in touch with the British or Irish or French couples?

[User] Well, actually, I visited the French and Irish couple on my way back, but didn't keep contact with them. I think a couple of times I wrote and I don't know, I can't remember whether they didn't write or write back or what but.

[Assistant] And what were your students like? Did you spend a lot of time with the students?

[User] Uh, yeah. I mean, there was a lot of work to be done. And they were. Actually it was one of the better, better schools and sometimes argued to be. I never sure whether it was true or not, but they argued they were the best school in the country and had the best scores in the country. So there was quite a bit of pressure by the school and the students themselves to do well. I had probably my best student in, um, who took the ordinary level exam. They used to say he came from a farm and, you know, really wanted to get ahead. He didn't want to go back to having to work every day. And they used to say that, some kids told me he had a flashlight and he used to, they were supposed to go to bed, you know, at 10:00, 9:00, 10:00. And he had a flashlight and used to study well into the night so. And he was very bright. Although surprisingly, the school scores on the exams were from 1 to 9. And I think surprisingly on chemistry, about half of my kids got ones. Half my kids got.

[Assistant] One is top or?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, actually, I visited the French and Irish couple on my way back, but didn't keep contact with them. I think a couple of times I wrote and I don't know, I can't remember whether they didn't write or write back or what but.

[Assistant] And what were your students like? Did you spend a lot of time with the students?

[User] Uh, yeah. I mean, there was a lot of work to be done. And they were. Actually it was one of the better, better schools and sometimes argued to be. I never sure whether it was true or not, but they argued they were the best school in the country and had the best scores in the country. So there was quite a bit of pressure by the school and the students themselves to do well. I had probably my best student in, um, who took the ordinary level exam. They used to say he came from a farm and, you know, really wanted to get ahead. He didn't want to go back to having to work every day. And they used to say that, some kids told me he had a flashlight and he used to, they were supposed to go to bed, you know, at 10:00, 9:00, 10:00. And he had a flashlight and used to study well into the night so. And he was very bright. Although surprisingly, the school scores on the exams were from 1 to 9. And I think surprisingly on chemistry, about half of my kids got ones. Half my kids got.

[Assistant] One is top or?

[User] One is top. One is top, and about half got a two. I think I had maybe a couple threes and a four. So they were very good students. And I think I saw, I think I got a list of scores. I think he might have gotten a two, which was surprising, but he was very good at math and everything. He was amazing. I wish I could remember his name. I may have my book, actually, but I'd like to find out what he.

[Assistant] What happened to him? Did he go to, did he go away to college while you were there?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Uh, yeah. I mean, there was a lot of work to be done. And they were. Actually it was one of the better, better schools and sometimes argued to be. I never sure whether it was true or not, but they argued they were the best school in the country and had the best scores in the country. So there was quite a bit of pressure by the school and the students themselves to do well. I had probably my best student in, um, who took the ordinary level exam. They used to say he came from a farm and, you know, really wanted to get ahead. He didn't want to go back to having to work every day. And they used to say that, some kids told me he had a flashlight and he used to, they were supposed to go to bed, you know, at 10:00, 9:00, 10:00. And he had a flashlight and used to study well into the night so. And he was very bright. Although surprisingly, the school scores on the exams were from 1 to 9. And I think surprisingly on chemistry, about half of my kids got ones. Half my kids got.

[Assistant] One is top or?

[User] One is top. One is top, and about half got a two. I think I had maybe a couple threes and a four. So they were very good students. And I think I saw, I think I got a list of scores. I think he might have gotten a two, which was surprising, but he was very good at math and everything. He was amazing. I wish I could remember his name. I may have my book, actually, but I'd like to find out what he.

[Assistant] What happened to him? Did he go to, did he go away to college while you were there?

[User] Well, no, because he was in the ordinary level. So he had to.

[Assistant] Oh, he had to still go up.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] One is top. One is top, and about half got a two. I think I had maybe a couple threes and a four. So they were very good students. And I think I saw, I think I got a list of scores. I think he might have gotten a two, which was surprising, but he was very good at math and everything. He was amazing. I wish I could remember his name. I may have my book, actually, but I'd like to find out what he.

[Assistant] What happened to him? Did he go to, did he go away to college while you were there?

[User] Well, no, because he was in the ordinary level. So he had to.

[Assistant] Oh, he had to still go up.

[User] He had to go on to the advanced level. Yeah. Some of my kids did go to college and a couple of them, I should have followed up more, but I got. I got busy and I feel bad, you know, I feel bad about that. I should have.

