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

[User] I suppose so, yeah.

[Assistant] Were you very shy or?

[User] I don't know how to describe myself. No, I'd say I was fairly outgoing at first in new situations. I guess I would sit back and take stock of what was going on before I would. I do not like to stand and never have liked to stand up in front of other people and make announcements. Now I usually arrange to have somebody else do that if it needs to be done. But I am outgoing and like other people and meet people easily.

[Assistant] So you went, you started. You were attending University of Maryland.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Were you at the same school for the four years?


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

[User] I don't know how to describe myself. No, I'd say I was fairly outgoing at first in new situations. I guess I would sit back and take stock of what was going on before I would. I do not like to stand and never have liked to stand up in front of other people and make announcements. Now I usually arrange to have somebody else do that if it needs to be done. But I am outgoing and like other people and meet people easily.

[Assistant] So you went, you started. You were attending University of Maryland.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Were you at the same school for the four years?

[User] No. I went to Mary Washington University. Mary Washington College at the University of Virginia in Fredericksburg for the first year. And at that time it was very First Family of Virginia oriented, and I hated it and couldn't wait to get out. And at the University of Maryland, it was a big university and nobody cared whether I was First Family of Virginia or whether I failed or passed, and it was just fine with me.

[Assistant] And then you were living at the university, I mean, you were resident in the university area.


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Were you at the same school for the four years?

[User] No. I went to Mary Washington University. Mary Washington College at the University of Virginia in Fredericksburg for the first year. And at that time it was very First Family of Virginia oriented, and I hated it and couldn't wait to get out. And at the University of Maryland, it was a big university and nobody cared whether I was First Family of Virginia or whether I failed or passed, and it was just fine with me.

[Assistant] And then you were living at the university, I mean, you were resident in the university area.

[User] I lived at. For the first two years of college, I lived in the dorms, and after that I lived with my grandparents in Washington, D.C., and commuted to finish the last two years of college.

[Assistant] During high school, extracurricular activities? Do you recall?


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

[User] No. I went to Mary Washington University. Mary Washington College at the University of Virginia in Fredericksburg for the first year. And at that time it was very First Family of Virginia oriented, and I hated it and couldn't wait to get out. And at the University of Maryland, it was a big university and nobody cared whether I was First Family of Virginia or whether I failed or passed, and it was just fine with me.

[Assistant] And then you were living at the university, I mean, you were resident in the university area.

[User] I lived at. For the first two years of college, I lived in the dorms, and after that I lived with my grandparents in Washington, D.C., and commuted to finish the last two years of college.

[Assistant] During high school, extracurricular activities? Do you recall?

[User] A lot of church-oriented things. In high school, I was fortunate enough to spend the last three years of high school in one place, and it was a place that had a lot of activities for young kids in Fort Monroe, Virginia, near Hampton and Norfolk, Newport News. And I was very active in church related things and in the teen club and Girl Scouts. And one or two things the last year in high school at school, like Future Voters of America.

[Assistant] Any vacation travel outside the country?


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

[User] I lived at. For the first two years of college, I lived in the dorms, and after that I lived with my grandparents in Washington, D.C., and commuted to finish the last two years of college.

[Assistant] During high school, extracurricular activities? Do you recall?

[User] A lot of church-oriented things. In high school, I was fortunate enough to spend the last three years of high school in one place, and it was a place that had a lot of activities for young kids in Fort Monroe, Virginia, near Hampton and Norfolk, Newport News. And I was very active in church related things and in the teen club and Girl Scouts. And one or two things the last year in high school at school, like Future Voters of America.

[Assistant] Any vacation travel outside the country?

[User] No, we didn't do that in those days, flights. We didn't just hop on a plane. And actually my very first airplane flight was as a Peace Corps trainee going up to New York for orientation. But we didn't, my folks didn't vacation a whole lot. I mean, the only vacations they took were to visit family. So we did drive down to Tennessee to see my father's folks, or up to Washington to see my mother's folks. But we didn't have vacations.

[Assistant] During the three years then at Maryland, did you study foreign language?


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

[User] A lot of church-oriented things. In high school, I was fortunate enough to spend the last three years of high school in one place, and it was a place that had a lot of activities for young kids in Fort Monroe, Virginia, near Hampton and Norfolk, Newport News. And I was very active in church related things and in the teen club and Girl Scouts. And one or two things the last year in high school at school, like Future Voters of America.

[Assistant] Any vacation travel outside the country?

[User] No, we didn't do that in those days, flights. We didn't just hop on a plane. And actually my very first airplane flight was as a Peace Corps trainee going up to New York for orientation. But we didn't, my folks didn't vacation a whole lot. I mean, the only vacations they took were to visit family. So we did drive down to Tennessee to see my father's folks, or up to Washington to see my mother's folks. But we didn't have vacations.

[Assistant] During the three years then at Maryland, did you study foreign language?

[User] Yes. I had well, actually, I'd had three years in high school of French, and then I took French first year at Mary Washington and did so terribly poor in it, poorly in it. So I decided, well, if I have to start over again, why don't I start over in Spanish? So I started with Spanish and I took two and a half years, a half year more than I had to, in Spanish at the University of Maryland. I really enjoy languages and always have even though I've never been really outstanding in them.

[Assistant] Yeah. Was it a cultural thing, I mean, or was it just the fascination of knowing another language?


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

[User] No, we didn't do that in those days, flights. We didn't just hop on a plane. And actually my very first airplane flight was as a Peace Corps trainee going up to New York for orientation. But we didn't, my folks didn't vacation a whole lot. I mean, the only vacations they took were to visit family. So we did drive down to Tennessee to see my father's folks, or up to Washington to see my mother's folks. But we didn't have vacations.

[Assistant] During the three years then at Maryland, did you study foreign language?

[User] Yes. I had well, actually, I'd had three years in high school of French, and then I took French first year at Mary Washington and did so terribly poor in it, poorly in it. So I decided, well, if I have to start over again, why don't I start over in Spanish? So I started with Spanish and I took two and a half years, a half year more than I had to, in Spanish at the University of Maryland. I really enjoy languages and always have even though I've never been really outstanding in them.

[Assistant] Yeah. Was it a cultural thing, I mean, or was it just the fascination of knowing another language?

[User] I don't know. I don't know. It's just, maybe just another language, as languages have always interested me. But now it's my fascination with languages, getting to know the culture as well.

[Assistant] Yeah. As you, well, '61, '62. Do you recall any awareness of politics of Kennedy becoming president and of the Peace Corps itself getting going?


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

[User] Well, I had, before I graduated, I applied. I had applied to the officer's training school for the Air Force at my father's suggestion, and I had also applied to the Peace Corps.

[Assistant] Hedging your bets.

[User] Well, I really wasn't very interested in going into the military.

[Assistant] Oh, OK.

[User] But I was very interested in this new Kennedy program of traveling overseas. I didn't know what they required. I didn't know if you had to be a specialist or be smarter than I was or more knowledgeable in some field, but it sounded very interesting from the little I'd heard about it. And of course, by that time, people hadn't come back. So it was hard to know, hear from somebody who had been overseas. I qualified for OCS and then I dropped that much to my father's dismay, and really was interested in going into the Peace Corps. I finally was accepted in the Peace Corps after a very long process during which they went back to every place I'd ever lived, I think, and talked to everybody I'd ever known and my parents had ever known.

[Assistant] In those days, there was an entrance exam. There was a lengthy questionnaire application, and there were also six letters of recommendation and background. So they did the background checking.


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

[User] But I was very interested in this new Kennedy program of traveling overseas. I didn't know what they required. I didn't know if you had to be a specialist or be smarter than I was or more knowledgeable in some field, but it sounded very interesting from the little I'd heard about it. And of course, by that time, people hadn't come back. So it was hard to know, hear from somebody who had been overseas. I qualified for OCS and then I dropped that much to my father's dismay, and really was interested in going into the Peace Corps. I finally was accepted in the Peace Corps after a very long process during which they went back to every place I'd ever lived, I think, and talked to everybody I'd ever known and my parents had ever known.

[Assistant] In those days, there was an entrance exam. There was a lengthy questionnaire application, and there were also six letters of recommendation and background. So they did the background checking.

[User] Oh, they did. As a matter of fact, I had other friends who were applying to work in Peace Corps Washington or applying to work in the Peace Corps, and they ended up interviewing them and their families about me, and me and my family about them. Separate people. But they offered me a position. This is the way it worked in those days. They offered me a position as a trainee in the Philippines, which was not where I had wanted to go. I had wanted to go in the Inca area of South America, the Peruvian Andes.

[Assistant] Why?

[User] Just a fascination with the native peoples. I had become interested at camp, at the camp I taught, in Indian lore and in the American Indians and in the South American Indians.

[Assistant] Oh OK. And how did your family react to your moving more toward the Peace Corps?


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

[User] Oh, they did. As a matter of fact, I had other friends who were applying to work in Peace Corps Washington or applying to work in the Peace Corps, and they ended up interviewing them and their families about me, and me and my family about them. Separate people. But they offered me a position. This is the way it worked in those days. They offered me a position as a trainee in the Philippines, which was not where I had wanted to go. I had wanted to go in the Inca area of South America, the Peruvian Andes.

