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

[User] Indeed. So I sort of feel I've been making a giant circle of the continent, from Ontario, to Langley, to Houston.

[Assistant] That's right.

[User] Stopped for forty years.

[Assistant] Sounds like you—well, you may still make it out to the West Coast. You still have plenty of time.\n\n As you were working with Mercury, then you worked into the Advanced Vehicles Group, and then Apollo, did you have any connection at all with Gemini?

[User] Not really. Gemini was inserted into the program for reasons, I'll say, other than engineering, and I think, looking at it in retrospect, it was a brilliant move. In fact, I think one of our Canadian colleagues, Jim [James A.] Chamberlin, was quite instrumental in promoting the Gemini Project, and I think he and, I'm sure, others realized that there needed to be a bridge between a single person in a very limited spacecraft for a period of a day, and three people in a very complicated spacecraft for a lunar mission for two weeks.\n\n Somehow you needed to develop a lot of operational understanding. You had to learn to do rendezvous and docking. You had to operate multiple spacecraft, as we did with the command module and the lunar module, and that you needed a vehicle to develop this. I think this was the genesis of the Gemini Program. From an engineering point of view, it was just sort of a slightly scaled-up overgrown Mercury, no particular engineering challenges. I think I made one trip to St. Louis [Missouri] to look at the Gemini shield, which was pretty standard state of the art. So I really had virtually nothing to do with it, but it was a good, solid program and an important part of the preparation for Apollo, giving the flight experience and the operational development opportunities.

[Assistant] A good learning opportunity.


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

[User] Stopped for forty years.

[Assistant] Sounds like you—well, you may still make it out to the West Coast. You still have plenty of time.\n\n As you were working with Mercury, then you worked into the Advanced Vehicles Group, and then Apollo, did you have any connection at all with Gemini?

[User] Not really. Gemini was inserted into the program for reasons, I'll say, other than engineering, and I think, looking at it in retrospect, it was a brilliant move. In fact, I think one of our Canadian colleagues, Jim [James A.] Chamberlin, was quite instrumental in promoting the Gemini Project, and I think he and, I'm sure, others realized that there needed to be a bridge between a single person in a very limited spacecraft for a period of a day, and three people in a very complicated spacecraft for a lunar mission for two weeks.\n\n Somehow you needed to develop a lot of operational understanding. You had to learn to do rendezvous and docking. You had to operate multiple spacecraft, as we did with the command module and the lunar module, and that you needed a vehicle to develop this. I think this was the genesis of the Gemini Program. From an engineering point of view, it was just sort of a slightly scaled-up overgrown Mercury, no particular engineering challenges. I think I made one trip to St. Louis [Missouri] to look at the Gemini shield, which was pretty standard state of the art. So I really had virtually nothing to do with it, but it was a good, solid program and an important part of the preparation for Apollo, giving the flight experience and the operational development opportunities.

[Assistant] A good learning opportunity.

[User] Very important part of the learning process.

[Assistant] While you were working with Apollo, you had a couple of different positions in the thermal analysis section in the thermo-structures branch. Is there any specific responsibility beyond what you've told us about, work on the Apollo heat shield, anything that was unique to any of those positions?


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

[User] You know, you fantasize about some of these scenarios, too. I thought supposing we do find something really deadly. What is the action? And it went through our minds that, well, you might, in fact, have to sacrifice everybody in the laboratory and bulldoze it under 100 feet of dirt. This sort of thing goes through your mind, if you really did have something that was seriously pathogenic. But fortunately, at least for the areas we visited, there was never anything of any serious hazard whatsoever.

[Assistant] At least so far. We've hit the thirty-year mark.

[User] It'll be interesting to go through this again as we tackle Mars samples return, because in three or four years we'll be coming back with samples from Mars, and we'll have to think through all the same decisions, but now with, I think, a much greater likelihood of life forms from Mars. So the quarantine issue has already been discussed again.

[Assistant] Should be interesting to see what comes of that. We'll go ahead and pause here briefly to change out the tape.

[User] Okay. [Recorder turned off.]

[Assistant] We were talking about your work at the Lunar Receiving Laboratory and the challenges that you had to work with, some that you had found yourself in the job to make it all work and to deal with the back contamination issue. Did you also have many considerations for the scientific issues, like what would be done with the rocks after they were brought back? Or was that a later consideration?


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

[User] All the way around.

[Assistant] It's good to see they were still interested.

[User] I was delighted. And just a historic accident that I had maintained my Canadian citizenship during that period of time, because they wanted me to represent Canada here at Johnson. They wanted a Canadian citizen. Through a series of historical quirks, I had not become a naturalized U.S. citizen, so I was still qualified for their short list of candidates.

[Assistant] Interesting how fate happens or twists and it all ends up working out.

[User] It certainly seems to. I've been richly blessed in terms of this kind of opportunity.

[Assistant] Very good.\n\n About your opportunity at the Canadian Space Agency. When you first came in, or at the time it was the NRC, what were your initial tasks and responsibilities and the state of the space station at the time, and how did that evolve?