[Assistant] But did you travel while you were in Peace Corps?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Well, no, because he was in the ordinary level. So he had to.

[Assistant] Oh, he had to still go up.

[User] He had to go on to the advanced level. Yeah. Some of my kids did go to college and a couple of them, I should have followed up more, but I got. I got busy and I feel bad, you know, I feel bad about that. I should have.

[Assistant] But did you travel while you were in Peace Corps?

[User] In the Peace Corps? While in the Peace Corps, we went to the beach often. That was kind of our favorite hang.

[Assistant] How far were you from the beach? Hours away or?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] He had to go on to the advanced level. Yeah. Some of my kids did go to college and a couple of them, I should have followed up more, but I got. I got busy and I feel bad, you know, I feel bad about that. I should have.

[Assistant] But did you travel while you were in Peace Corps?

[User] In the Peace Corps? While in the Peace Corps, we went to the beach often. That was kind of our favorite hang.

[Assistant] How far were you from the beach? Hours away or?

[User] Probably 2 hours total. Sometimes there was a, there was a hostel in Accra, and we used to always meet in Accra and hang out at the hostel, sometimes for several days. And the beds were crude things like that. But I don't know, we were only paying a few bucks a night, so it was cheap. And a lot of people there from the Peace Corps and other places, you know, just traveling around. And so we usually met there and then went down to a beach called Takoradi. And the interesting thing about beaches there is that Ghanaians don't go to the beach, they don't swim, and they think that it's, swimming is for fishermen, which is a low level job. So we used to be on the beach and, you know, maybe we'd have a beach almost all to ourselves. Maybe we'd have no more than ten people pass us all day. So yeah, I went to Hawaii one time and it was like.

[Assistant] All these people.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] In the Peace Corps? While in the Peace Corps, we went to the beach often. That was kind of our favorite hang.

[Assistant] How far were you from the beach? Hours away or?

[User] Probably 2 hours total. Sometimes there was a, there was a hostel in Accra, and we used to always meet in Accra and hang out at the hostel, sometimes for several days. And the beds were crude things like that. But I don't know, we were only paying a few bucks a night, so it was cheap. And a lot of people there from the Peace Corps and other places, you know, just traveling around. And so we usually met there and then went down to a beach called Takoradi. And the interesting thing about beaches there is that Ghanaians don't go to the beach, they don't swim, and they think that it's, swimming is for fishermen, which is a low level job. So we used to be on the beach and, you know, maybe we'd have a beach almost all to ourselves. Maybe we'd have no more than ten people pass us all day. So yeah, I went to Hawaii one time and it was like.

[Assistant] All these people.

[User] Hawaii and the Jersey beaches and everywhere else. Whoa, whoa. Where's my, where's Takoradi?

[Assistant] Yeah, your private beach.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Probably 2 hours total. Sometimes there was a, there was a hostel in Accra, and we used to always meet in Accra and hang out at the hostel, sometimes for several days. And the beds were crude things like that. But I don't know, we were only paying a few bucks a night, so it was cheap. And a lot of people there from the Peace Corps and other places, you know, just traveling around. And so we usually met there and then went down to a beach called Takoradi. And the interesting thing about beaches there is that Ghanaians don't go to the beach, they don't swim, and they think that it's, swimming is for fishermen, which is a low level job. So we used to be on the beach and, you know, maybe we'd have a beach almost all to ourselves. Maybe we'd have no more than ten people pass us all day. So yeah, I went to Hawaii one time and it was like.

[Assistant] All these people.

[User] Hawaii and the Jersey beaches and everywhere else. Whoa, whoa. Where's my, where's Takoradi?

[Assistant] Yeah, your private beach.

[User] Right, private beach. So.

[Assistant] So you saw Peace Corps volunteers a lot?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Hawaii and the Jersey beaches and everywhere else. Whoa, whoa. Where's my, where's Takoradi?

[Assistant] Yeah, your private beach.

[User] Right, private beach. So.

[Assistant] So you saw Peace Corps volunteers a lot?

[User] Yeah, a fair amount. Although we were kind of, not at the beach. We didn't. We kind of hung out with the same people. And always, one fact, what we did was we, there was a castle, an old castle near there and we used to get a room for about a dollar a night there. And it had straw mattresses. And so it was kind of crude, but it was cheap.