[Assistant] Why?

[User] Just a fascination with the native peoples. I had become interested at camp, at the camp I taught, in Indian lore and in the American Indians and in the South American Indians.

[Assistant] Oh OK. And how did your family react to your moving more toward the Peace Corps?

[User] Oh, I think my father felt well as long as it's a job, and my mother was behind me 100 percent. She didn't know what Peace Corps was, but she had confidence in my ability to make a decision and to do what I felt was the right thing.

[Assistant] Your siblings, older, younger?


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

[User] Just a fascination with the native peoples. I had become interested at camp, at the camp I taught, in Indian lore and in the American Indians and in the South American Indians.

[Assistant] Oh OK. And how did your family react to your moving more toward the Peace Corps?

[User] Oh, I think my father felt well as long as it's a job, and my mother was behind me 100 percent. She didn't know what Peace Corps was, but she had confidence in my ability to make a decision and to do what I felt was the right thing.

[Assistant] Your siblings, older, younger?

[User] I have younger brothers. And there was one two years younger who was in West Point at the time. And I think he didn't think much about my decisions. And then the other brothers were 12 and 14, 15 years younger than I. So they were very small. So when they accepted me. They didn't accept me, but they accepted me as an applicant for the Philippines program. And I said, OK. It sounded interesting, and my mother had been born in the Philippines, as an army brat. So she had some of her friends check out the current situations in the Philippines, which was better then than now. And they said, well, it could be very tough, could be hard living, but I knew that it was not going to be luxurious living no matter where I went.

[Assistant] Do you remember if it was a program to be a teacher aide?


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

[User] I think so. I think so. And then they decided, Peace Corps decided, that they had too many volunteers in the Philippines, that they were flooding that country, so they canceled the whole program. So I wondered what was going to happen to me. And this was about the time that I was graduating with no job. And then, so I, instead of getting the job, I was going to spend the summer waiting to hear from the Peace Corps and doing some hiking and seeing friends and things like that. So I waited and then finally, after several very long months, they offered me a job in Colombia, which again was one of the first countries they went into in 1961, right as an urban Peace Corps volunteer. And I turned them down. I said, I don't want to be urban. I want to be rural. I have no interest in going to a city. I guess I was getting a little too big for my britches here. But they said, OK, well. They made it clear that it was acceptable to do that, and that didn't mean that I was out of their consideration.

[Assistant] Oh, OK. Did you do you remember taking a language exam as part of the application process?

[User] We're reaching way far back now.

[Assistant] I mean, as far as you can remember.

[User] I don't think I was given one unless it was, I think maybe there was a written language exam. It wouldn't have been an oral one, but there may have been.

[Assistant] Well did you feel you were at all qualified in Spanish?


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

[User] We're reaching way far back now.

[Assistant] I mean, as far as you can remember.

[User] I don't think I was given one unless it was, I think maybe there was a written language exam. It wouldn't have been an oral one, but there may have been.

[Assistant] Well did you feel you were at all qualified in Spanish?

[User] I don't know. I was not. I had never had a course in Spanish conversation, so I had never had conversations with anybody. But I had book learning for five semesters, you know, four of language and then a fifth semester of poetry and literature.

[Assistant] Right. So but your interest was in Spanish speaking Latin America, personally?


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

[User] I don't think I was given one unless it was, I think maybe there was a written language exam. It wouldn't have been an oral one, but there may have been.

[Assistant] Well did you feel you were at all qualified in Spanish?

[User] I don't know. I was not. I had never had a course in Spanish conversation, so I had never had conversations with anybody. But I had book learning for five semesters, you know, four of language and then a fifth semester of poetry and literature.

[Assistant] Right. So but your interest was in Spanish speaking Latin America, personally?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And a rural, preferring a rural not an urban assignment. So you said no to Colombia.


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

[User] I don't know. I was not. I had never had a course in Spanish conversation, so I had never had conversations with anybody. But I had book learning for five semesters, you know, four of language and then a fifth semester of poetry and literature.

[Assistant] Right. So but your interest was in Spanish speaking Latin America, personally?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And a rural, preferring a rural not an urban assignment. So you said no to Colombia.

[User] And then one of my friends who was in the D.C. area, who was applying to work at Peace Corps Washington, was interviewed about my background, because they had known me since I was a baby. She and her father and her mother. And they mentioned something about rural versus urban, and the interviewer told her that I was going to be offered very soon a position I definitely would take. And she relayed that to me. I thought, well that's interesting. Why don't they tell me?

[Assistant] I mean, it's so personal too I mean.


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And a rural, preferring a rural not an urban assignment. So you said no to Colombia.

[User] And then one of my friends who was in the D.C. area, who was applying to work at Peace Corps Washington, was interviewed about my background, because they had known me since I was a baby. She and her father and her mother. And they mentioned something about rural versus urban, and the interviewer told her that I was going to be offered very soon a position I definitely would take. And she relayed that to me. I thought, well that's interesting. Why don't they tell me?

[Assistant] I mean, it's so personal too I mean.

[User] Yeah. So they did offer me the position in rural Ecuador in community development. So I said yes. And by then, I was really hoping that I was going to get something.

[Assistant] Yes. And when was this, October, November?


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

[User] And then one of my friends who was in the D.C. area, who was applying to work at Peace Corps Washington, was interviewed about my background, because they had known me since I was a baby. She and her father and her mother. And they mentioned something about rural versus urban, and the interviewer told her that I was going to be offered very soon a position I definitely would take. And she relayed that to me. I thought, well that's interesting. Why don't they tell me?

[Assistant] I mean, it's so personal too I mean.

[User] Yeah. So they did offer me the position in rural Ecuador in community development. So I said yes. And by then, I was really hoping that I was going to get something.

[Assistant] Yes. And when was this, October, November?

[User] It was probably September or August. It seemed like forever when you're waiting for the job to come through.

[Assistant] But you hadn't considered chucking it and doing something else? You were would just sort of holding out for the.


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

[User] Yeah. So they did offer me the position in rural Ecuador in community development. So I said yes. And by then, I was really hoping that I was going to get something.

[Assistant] Yes. And when was this, October, November?

[User] It was probably September or August. It seemed like forever when you're waiting for the job to come through.

[Assistant] But you hadn't considered chucking it and doing something else? You were would just sort of holding out for the.

[User] I was holding out for it because the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like something that would be, that I would like. I thought, well, maybe I'll have to go back and get teaching credentials and teach or something. But even though I majored in English, I had no intention of teaching. I enjoyed the literature. I liked languages. The basic study of English helped a little bit with other languages. And I really didn't want to be a teacher.

[Assistant] Right. But you hadn't thought of applying to graduate school or?


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

[User] It was probably September or August. It seemed like forever when you're waiting for the job to come through.

[Assistant] But you hadn't considered chucking it and doing something else? You were would just sort of holding out for the.

[User] I was holding out for it because the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like something that would be, that I would like. I thought, well, maybe I'll have to go back and get teaching credentials and teach or something. But even though I majored in English, I had no intention of teaching. I enjoyed the literature. I liked languages. The basic study of English helped a little bit with other languages. And I really didn't want to be a teacher.

[Assistant] Right. But you hadn't thought of applying to graduate school or?

[User] I wouldn't have known what I would study in. Advice from another friend was don't ever go to graduate school in the same thing you went to undergraduate school in. But no, I think I'd had enough of college for a while, enough of studies for a while, and I wanted to get out in the real world and do something. And international travel had been a fascination ever since I lived in Japan and had not done very much. We had been.

[Assistant] How old were you when you lived in Japan?


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

[User] I was holding out for it because the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like something that would be, that I would like. I thought, well, maybe I'll have to go back and get teaching credentials and teach or something. But even though I majored in English, I had no intention of teaching. I enjoyed the literature. I liked languages. The basic study of English helped a little bit with other languages. And I really didn't want to be a teacher.

[Assistant] Right. But you hadn't thought of applying to graduate school or?

[User] I wouldn't have known what I would study in. Advice from another friend was don't ever go to graduate school in the same thing you went to undergraduate school in. But no, I think I'd had enough of college for a while, enough of studies for a while, and I wanted to get out in the real world and do something. And international travel had been a fascination ever since I lived in Japan and had not done very much. We had been.

[Assistant] How old were you when you lived in Japan?

[User] Seven, eight and nine. In the trail club, we got as far as Quebec. And we, I mean, it was French speaking. So we had experiences with another language there.

[Assistant] Yeah. The invitation finally comes. And what was the invitation to? I mean, Ecuador.


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

[User] I wouldn't have known what I would study in. Advice from another friend was don't ever go to graduate school in the same thing you went to undergraduate school in. But no, I think I'd had enough of college for a while, enough of studies for a while, and I wanted to get out in the real world and do something. And international travel had been a fascination ever since I lived in Japan and had not done very much. We had been.

[Assistant] How old were you when you lived in Japan?

[User] Seven, eight and nine. In the trail club, we got as far as Quebec. And we, I mean, it was French speaking. So we had experiences with another language there.

[Assistant] Yeah. The invitation finally comes. And what was the invitation to? I mean, Ecuador.

[User] Ecuador. Rural community action. And I didn't know what community action was. And frankly, the Peace Corps didn't know what community action was in those days.

[Assistant] Right. Then you're told to report to training. Am I right?


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

[User] Seven, eight and nine. In the trail club, we got as far as Quebec. And we, I mean, it was French speaking. So we had experiences with another language there.

[Assistant] Yeah. The invitation finally comes. And what was the invitation to? I mean, Ecuador.

[User] Ecuador. Rural community action. And I didn't know what community action was. And frankly, the Peace Corps didn't know what community action was in those days.

[Assistant] Right. Then you're told to report to training. Am I right?

[User] I was told that I would be sent tickets and I would be sent tickets to New York City, where we would all be gathered together for orientation into what is the Peace Corps and what you're getting into. In retrospect, it seems to me that this is a very good idea because you can weed out people at that stage and not cost the Peace Corps quite so much if they realize that they're going to go to a country that doesn't speak English. Perhaps they didn't realize that before. But nobody quit then. We were 56 people.

[Assistant] Where did you go? Where did you stay?


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

[User] Ecuador. Rural community action. And I didn't know what community action was. And frankly, the Peace Corps didn't know what community action was in those days.

[Assistant] Right. Then you're told to report to training. Am I right?

[User] I was told that I would be sent tickets and I would be sent tickets to New York City, where we would all be gathered together for orientation into what is the Peace Corps and what you're getting into. In retrospect, it seems to me that this is a very good idea because you can weed out people at that stage and not cost the Peace Corps quite so much if they realize that they're going to go to a country that doesn't speak English. Perhaps they didn't realize that before. But nobody quit then. We were 56 people.

[Assistant] Where did you go? Where did you stay?

[User] In a hotel in New York City. I don't know the name.

[Assistant] And the meetings were at the hotel?


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

[User] I was told that I would be sent tickets and I would be sent tickets to New York City, where we would all be gathered together for orientation into what is the Peace Corps and what you're getting into. In retrospect, it seems to me that this is a very good idea because you can weed out people at that stage and not cost the Peace Corps quite so much if they realize that they're going to go to a country that doesn't speak English. Perhaps they didn't realize that before. But nobody quit then. We were 56 people.

[Assistant] Where did you go? Where did you stay?

[User] In a hotel in New York City. I don't know the name.

[Assistant] And the meetings were at the hotel?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] And was the entire group for Ecuador?


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

[User] In a hotel in New York City. I don't know the name.

[Assistant] And the meetings were at the hotel?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] And was the entire group for Ecuador?

[User]
Yes.

Both urban and rural Ecuador, some of us. And they said the lines weren't very clearly drawn. They might move some urban people into rural and vice versa. Which was a problem later when we began to plan our clothes to go overseas. Because the urban people in Guayaquil, where it's 90 degrees and 100 percent humidity all the time, had brought clothes for the Andes, which didn't work out, but anyway. It was urban and rural, and they said that you might be changed. I had a pretty good idea that I wouldn't be changed because I had made such a big point about being rural.

[Assistant] What was the male female break in the group, do you remember particularly?


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

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] And was the entire group for Ecuador?

[User]
Yes.

Both urban and rural Ecuador, some of us. And they said the lines weren't very clearly drawn. They might move some urban people into rural and vice versa. Which was a problem later when we began to plan our clothes to go overseas. Because the urban people in Guayaquil, where it's 90 degrees and 100 percent humidity all the time, had brought clothes for the Andes, which didn't work out, but anyway. It was urban and rural, and they said that you might be changed. I had a pretty good idea that I wouldn't be changed because I had made such a big point about being rural.

[Assistant] What was the male female break in the group, do you remember particularly?

[User] No, I don't. There were quite a lot of both. I think we were 56 people or 65 people. I think probably 56.

[Assistant] For the most part in early to mid-twenties?


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

[User]
Yes.

Both urban and rural Ecuador, some of us. And they said the lines weren't very clearly drawn. They might move some urban people into rural and vice versa. Which was a problem later when we began to plan our clothes to go overseas. Because the urban people in Guayaquil, where it's 90 degrees and 100 percent humidity all the time, had brought clothes for the Andes, which didn't work out, but anyway. It was urban and rural, and they said that you might be changed. I had a pretty good idea that I wouldn't be changed because I had made such a big point about being rural.

[Assistant] What was the male female break in the group, do you remember particularly?

[User] No, I don't. There were quite a lot of both. I think we were 56 people or 65 people. I think probably 56.

[Assistant] For the most part in early to mid-twenties?

[User] Yes. There was one girl who had not finished college. She was 20. There were several, including my first husband, my current husband, who is, um, who had finished graduate school. But I don't think anybody was older than 25.

[Assistant] Right. Were there married couples in the group?


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

[User] No, I don't. There were quite a lot of both. I think we were 56 people or 65 people. I think probably 56.

[Assistant] For the most part in early to mid-twenties?

[User] Yes. There was one girl who had not finished college. She was 20. There were several, including my first husband, my current husband, who is, um, who had finished graduate school. But I don't think anybody was older than 25.

[Assistant] Right. Were there married couples in the group?

[User] Yeah, there were six married couples who started training.

[Assistant] Yeah. So how long were you in New York?


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

[User] Yeah, there were six married couples who started training.

[Assistant] Yeah. So how long were you in New York?

[User] Just three days and this happened to be. We were convened there November 23rd, 1963.

[Assistant] Ah yes.

[User] And while we were on a break, we were walking around the streets and people had the strangest. People you'd never talked to in New York, where people don't talk to strangers, would say the president's been shot and newsstand people would just throw up their hands. People were crying on the streets. And we. I went back to the hotel room, not knowing, not believing it. Not knowing what to do. I went back to the hotel room and everybody, this was a suite with three bedrooms and six people in it, and everybody was gathered around the television, watching the news and watching what was happening. Um, one girl with a very tall beehive hairdo that we thought she will never maintain this hairdo throughout the whole term - and she did - was weeping and she cried. She cried for hours and the rest of us were just staring at each other wondering what to do. We didn't know each other. We had no, we had just met. It was very strange. And the question came up, would they cancel the Peace Corps? Would they cancel our project? Were we going home tomorrow?

[Assistant] Yeah, interesting. Did you did you call home, do you remember?


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

[User] Just three days and this happened to be. We were convened there November 23rd, 1963.

[Assistant] Ah yes.

[User] And while we were on a break, we were walking around the streets and people had the strangest. People you'd never talked to in New York, where people don't talk to strangers, would say the president's been shot and newsstand people would just throw up their hands. People were crying on the streets. And we. I went back to the hotel room, not knowing, not believing it. Not knowing what to do. I went back to the hotel room and everybody, this was a suite with three bedrooms and six people in it, and everybody was gathered around the television, watching the news and watching what was happening. Um, one girl with a very tall beehive hairdo that we thought she will never maintain this hairdo throughout the whole term - and she did - was weeping and she cried. She cried for hours and the rest of us were just staring at each other wondering what to do. We didn't know each other. We had no, we had just met. It was very strange. And the question came up, would they cancel the Peace Corps? Would they cancel our project? Were we going home tomorrow?

[Assistant] Yeah, interesting. Did you did you call home, do you remember?

[User] No. In those days, we didn't call home a lot. Even 10, 15 years ago, we didn't call a lot. They had the same news we had. I would have had to call if I wasn't going to go overseas. We were getting ready to go to Puerto Rico, and two days later, we did.

[Assistant] During the day or the day after, before you went to Puerto Rico, was there an official Peace Corps spokesman? There must have been someone who was calling the shots or directing what you were doing.


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

[User] And while we were on a break, we were walking around the streets and people had the strangest. People you'd never talked to in New York, where people don't talk to strangers, would say the president's been shot and newsstand people would just throw up their hands. People were crying on the streets. And we. I went back to the hotel room, not knowing, not believing it. Not knowing what to do. I went back to the hotel room and everybody, this was a suite with three bedrooms and six people in it, and everybody was gathered around the television, watching the news and watching what was happening. Um, one girl with a very tall beehive hairdo that we thought she will never maintain this hairdo throughout the whole term - and she did - was weeping and she cried. She cried for hours and the rest of us were just staring at each other wondering what to do. We didn't know each other. We had no, we had just met. It was very strange. And the question came up, would they cancel the Peace Corps? Would they cancel our project? Were we going home tomorrow?

[Assistant] Yeah, interesting. Did you did you call home, do you remember?

[User] No. In those days, we didn't call home a lot. Even 10, 15 years ago, we didn't call a lot. They had the same news we had. I would have had to call if I wasn't going to go overseas. We were getting ready to go to Puerto Rico, and two days later, we did.

[Assistant] During the day or the day after, before you went to Puerto Rico, was there an official Peace Corps spokesman? There must have been someone who was calling the shots or directing what you were doing.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did they deal with Kennedy's death or?