[Assistant] This is a Ghanaian king's castle or?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] I think it was a British, former British castle, as I recall. And, you know, that used to protect their, um, their hold. They were the, they were the ruling class. And they owned it before, if you will. And actually, Ghana was the first country in the early sixties, I think like '60, '61, that got its independence from Britain.

[Assistant] Mm hmm.

[User] It was called the Gold Coast before that. And then other trip I took. Well, actually, we took one trip up to, um, well, this was called Upper Volta. And I now I think it's back to a French name. It was a French colony just north of Ghana.

[Assistant] Burkina Faso?

[User] Yeah, I believe so. And then we went to, on New Year's Eve, we were at the border of Niger. And I was going to visit a Peace Corps person I had met, but we kind of were running out of time and there were these, like wooden seated trucks that you had to go. And we kind of chickened out to go up there, and we were kind of running out of time. We had to get back to teach. So anyway, I'm disappointed that I didn't do that, but I didn't know if I could handle after the travel.

[Assistant] What's your most memorable memory of your time teaching? If you think back.


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] It was called the Gold Coast before that. And then other trip I took. Well, actually, we took one trip up to, um, well, this was called Upper Volta. And I now I think it's back to a French name. It was a French colony just north of Ghana.

[Assistant] Burkina Faso?

[User] Yeah, I believe so. And then we went to, on New Year's Eve, we were at the border of Niger. And I was going to visit a Peace Corps person I had met, but we kind of were running out of time and there were these, like wooden seated trucks that you had to go. And we kind of chickened out to go up there, and we were kind of running out of time. We had to get back to teach. So anyway, I'm disappointed that I didn't do that, but I didn't know if I could handle after the travel.

[Assistant] What's your most memorable memory of your time teaching? If you think back.

[User] Other than teaching itself?

[Assistant] Well, was teaching itself the most memorable thing?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Yeah, I believe so. And then we went to, on New Year's Eve, we were at the border of Niger. And I was going to visit a Peace Corps person I had met, but we kind of were running out of time and there were these, like wooden seated trucks that you had to go. And we kind of chickened out to go up there, and we were kind of running out of time. We had to get back to teach. So anyway, I'm disappointed that I didn't do that, but I didn't know if I could handle after the travel.

[Assistant] What's your most memorable memory of your time teaching? If you think back.

[User] Other than teaching itself?

[Assistant] Well, was teaching itself the most memorable thing?

[User] Well, that's pretty memorable. I guess, we did. I did a trip on my own, actually, to Nigeria, which is west of Ghana. There's two little countries, as I mentioned before, Togo and Dahomey [now Benin], and went to Nigeria and did a circular path in Nigeria. And that trip was kind of exciting. I met someone in Ghana who said, oh, come visit me in Nigeria and I went to, I can't think of the town, but it had been part of the Biafran War movement in the sixties and seventies and it was a little bit wild. And I went there and tried to find this guy, but I couldn't. So I don't know whether he was playing a joke on me or whether they just wouldn't refer me or not. But eventually I found a place to stay and then took off from there. And then I went up to the northern Muslim, um, Islam.

[Assistant] Part of Nigeria?


[System] Act as an information elicitation agent for oral history.

[User] Other than teaching itself?

[Assistant] Well, was teaching itself the most memorable thing?

[User] Well, that's pretty memorable. I guess, we did. I did a trip on my own, actually, to Nigeria, which is west of Ghana. There's two little countries, as I mentioned before, Togo and Dahomey [now Benin], and went to Nigeria and did a circular path in Nigeria. And that trip was kind of exciting. I met someone in Ghana who said, oh, come visit me in Nigeria and I went to, I can't think of the town, but it had been part of the Biafran War movement in the sixties and seventies and it was a little bit wild. And I went there and tried to find this guy, but I couldn't. So I don't know whether he was playing a joke on me or whether they just wouldn't refer me or not. But eventually I found a place to stay and then took off from there. And then I went up to the northern Muslim, um, Islam.

[Assistant] Part of Nigeria?

[User] Called Kano is probably the biggest city, K-A-N-O. And that was interesting and safer, I think, than it is nowadays because that's where they've had a lot of, up in the, um, where they had a lot of the kidnappings and things most recently. The ride up there was very interesting. I happen to be seated next to a young man who had read Time magazine and he was very upset that, uh, the way we wrote about Nigeria in Time magazine and, you know, and how we had sort of indicated, how the article had sort of indicated they were a backward country and everything else. And that Time, for a while I was kind of worried about the views, a little bit, of upsetting the type of person who I was afraid was going to get upset.

[Assistant] How did you respond to him?