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

[User] No. In those days, we didn't call home a lot. Even 10, 15 years ago, we didn't call a lot. They had the same news we had. I would have had to call if I wasn't going to go overseas. We were getting ready to go to Puerto Rico, and two days later, we did.

[Assistant] During the day or the day after, before you went to Puerto Rico, was there an official Peace Corps spokesman? There must have been someone who was calling the shots or directing what you were doing.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did they deal with Kennedy's death or?

[User] Well, yeah. They said, we will be going ahead. The Peace Corps is not canceled. And they just told us what you would get on the news that, you know, there would be an official 30 day period of mourning and something about the burial, the funeral, and that we would be going to Puerto Rico as planned. And um, that was pretty much it, I mean.

[Assistant] Now, what was the purpose of going to Puerto Rico?


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Did they deal with Kennedy's death or?

[User] Well, yeah. They said, we will be going ahead. The Peace Corps is not canceled. And they just told us what you would get on the news that, you know, there would be an official 30 day period of mourning and something about the burial, the funeral, and that we would be going to Puerto Rico as planned. And um, that was pretty much it, I mean.

[Assistant] Now, what was the purpose of going to Puerto Rico?

[User] Training. Not because it was where we were going was going to be hot, but what they did in those days. I don't know if the first groups went through this for Ghana, but we had Outward Bound training. And I guess I don't have the time to go into what Outward Bound training is.

[Assistant] Well, that's OK. Yeah, I think it's.


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

[User] Everybody understands.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] We went to Camp Crozier. There were two camps in the mountains, Radley and Crozier, in the mountains near Arecibo. And we had. They were set up sort of like army barracks. There were several cabins which held about 12 people and they had screens on them, which usually worked. But we had lots of bugs come in too. And it was in a rainforest. So there were lots of bugs. It was always wet. When you got into your bed at night, it was damp. The sheets were damp. We got up and we did calisthenics. We had to run a mile before breakfast. We had serious physical training and even more so emotional and mental training, as well as five hours a day of Spanish.

[Assistant] Oh, OK.

[User] That was the beginning. And then the training went on for a total of four months and we had five hours a day of Spanish, every day.

[Assistant] All of this in Puerto Rico.


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

[User] We went to Camp Crozier. There were two camps in the mountains, Radley and Crozier, in the mountains near Arecibo. And we had. They were set up sort of like army barracks. There were several cabins which held about 12 people and they had screens on them, which usually worked. But we had lots of bugs come in too. And it was in a rainforest. So there were lots of bugs. It was always wet. When you got into your bed at night, it was damp. The sheets were damp. We got up and we did calisthenics. We had to run a mile before breakfast. We had serious physical training and even more so emotional and mental training, as well as five hours a day of Spanish.

[Assistant] Oh, OK.

[User] That was the beginning. And then the training went on for a total of four months and we had five hours a day of Spanish, every day.

[Assistant] All of this in Puerto Rico.

[User] No, no. This is just the beginning. We had one month in Puerto Rico, three weeks in Outward Bound, and then we were put for one week in a community with two or three other Peace Corps trainees where they were doing construction. And we were supposed to help with the construction, which we had no training in. But maybe it was for language skills. I don't really know why they did this.

[Assistant] Did you live with the family at that time?


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

[User] That was the beginning. And then the training went on for a total of four months and we had five hours a day of Spanish, every day.

[Assistant] All of this in Puerto Rico.

[User] No, no. This is just the beginning. We had one month in Puerto Rico, three weeks in Outward Bound, and then we were put for one week in a community with two or three other Peace Corps trainees where they were doing construction. And we were supposed to help with the construction, which we had no training in. But maybe it was for language skills. I don't really know why they did this.

[Assistant] Did you live with the family at that time?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] That may have been the language training. While you were in Puerto Rico with the Outward Bound training, was there a sense and with the intensive language training, was it a sense that you were being evaluated? You would have to pass some kind of standard on each of those before you would move on?


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] That may have been the language training. While you were in Puerto Rico with the Outward Bound training, was there a sense and with the intensive language training, was it a sense that you were being evaluated? You would have to pass some kind of standard on each of those before you would move on?

[User] My understanding at the time was that this was for training purposes and that I understood some of these people were very overweight. Some of these people had never, they didn't know how to swim, couldn't swim at all. There's no way the Peace Corps was going to kick people out if they couldn't manage to climb up a rope 30 feet. And the women, you know, we're not as strong as the guys. So a woman who had never done this before couldn't climb straight up a rope 30 feet. Why would the Peace Corps kick her out? I thought that this was training and just getting you to, I don't know, to understand your limits and to understand how to deal with situations you never been in before.

[Assistant] Mm hmm.

[User] There was a part of it was rock climbing, which, as it happens, I had done before. But most of the people, 99.44% percent of the people had never done before, and I couldn't imagine Peace Corps d selecting somebody because they couldn't climb the rocks. Deselecting is a word they used in those days and to any of us from that period that went through the selections that we went through, it is extremely negative. We had so many things, not so much in Puerto Rico, but afterwards in the university training.

[Assistant] Well during the physical training and the language, the initial language in Puerto Rico, did many people choose to drop out or do you recall?


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

[User] Yeah. And so they felt very united as a group. They'd finished a lot of their selections. They were smaller group, like maybe 35, and they were mixed in with us. So our classes, our groups were composed of part Ecuador VI and part really nuevo people, Ecuador VII. And it was very interesting to see the difference. At the very end of training, if I can skip a few, at the very end of the Outward Bound training, they had a race. There was a race up a mountain. Well, it would be a hill compared to the Andes, but it was pretty steep. And the object was to get the entire group, your group, to the top of the hill and back down. The object was not to see an individual basis how fast you could run up and run down.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] Even though this was thoroughly and adequately explained, the majority of jocks, women as well as men, raced up that hill and down and thought, I'm going to do the best I can for my team by doing this. But Group B, we had had a pretty good experience, at least in my opinion. And we had some heavy-set people and some frail little people, and we pushed them up the hill and pulled them up the hill. And we worked as a group and we won. We won a case of Lowenbrau. And I was very proud of the group at that time.

[Assistant] Which is one of the points of Outward Bound, of course, is team building and, you know, learning to work with others.

[User] Well, I hadn't known that that was one of the points, but that was what we did. [tape break]

[Assistant] Puerto Rico and coming to the, it was a four-week period.


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

[User] Even though this was thoroughly and adequately explained, the majority of jocks, women as well as men, raced up that hill and down and thought, I'm going to do the best I can for my team by doing this. But Group B, we had had a pretty good experience, at least in my opinion. And we had some heavy-set people and some frail little people, and we pushed them up the hill and pulled them up the hill. And we worked as a group and we won. We won a case of Lowenbrau. And I was very proud of the group at that time.

[Assistant] Which is one of the points of Outward Bound, of course, is team building and, you know, learning to work with others.

[User] Well, I hadn't known that that was one of the points, but that was what we did. [tape break]

[Assistant] Puerto Rico and coming to the, it was a four-week period.

[User] Right. It was three weeks at Outward Bound and then the one in the community.

[Assistant] OK. And in the community, you would just in a small town with some others?


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

[User] Well, I hadn't known that that was one of the points, but that was what we did. [tape break]

[Assistant] Puerto Rico and coming to the, it was a four-week period.

[User] Right. It was three weeks at Outward Bound and then the one in the community.

[Assistant] OK. And in the community, you would just in a small town with some others?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And the main purpose was probably language?


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And the main purpose was probably language?

[User] Probably, although some of us would possibly be involved in construction later on. One of the, I was in a community that had one other single woman volunteer trainee and a married couple. And Pat Roy, the married couple wife, realized early that she would not be doing physical construction and shoveling cement into cement mixers when she was a volunteer in her site. Because women don't do that in Latin America, or at least they didn't then. And so she started making friends with the children and talking to people, and I thought that was very smart of her.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] All of our Spanish was fairly rudimentary. I mean, we had book learning. I had had five semesters in college, and then five hours a day for three weeks. And then we had. What I remember most, I think, was meeting this little seven or eight or nine year old kid and letting him win at marbles. He was very outgoing and wanted to talk to this strange woman who had come to live with an older couple in their house and work with cement. And so we played marbles and I made sure that he won. And he, on the last day there. We tried to have many conversations, but my Spanish vocabulary wasn't really great. The last day there, he walked me down to where we had to stand alongside the highway and wave the bus down and catch the bus back into to San Juan. And he escorted me there and carried my little suitcase. And I said, don't you have to be in school? He said, well, there's this play and I'm the emcee in the play. And they can't. I said, aren't you going to miss this play? He said, they can't do it without me. They just have to wait. And he's probably the mayor of the town that at this point.

[Assistant] Yeah. So then back to San Juan. Your group reformed, the Ecuador VII group?


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

[User] Right. Well, there were two sets. Both groups were there. And I don't know whether Ecuador VI went straight on to, uh, Ecuador at that point, or they probably in all likelihood had to go back to Miami and then go back. Well, it was just before Christmas. It was about two or three days before Christmas. So the Peace Corps decided in view of the fact that it was just before Christmas that they were going to let us take our home leave, our post training leave that we would normally get after all the training, they would let us do it at Christmas instead, which would mean we wouldn't get it later. And so we went home for a week or two weeks, probably one week. And then we were told to report to Denver and they gave us the tickets. So after Christmas, we all flew out to Denver.

[Assistant] Going home, how'd the family greet you now that you were a Peace Corps volunteer and climbed tall mountains and leaped tall buildings?

[User] Oh, I don't. I don't remember. I don't think it was as big a deal for them as for me because they hadn't been there with me. And although they'd heard about it.

[Assistant] Were you writing during the time?

[User] Yeah, I'm sure I was. I've always been a writer, writing home.

[Assistant] Do you know if the letters exist?


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

[User] Oh, I don't. I don't remember. I don't think it was as big a deal for them as for me because they hadn't been there with me. And although they'd heard about it.

[Assistant] Were you writing during the time?

[User] Yeah, I'm sure I was. I've always been a writer, writing home.

[Assistant] Do you know if the letters exist?

[User] Oh, I'm sure they don't.

[Assistant] OK. So you had the week home. Any second thoughts about maybe you shouldn't be going?


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

[User] Oh, I'm sure they don't.

[Assistant] OK. So you had the week home. Any second thoughts about maybe you shouldn't be going?

[User] Oh, none at all. Absolutely not. One of the reasons that I thought about going into the Peace Corps was a friend of mine, but actually he was the son of friends of my parents. He had worked in Indonesia, and I don't know with what program, whether it was a church program or the government program, and he was working in agriculture. I'm not sure it was Indonesia. It was Southeast Asia. It may have been Vietnam before the war. It was sometime before this period at any rate, and he was quite a bit older than I. Well, ten years at that period, it was quite a bit older. And he had been working with people in the fields and there had been an accident with the tractor and he lost his leg. And he was sent back to the United States and he was put in hospitals for a while. First thing he did when he got out of the hospital was go right back to his job.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And he was not. I don't know that. He wasn't a Peace Corps volunteer. I don't know what kind of living conditions he had, but I have to assume that it was fairly basic. And his work with the people there made me think that he was a very giving person. A person who is really giving a good impression of what some of us in America are like, you know, or would like to be like. And I thought that was sort of an inspiration for me to try to get into the Peace Corps and do something like that.

[Assistant] Do you remember reading a book called The Ugly American?


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

[User] Oh, none at all. Absolutely not. One of the reasons that I thought about going into the Peace Corps was a friend of mine, but actually he was the son of friends of my parents. He had worked in Indonesia, and I don't know with what program, whether it was a church program or the government program, and he was working in agriculture. I'm not sure it was Indonesia. It was Southeast Asia. It may have been Vietnam before the war. It was sometime before this period at any rate, and he was quite a bit older than I. Well, ten years at that period, it was quite a bit older. And he had been working with people in the fields and there had been an accident with the tractor and he lost his leg. And he was sent back to the United States and he was put in hospitals for a while. First thing he did when he got out of the hospital was go right back to his job.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And he was not. I don't know that. He wasn't a Peace Corps volunteer. I don't know what kind of living conditions he had, but I have to assume that it was fairly basic. And his work with the people there made me think that he was a very giving person. A person who is really giving a good impression of what some of us in America are like, you know, or would like to be like. And I thought that was sort of an inspiration for me to try to get into the Peace Corps and do something like that.

[Assistant] Do you remember reading a book called The Ugly American?

[User] Oh yeah.

[Assistant] OK. That was part of that same mix of value forming about the role Americans could play, didn't play, but could play, sort of.


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

[User] And he was not. I don't know that. He wasn't a Peace Corps volunteer. I don't know what kind of living conditions he had, but I have to assume that it was fairly basic. And his work with the people there made me think that he was a very giving person. A person who is really giving a good impression of what some of us in America are like, you know, or would like to be like. And I thought that was sort of an inspiration for me to try to get into the Peace Corps and do something like that.

[Assistant] Do you remember reading a book called The Ugly American?

[User] Oh yeah.

[Assistant] OK. That was part of that same mix of value forming about the role Americans could play, didn't play, but could play, sort of.

[User] Right. And speaking of books about Americans' roles overseas, I again have to mention this book Green Fires by Marnie Mueller, about a Peace Corps volunteer who returns to Ecuador, returns to her country of service, and finds out that she had done the wrong things for the right reasons. But there's all this cultural interplay and history. We, as Americans, we get to a new place and we think we're the first people there. Well, in fact, these people have been there for centuries and they have histories of interaction. And if we jump in the middle of it. We're not the first people there. We're just the latest in a series of things that's causing actions and reactions. And sometimes we don't interpret everything correctly.

[Assistant] Yeah. So you flew out to Denver for the second part of your training?


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

[User] Oh yeah.

[Assistant] OK. That was part of that same mix of value forming about the role Americans could play, didn't play, but could play, sort of.

[User] Right. And speaking of books about Americans' roles overseas, I again have to mention this book Green Fires by Marnie Mueller, about a Peace Corps volunteer who returns to Ecuador, returns to her country of service, and finds out that she had done the wrong things for the right reasons. But there's all this cultural interplay and history. We, as Americans, we get to a new place and we think we're the first people there. Well, in fact, these people have been there for centuries and they have histories of interaction. And if we jump in the middle of it. We're not the first people there. We're just the latest in a series of things that's causing actions and reactions. And sometimes we don't interpret everything correctly.

[Assistant] Yeah. So you flew out to Denver for the second part of your training?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And where did you end up?


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

[User] Right. And speaking of books about Americans' roles overseas, I again have to mention this book Green Fires by Marnie Mueller, about a Peace Corps volunteer who returns to Ecuador, returns to her country of service, and finds out that she had done the wrong things for the right reasons. But there's all this cultural interplay and history. We, as Americans, we get to a new place and we think we're the first people there. Well, in fact, these people have been there for centuries and they have histories of interaction. And if we jump in the middle of it. We're not the first people there. We're just the latest in a series of things that's causing actions and reactions. And sometimes we don't interpret everything correctly.

[Assistant] Yeah. So you flew out to Denver for the second part of your training?

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And where did you end up?

[User] We were at the University of Denver and we were in, oh, this is really modern. We were in dorms that had apartments, and the apartments had either two or three bedrooms and a living room and dining room and kitchen. And we were on the same floor. Well, actually, the boys were on one floor and the girls were on another floor, but you could actually walk up and down the stairs and be in each other's apartments. It's not exactly coed living like they have now, but yeah, it was pretty racy for then. As far as I know, absolutely nothing went on that shouldn't have gone on.

[Assistant] That's right smack in the middle of Denver, though, isn't it?


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] And where did you end up?

[User] We were at the University of Denver and we were in, oh, this is really modern. We were in dorms that had apartments, and the apartments had either two or three bedrooms and a living room and dining room and kitchen. And we were on the same floor. Well, actually, the boys were on one floor and the girls were on another floor, but you could actually walk up and down the stairs and be in each other's apartments. It's not exactly coed living like they have now, but yeah, it was pretty racy for then. As far as I know, absolutely nothing went on that shouldn't have gone on.

[Assistant] That's right smack in the middle of Denver, though, isn't it?

[User] It's right smack in Denver and it was winter and it was cold and dry. And people would, there'd be a big snowfall and people would go out in shorts and get suntanned. Not us, because we were too busy.

[Assistant] Do you have any idea why they chose the University of Denver?


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

[User] We were at the University of Denver and we were in, oh, this is really modern. We were in dorms that had apartments, and the apartments had either two or three bedrooms and a living room and dining room and kitchen. And we were on the same floor. Well, actually, the boys were on one floor and the girls were on another floor, but you could actually walk up and down the stairs and be in each other's apartments. It's not exactly coed living like they have now, but yeah, it was pretty racy for then. As far as I know, absolutely nothing went on that shouldn't have gone on.

[Assistant] That's right smack in the middle of Denver, though, isn't it?

[User] It's right smack in Denver and it was winter and it was cold and dry. And people would, there'd be a big snowfall and people would go out in shorts and get suntanned. Not us, because we were too busy.

[Assistant] Do you have any idea why they chose the University of Denver?

[User] No. And I suppose in some bureaucrat's mind they'd done the hot climate, so they were going to do the cold part of Ecuador, because there's hot and cold in Ecuador. But it really had no bearing on.

[Assistant] Were there any resident specialists in Latin American studies or Ecuador?


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

[User] It's right smack in Denver and it was winter and it was cold and dry. And people would, there'd be a big snowfall and people would go out in shorts and get suntanned. Not us, because we were too busy.

[Assistant] Do you have any idea why they chose the University of Denver?

[User] No. And I suppose in some bureaucrat's mind they'd done the hot climate, so they were going to do the cold part of Ecuador, because there's hot and cold in Ecuador. But it really had no bearing on.

[Assistant] Were there any resident specialists in Latin American studies or Ecuador?

[User] We had a lot of people come and talk to us. We had five hours of Spanish every day, two hours of lab and three hours of talking in a small classroom, and we were divided up into ability levels one to six or seven, one to seven, I guess. And so you were in with people who had your same amount of learning and you had to speak in classroom as well as in the lab, which was all tape recorded Foreign Service tapes.

[Assistant] In a small class setting, was there a teacher or an instructor present?


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

[User] No. And I suppose in some bureaucrat's mind they'd done the hot climate, so they were going to do the cold part of Ecuador, because there's hot and cold in Ecuador. But it really had no bearing on.

[Assistant] Were there any resident specialists in Latin American studies or Ecuador?

[User] We had a lot of people come and talk to us. We had five hours of Spanish every day, two hours of lab and three hours of talking in a small classroom, and we were divided up into ability levels one to six or seven, one to seven, I guess. And so you were in with people who had your same amount of learning and you had to speak in classroom as well as in the lab, which was all tape recorded Foreign Service tapes.

[Assistant] In a small class setting, was there a teacher or an instructor present?

[User] Oh yes, a native Spanish speaker. Not an American who could speak Spanish well, but a native Spanish speaker.

[Assistant] Not necessarily an Ecuadorian.


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

[User] No, not Ecuadorians. We had a Chilean and ours was a Mexican lady. And they kept us very busy at that. And then we had lectures on, it was called ASWAC, A-S-W-A-K [sic]. American society, something or other, and communism. And they would give us lectures to make sure that we understood our country. And most of us have had that sort of thing through grade school, middle school and high school, as well as if anybody took any courses in college.

[Assistant] Yes.

[User] There was this young man, actually more than one young man, who raised their hands and asked questions and commented and made remarks to these speakers, because the young men felt that they knew more about the situation than the people speaking, and sometimes they did. Because one of these guys, I later married. Some of the speakers, a great deal of the speakers who came to us, I don't know where or why the Peace Corps recruited these people, but they would come in and say, well, I'm here to talk to you about community development in Ecuador. Now I haven't been to Ecuador, but I just got back from Vietnam, and I can tell you there's a communist behind every tree and you have to be very careful. And I don't know how many speakers started that way.

[Assistant] Wow.

[User] Many, many of them had just come back from Vietnam. And why the Peace Corps was attracted to these people? And the people who had traveled in Latin America. My at that point future husband had gone to grad school and did his thesis on social reform during the forties in Argentina under Juan Peron. And then he and his roommate had taken a trip through all of South America and Latin America by bus for six months, staying in really small places and spending very little money. And he did know something about Latin America after that experience, so he felt qualified to challenge some of the experts that were brought in.

[Assistant] You mentioned that you were Ecuador VII. So there was a project in Ecuador beginning as early as '61, '62?


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

[User] There was this young man, actually more than one young man, who raised their hands and asked questions and commented and made remarks to these speakers, because the young men felt that they knew more about the situation than the people speaking, and sometimes they did. Because one of these guys, I later married. Some of the speakers, a great deal of the speakers who came to us, I don't know where or why the Peace Corps recruited these people, but they would come in and say, well, I'm here to talk to you about community development in Ecuador. Now I haven't been to Ecuador, but I just got back from Vietnam, and I can tell you there's a communist behind every tree and you have to be very careful. And I don't know how many speakers started that way.

[Assistant] Wow.

[User] Many, many of them had just come back from Vietnam. And why the Peace Corps was attracted to these people? And the people who had traveled in Latin America. My at that point future husband had gone to grad school and did his thesis on social reform during the forties in Argentina under Juan Peron. And then he and his roommate had taken a trip through all of South America and Latin America by bus for six months, staying in really small places and spending very little money. And he did know something about Latin America after that experience, so he felt qualified to challenge some of the experts that were brought in.

[Assistant] You mentioned that you were Ecuador VII. So there was a project in Ecuador beginning as early as '61, '62?

[User] There must have been because.

[Assistant] Did you have any idea of what Ecuador I, II, III, IV had done or was doing?


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

[User] Many, many of them had just come back from Vietnam. And why the Peace Corps was attracted to these people? And the people who had traveled in Latin America. My at that point future husband had gone to grad school and did his thesis on social reform during the forties in Argentina under Juan Peron. And then he and his roommate had taken a trip through all of South America and Latin America by bus for six months, staying in really small places and spending very little money. And he did know something about Latin America after that experience, so he felt qualified to challenge some of the experts that were brought in.

[Assistant] You mentioned that you were Ecuador VII. So there was a project in Ecuador beginning as early as '61, '62?

[User] There must have been because.

[Assistant] Did you have any idea of what Ecuador I, II, III, IV had done or was doing?

[User] Well at that point, I had none.

[Assistant] OK. And so no one came from the field.


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

[User] There must have been because.

[Assistant] Did you have any idea of what Ecuador I, II, III, IV had done or was doing?

[User] Well at that point, I had none.

[Assistant] OK. And so no one came from the field.

[User] No.

[Assistant] How about Peace Corps staff from Washington or people who would be working with you once you got in the field? Do you remember any of them at the university?


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

[User] Well at that point, I had none.

[Assistant] OK. And so no one came from the field.

[User] No.

[Assistant] How about Peace Corps staff from Washington or people who would be working with you once you got in the field? Do you remember any of them at the university?

[User] Yeah, we had, uh, Carston Lane was one of the Peace Corps Washington staff. And he was a little strange but tried to keep us on the official line doing what we were supposed to be doing. But he wasn't involved in the day to day operations.

[Assistant] Yeah. How were you, during this time, how were you aware of the selection process?


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

[User] Yeah, we had, uh, Carston Lane was one of the Peace Corps Washington staff. And he was a little strange but tried to keep us on the official line doing what we were supposed to be doing. But he wasn't involved in the day to day operations.

[Assistant] Yeah. How were you, during this time, how were you aware of the selection process?

[User] Oh, the selection process. This was when we had peer ratings. And at the end of every six weeks or it seemed like it was fairly often, but it probably wasn't that often, we had to fill out a questionnaire. And the questionnaire asked which three people do you think would make the best Peace Corps volunteers? Which three people would make the worst Peace Corps volunteers? Which two people would you like to be stranded on a desert island with? And, um, a lot of other questions, and then we began to realize that these rating sheets were taken in by the four psychologists and one psychiatrist that were overseeing our group. And taken together, put with their findings, and used as a means of kicking people out of the Peace Corps.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And at some point we just refused to fill out at least the part about rating each other. But the psychologists were not at all responsible, some of them. They told one young man that every single person had voted against him. So he looked every one of us individually in the eye, and he knew that we had each voted against him. But when you voted against somebody, it was most likely because you didn't know them very well. They weren't outgoing. It didn't mean that they couldn't have been a good volunteer.

[Assistant] Right. Did you each undergo a psychiatric interview?


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

[User] Oh, the selection process. This was when we had peer ratings. And at the end of every six weeks or it seemed like it was fairly often, but it probably wasn't that often, we had to fill out a questionnaire. And the questionnaire asked which three people do you think would make the best Peace Corps volunteers? Which three people would make the worst Peace Corps volunteers? Which two people would you like to be stranded on a desert island with? And, um, a lot of other questions, and then we began to realize that these rating sheets were taken in by the four psychologists and one psychiatrist that were overseeing our group. And taken together, put with their findings, and used as a means of kicking people out of the Peace Corps.

[Assistant] Yeah.

[User] And at some point we just refused to fill out at least the part about rating each other. But the psychologists were not at all responsible, some of them. They told one young man that every single person had voted against him. So he looked every one of us individually in the eye, and he knew that we had each voted against him. But when you voted against somebody, it was most likely because you didn't know them very well. They weren't outgoing. It didn't mean that they couldn't have been a good volunteer.

[Assistant] Right. Did you each undergo a psychiatric interview?

[User] Oh, many, many of them. We had psychiatric, psychological or psychiatric groups which were not Grupo Be, but they were different groups put together. I don't know how. And then they'd get us together as if it were a psychoanalysis session. And they would ask us, what do you think about the group and who do you think is the worst person? And of course, the person chosen would be somebody that wasn't in the room. And what do you think we should do about this? How can we make her be better and what is your thinking about? And it was all, most of us saw it as total nonsense. But they were using this to evaluate us.

[Assistant] Right. But you, as an individual, had at least one separate interview with a psychiatrist and one with the psychologist.


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

[User] And at some point we just refused to fill out at least the part about rating each other. But the psychologists were not at all responsible, some of them. They told one young man that every single person had voted against him. So he looked every one of us individually in the eye, and he knew that we had each voted against him. But when you voted against somebody, it was most likely because you didn't know them very well. They weren't outgoing. It didn't mean that they couldn't have been a good volunteer.

[Assistant] Right. Did you each undergo a psychiatric interview?

[User] Oh, many, many of them. We had psychiatric, psychological or psychiatric groups which were not Grupo Be, but they were different groups put together. I don't know how. And then they'd get us together as if it were a psychoanalysis session. And they would ask us, what do you think about the group and who do you think is the worst person? And of course, the person chosen would be somebody that wasn't in the room. And what do you think we should do about this? How can we make her be better and what is your thinking about? And it was all, most of us saw it as total nonsense. But they were using this to evaluate us.

[Assistant] Right. But you, as an individual, had at least one separate interview with a psychiatrist and one with the psychologist.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Yeah, because one of the things that struck me has struck many people. You have no experience of psychiatry. I mean, you haven't been, you've never seen a psychiatrist and all of a sudden you're in a position of wanting to be in the Peace Corps and wanting to go to Ecuador, and you've got to confront this.


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

[User] Oh, many, many of them. We had psychiatric, psychological or psychiatric groups which were not Grupo Be, but they were different groups put together. I don't know how. And then they'd get us together as if it were a psychoanalysis session. And they would ask us, what do you think about the group and who do you think is the worst person? And of course, the person chosen would be somebody that wasn't in the room. And what do you think we should do about this? How can we make her be better and what is your thinking about? And it was all, most of us saw it as total nonsense. But they were using this to evaluate us.

[Assistant] Right. But you, as an individual, had at least one separate interview with a psychiatrist and one with the psychologist.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] Yeah, because one of the things that struck me has struck many people. You have no experience of psychiatry. I mean, you haven't been, you've never seen a psychiatrist and all of a sudden you're in a position of wanting to be in the Peace Corps and wanting to go to Ecuador, and you've got to confront this.

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Do you particularly recall it or was it?


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

[User] Right.

[Assistant] Do you particularly recall it or was it?

[User] I do, because of some of the questions he asked. My major was, my minor was psych.

[Assistant] Oh, OK.

[User] And I had wanted, actually after I'd had a couple of years in college, I decided what I really would like to do was be a psychoanalyst or a clinical psychologist. But I didn't. I wasn't able. I mean, I didn't think that my parents would pay to put me through more college than four years of college, and I had younger brothers who had to go to college. So I stuck with what I had, but I was a little maybe more familiar than some people. The psychologist that interviewed me asked me if I, when I got very, very frustrated, did I ever feel that I had to go out and drag a man home to my bed? And I thought this was a rather bizarre thing to be asking a 21 year old girl right out of college. I don't know whether it was bizarre or not, but it certainly seems so to me. Nobody had ever said that to me before.

[Assistant] Right. And this was 1962.


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

[User] I do, because of some of the questions he asked. My major was, my minor was psych.

[Assistant] Oh, OK.

[User] And I had wanted, actually after I'd had a couple of years in college, I decided what I really would like to do was be a psychoanalyst or a clinical psychologist. But I didn't. I wasn't able. I mean, I didn't think that my parents would pay to put me through more college than four years of college, and I had younger brothers who had to go to college. So I stuck with what I had, but I was a little maybe more familiar than some people. The psychologist that interviewed me asked me if I, when I got very, very frustrated, did I ever feel that I had to go out and drag a man home to my bed? And I thought this was a rather bizarre thing to be asking a 21 year old girl right out of college. I don't know whether it was bizarre or not, but it certainly seems so to me. Nobody had ever said that to me before.

[Assistant] Right. And this was 1962.

[User] Yeah, we have to, you know, the nineties and the 2000s are very different than '63, '64. So um. The interviews with psychologists, I think, tended to go rather flat because once people realized that the psychologists were ruling people out, I think most of the group became non-cooperative.

[Assistant] Yeah. Were people deselected during training?


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

[User] And I had wanted, actually after I'd had a couple of years in college, I decided what I really would like to do was be a psychoanalyst or a clinical psychologist. But I didn't. I wasn't able. I mean, I didn't think that my parents would pay to put me through more college than four years of college, and I had younger brothers who had to go to college. So I stuck with what I had, but I was a little maybe more familiar than some people. The psychologist that interviewed me asked me if I, when I got very, very frustrated, did I ever feel that I had to go out and drag a man home to my bed? And I thought this was a rather bizarre thing to be asking a 21 year old girl right out of college. I don't know whether it was bizarre or not, but it certainly seems so to me. Nobody had ever said that to me before.

[Assistant] Right. And this was 1962.

[User] Yeah, we have to, you know, the nineties and the 2000s are very different than '63, '64. So um. The interviews with psychologists, I think, tended to go rather flat because once people realized that the psychologists were ruling people out, I think most of the group became non-cooperative.

[Assistant] Yeah. Were people deselected during training?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] So people were disappearing. You'd come to class.


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

[User] Yeah, we have to, you know, the nineties and the 2000s are very different than '63, '64. So um. The interviews with psychologists, I think, tended to go rather flat because once people realized that the psychologists were ruling people out, I think most of the group became non-cooperative.

[Assistant] Yeah. Were people deselected during training?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] So people were disappearing. You'd come to class.

[User] Well, the first deselection was Valentine's Day. We call it the Valentine's Day massacre, and my future husband to be was deselected. Just prior to that, his shoulder dislocated in one of these things that you're not required to do. It was a basketball game. Everybody's playing. And he has trick shoulders and Peace Corps told him that they couldn't be responsible for him in South America if his shoulders were going to dislocate. They didn't know where he would be, how far from help he would be. And this was maybe the third time that his shoulder had dislocated. And it's in fact, it's happened, I think, a total of eight times now, both shoulders, and there's really no way to fix it. Just stay out of positions that are going to. Don't ski, for example. Anyway, a lot of people were kicked out. I don't know, 12 people out of the total number, something like that. And some of them for reasons that you couldn't understand. They seem like perfectly fine people.

[Assistant] And nobody made any explanations to you, to the group?


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

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] So people were disappearing. You'd come to class.

[User] Well, the first deselection was Valentine's Day. We call it the Valentine's Day massacre, and my future husband to be was deselected. Just prior to that, his shoulder dislocated in one of these things that you're not required to do. It was a basketball game. Everybody's playing. And he has trick shoulders and Peace Corps told him that they couldn't be responsible for him in South America if his shoulders were going to dislocate. They didn't know where he would be, how far from help he would be. And this was maybe the third time that his shoulder had dislocated. And it's in fact, it's happened, I think, a total of eight times now, both shoulders, and there's really no way to fix it. Just stay out of positions that are going to. Don't ski, for example. Anyway, a lot of people were kicked out. I don't know, 12 people out of the total number, something like that. And some of them for reasons that you couldn't understand. They seem like perfectly fine people.

[Assistant] And nobody made any explanations to you, to the group?

[User] No, not that I remember. It's possible that something was said. Maybe they met with us and said, these people are leaving and you'll have to take our word for it that they're not going to be good volunteers. I don't know.

[Assistant] When your future husband was deselected, had you been dating before?


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

[User] Well, the first deselection was Valentine's Day. We call it the Valentine's Day massacre, and my future husband to be was deselected. Just prior to that, his shoulder dislocated in one of these things that you're not required to do. It was a basketball game. Everybody's playing. And he has trick shoulders and Peace Corps told him that they couldn't be responsible for him in South America if his shoulders were going to dislocate. They didn't know where he would be, how far from help he would be. And this was maybe the third time that his shoulder had dislocated. And it's in fact, it's happened, I think, a total of eight times now, both shoulders, and there's really no way to fix it. Just stay out of positions that are going to. Don't ski, for example. Anyway, a lot of people were kicked out. I don't know, 12 people out of the total number, something like that. And some of them for reasons that you couldn't understand. They seem like perfectly fine people.

[Assistant] And nobody made any explanations to you, to the group?

[User] No, not that I remember. It's possible that something was said. Maybe they met with us and said, these people are leaving and you'll have to take our word for it that they're not going to be good volunteers. I don't know.

[Assistant] When your future husband was deselected, had you been dating before?

[User] No. He had been dating my roommate.

[Assistant] Oh, OK. So it wasn't, I mean, then it wasn't you had envisioned being there with him and that.


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

[User] No, not that I remember. It's possible that something was said. Maybe they met with us and said, these people are leaving and you'll have to take our word for it that they're not going to be good volunteers. I don't know.

[Assistant] When your future husband was deselected, had you been dating before?

[User] No. He had been dating my roommate.

[Assistant] Oh, OK. So it wasn't, I mean, then it wasn't you had envisioned being there with him and that.

[User] No, no. There were a lot of people very unhappy because by that time we had formed friendships.

[Assistant] Yeah. Oh yeah.


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

[User] No. He had been dating my roommate.

[Assistant] Oh, OK. So it wasn't, I mean, then it wasn't you had envisioned being there with him and that.

[User] No, no. There were a lot of people very unhappy because by that time we had formed friendships.

[Assistant] Yeah. Oh yeah.

[User] But it wasn't that I envisioned being in South America with him.

[Assistant] How long was the entire period at Denver?


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

[User] No, no. There were a lot of people very unhappy because by that time we had formed friendships.

[Assistant] Yeah. Oh yeah.

[User] But it wasn't that I envisioned being in South America with him.

[Assistant] How long was the entire period at Denver?

[User] Well, from maybe January 2nd to sometime in March. I don't know exactly, because I know that we did go down for one or two weeks to Mexico. We split up after this training. There were at least two deselections, possibly three during that time. Then the rural group went to the UNESCO Training Center, which is the acronym is CREFAL, C-R-E-F- A-L, in Pátzcuaro, Mexico, where we were given courses. We were given in Spanish lectures on community action.

[Assistant] So you were in that group.


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

[User] But it wasn't that I envisioned being in South America with him.

[Assistant] How long was the entire period at Denver?

[User] Well, from maybe January 2nd to sometime in March. I don't know exactly, because I know that we did go down for one or two weeks to Mexico. We split up after this training. There were at least two deselections, possibly three during that time. Then the rural group went to the UNESCO Training Center, which is the acronym is CREFAL, C-R-E-F- A-L, in Pátzcuaro, Mexico, where we were given courses. We were given in Spanish lectures on community action.

[Assistant] So you were in that group.

[User] I was in that group. I was really lucky because that was a wonderful experience. Really nice people working there and.

[Assistant] Obviously your Spanish had improved and the language training took with you, I mean.


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

[User] Well, from maybe January 2nd to sometime in March. I don't know exactly, because I know that we did go down for one or two weeks to Mexico. We split up after this training. There were at least two deselections, possibly three during that time. Then the rural group went to the UNESCO Training Center, which is the acronym is CREFAL, C-R-E-F- A-L, in Pátzcuaro, Mexico, where we were given courses. We were given in Spanish lectures on community action.

[Assistant] So you were in that group.

[User] I was in that group. I was really lucky because that was a wonderful experience. Really nice people working there and.

[Assistant] Obviously your Spanish had improved and the language training took with you, I mean.

[User] Well, it took with everybody to some extent. I mean, you can't spend five hours a day. We were all dreaming in Spanish and talking in our sleep in Spanish.

[Assistant] And when you were evaluated in Spanish while you were still in Denver, did you get some kind of rating that you were an FSR something?


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

[User] I was in that group. I was really lucky because that was a wonderful experience. Really nice people working there and.

[Assistant] Obviously your Spanish had improved and the language training took with you, I mean.

[User] Well, it took with everybody to some extent. I mean, you can't spend five hours a day. We were all dreaming in Spanish and talking in our sleep in Spanish.

[Assistant] And when you were evaluated in Spanish while you were still in Denver, did you get some kind of rating that you were an FSR something?

[User] No, I was never told anything like that. I don't even remember an evaluation.

[Assistant] How did they know that you knew Spanish?


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

[User] Well, it took with everybody to some extent. I mean, you can't spend five hours a day. We were all dreaming in Spanish and talking in our sleep in Spanish.

[Assistant] And when you were evaluated in Spanish while you were still in Denver, did you get some kind of rating that you were an FSR something?

[User] No, I was never told anything like that. I don't even remember an evaluation.

[Assistant] How did they know that you knew Spanish?

[User] I don't know whether they did know. Well, they probably talked to the language teachers and the language teachers could easily tell. I was in the next to the highest group. My roommate in Ecuador, who did go to Ecuador, was in the bottom group, who didn't know any Spanish and doesn't really seem to have an inclination toward languages. But because of her skills, one way or another, she was sent down there.

[Assistant] Still in Denver, during training, did you begin to get a sense of what your role was going to be or might be when you got to Ecuador? Or was the focus still sort of general and generic?


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

[User] No, I was never told anything like that. I don't even remember an evaluation.

[Assistant] How did they know that you knew Spanish?

[User] I don't know whether they did know. Well, they probably talked to the language teachers and the language teachers could easily tell. I was in the next to the highest group. My roommate in Ecuador, who did go to Ecuador, was in the bottom group, who didn't know any Spanish and doesn't really seem to have an inclination toward languages. But because of her skills, one way or another, she was sent down there.

[Assistant] Still in Denver, during training, did you begin to get a sense of what your role was going to be or might be when you got to Ecuador? Or was the focus still sort of general and generic?

[User] Well, they tried. They showed us how to kill chickens and how to dismember them, pluck them, and put them together. They showed the men how to lay a water main, including pouring the lead into the turnings and everything. This was very sexist orientation, but that's the way Latin America is. Women are not going to be laying water mains. So we had some idea that this might be handy. We were also given courses in health, in sanitation, things like that.

[Assistant] But was there anything specific to Ecuador, that this is the rural urban split and these kind of villages and the general needs might be?


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

[User] Well, they tried. They showed us how to kill chickens and how to dismember them, pluck them, and put them together. They showed the men how to lay a water main, including pouring the lead into the turnings and everything. This was very sexist orientation, but that's the way Latin America is. Women are not going to be laying water mains. So we had some idea that this might be handy. We were also given courses in health, in sanitation, things like that.

[Assistant] But was there anything specific to Ecuador, that this is the rural urban split and these kind of villages and the general needs might be?

[User] No, there was very little information about specifics.

[Assistant] Ecuador history?

[User] We probably had some Ecuador history. I don't remember now. But they didn't tell us who was going where. And they didn't tell us, uh, I suppose some of that would depend on how you worked out in the urban rural situation you were put in. I don't know.

[Assistant] Well did they know do you think?


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

[User] No, there was very little information about specifics.

[Assistant] Ecuador history?

[User] We probably had some Ecuador history. I don't remember now. But they didn't tell us who was going where. And they didn't tell us, uh, I suppose some of that would depend on how you worked out in the urban rural situation you were put in. I don't know.

[Assistant] Well did they know do you think?

[User] Probably not. Not at that point.

[Assistant] OK. Was there Peace Corps field staff who would touch base at the training to become familiar with you? I mean, was there any kind of communication between the field and training that you knew of?


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

[User] We probably had some Ecuador history. I don't remember now. But they didn't tell us who was going where. And they didn't tell us, uh, I suppose some of that would depend on how you worked out in the urban rural situation you were put in. I don't know.

[Assistant] Well did they know do you think?

[User] Probably not. Not at that point.

[Assistant] OK. Was there Peace Corps field staff who would touch base at the training to become familiar with you? I mean, was there any kind of communication between the field and training that you knew of?

[User] It's hard for me to remember. But it's possible the director, who was Gene Baird, came and visited us, but he wouldn't have been given an opportunity to make any selection or anything. And there was nobody who really told us what life is like in a village or life is like in Guayaquil in the big city. So we really didn't have. Most of our speakers had talked to us about Vietnam.

[Assistant] Were there any Washington visitors?


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

[User] It's hard for me to remember. But it's possible the director, who was Gene Baird, came and visited us, but he wouldn't have been given an opportunity to make any selection or anything. And there was nobody who really told us what life is like in a village or life is like in Guayaquil in the big city. So we really didn't have. Most of our speakers had talked to us about Vietnam.

[Assistant] Were there any Washington visitors?

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Name people?

[User] Well, Carston Lane was one who was constantly. He must have been in charge of our group because he would be there every so often and give us a little chat about official stuff.

[Assistant] Shriver? Bill Moyers?


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

[User] Yeah.

[Assistant] Name people?

[User] Well, Carston Lane was one who was constantly. He must have been in charge of our group because he would be there every so often and give us a little chat about official stuff.

[Assistant] Shriver? Bill Moyers?

[User] No. No, no, no. Those were big guys and we were just a very small group.

[Assistant] You never knew where Shriver was going to pop up


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

[User] Well, Carston Lane was one who was constantly. He must have been in charge of our group because he would be there every so often and give us a little chat about official stuff.

[Assistant] Shriver? Bill Moyers?

[User] No. No, no, no. Those were big guys and we were just a very small group.

[Assistant] You never knew where Shriver was going to pop up

[User] Well, he didn't seem to pop up in our place.

[Assistant] Did you have a sense of you were going off sort of individual or in small group on this adventure? Or did you have a strong link to the Peace Corps? I mean, do you have any sense of that? Don't let me put words in your mouth, I mean.


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

[User] Well, he didn't seem to pop up in our place.

[Assistant] Did you have a sense of you were going off sort of individual or in small group on this adventure? Or did you have a strong link to the Peace Corps? I mean, do you have any sense of that? Don't let me put words in your mouth, I mean.

[User]
Well, my background is my relatives were all military. I was used to being a government subsidy or a government person. And yes, and the kind of person I am, I felt loyalty to the Peace Corps. I felt this was my organization that I belonged to. I don't know that everybody felt the same way. I had heard many negative reports about training, even about Outward Bound, which my husband and I felt was one of the best experiences in our lives we've ever had. And we felt that way right afterwards, whereas a lot of people in our group felt it was very negative and didn't like it. And I don't know how they feel about it now. But there were lots of different feelings about the whole organization.

My experience has been, since I have a daughter who was in the Peace Corps too, and I was a staff wife at one point, that the worst thing that volunteers. Well, one of the worst things that they encounter is their antagonism toward the administration. And they're always going to be fighting the administration. And unlike many jobs, it's the volunteers who are doing the job that was supposed to be done. It's not the administration that's there to be the administration. I mean, they're there as backup, but it's the people on the bottom that are there doing the job.

[Assistant] Interesting point.

[User] And it's an interesting way to, um, to see a structure of an organization and have to deal with people. When you get somebody in who is a supervisor or a boss, he's often used to knowing everything and telling people how he wants them to behave. And in the Peace Corps, it's often the other way around. The volunteer is the person who knows the things.

[Assistant] Yeah, so you went Denver, two weeks in Mexico at the UNESCO Training Center.