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

[User] Well, I'd like to think it has yet to come, so I'm not sure. I think the analytical melding of all the data that gave us the confidence in the Apollo heat shield performance, that is sort of one thing I look back on and say that was, in engineering terms, not in scientific terms, but in engineering terms, that was about as close to pioneering as I've ever gotten. It was probing into some really new areas. There wasn't a lot of precedent to go by. We had to do something, so you did what you could. Then very thankful when it works. So that, I think, is one that stands out.

[Assistant] It certainly was a big challenge and certainly was met successfully. As you said, you probably do have more coming. [Laughter]

[User] We'll see.

[Assistant] And in comparison, or maybe the same thing, what would you think of as your greatest accomplishment?

[User] Well, in a purely professional sense, certainly the Apollo era and the successful return from the moon, that was a landmark.\n\n I also feel good about the large-area crop inventory experiment that we did in the earth resources area. That was a well-conceived experiment, it was well executed, even though the technology was not adopted by our users to the extent we would have liked. It was still a good professional piece of work. I felt good about that.\n\n Under my current circumstances, I have finally got a small space power program going in Canada, and I have persevered and I feel good about that. Now, whether it comes to fruition in any significant way remains to be seen, but I think I will be proud of that as another one of those things that you look back on.

[Assistant] You certainly have many things that you can say that you accomplished and did well. I'm sure that your work on the solar power will come through eventually.


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

[User] We'll see.

[Assistant] And in comparison, or maybe the same thing, what would you think of as your greatest accomplishment?

[User] Well, in a purely professional sense, certainly the Apollo era and the successful return from the moon, that was a landmark.\n\n I also feel good about the large-area crop inventory experiment that we did in the earth resources area. That was a well-conceived experiment, it was well executed, even though the technology was not adopted by our users to the extent we would have liked. It was still a good professional piece of work. I felt good about that.\n\n Under my current circumstances, I have finally got a small space power program going in Canada, and I have persevered and I feel good about that. Now, whether it comes to fruition in any significant way remains to be seen, but I think I will be proud of that as another one of those things that you look back on.

[Assistant] You certainly have many things that you can say that you accomplished and did well. I'm sure that your work on the solar power will come through eventually.

[User] We hope so.

[Assistant] A lot of good reasons for it.\n\n You mentioned earlier that it was in fifth grade when the explorer came and talked about going to the moon, you thought that would be really interesting. Would you ever have thought, or even possibly conceived, where all the different stages your career would take you?


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

[User] No problem.

[Assistant] —to talk about Expedition 50 today and 51. I wanted to ask you when you learned that you would be assigned to a new increment.

[User] I don’t remember the exact date. I think it was last August; it was in August of 2014. The training team assessed my level of knowledge, how much I remembered from before in October. I didn’t start training until April of 2015. The mission is planned to launch in mid-November of 2016.

[Assistant] Seems so long ago, right? I thought it was interesting, because when I was out on your Tumblr page there was a timeline. Someone put that it was announced February 9th. What a great birthday present.

[User] Actually, the official announcement was on February 9th. There’s always a delay between your assignment and the official announcement; it has to be coordinated internationally. It takes time, so that’s what the delay was. It coincidentally happened to be announced on my birthday, so I did get officially announced then.

[Assistant] I was wondering about that.


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

[User] I don’t remember the exact date. I think it was last August; it was in August of 2014. The training team assessed my level of knowledge, how much I remembered from before in October. I didn’t start training until April of 2015. The mission is planned to launch in mid-November of 2016.

[Assistant] Seems so long ago, right? I thought it was interesting, because when I was out on your Tumblr page there was a timeline. Someone put that it was announced February 9th. What a great birthday present.

[User] Actually, the official announcement was on February 9th. There’s always a delay between your assignment and the official announcement; it has to be coordinated internationally. It takes time, so that’s what the delay was. It coincidentally happened to be announced on my birthday, so I did get officially announced then.

[Assistant] I was wondering about that.

[User] And so it was a nice birthday present.

[Assistant] Yes, that’s very nice.


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

[User] Actually, the official announcement was on February 9th. There’s always a delay between your assignment and the official announcement; it has to be coordinated internationally. It takes time, so that’s what the delay was. It coincidentally happened to be announced on my birthday, so I did get officially announced then.

[Assistant] I was wondering about that.

[User] And so it was a nice birthday present.

[Assistant] Yes, that’s very nice.

[User] Not as good as the Columbus module I received on one of my birthday presents.

[Assistant] Still, very memorable. You’ll never forget that.


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

[User] And so it was a nice birthday present.

[Assistant] Yes, that’s very nice.

[User] Not as good as the Columbus module I received on one of my birthday presents.

[Assistant] Still, very memorable. You’ll never forget that.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] It’s been about eight years since you’ve launched and gone to the ISS [International Space Station]. Are you preparing or approaching this mission any differently than you were the last time?


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

[User] Not as good as the Columbus module I received on one of my birthday presents.

[Assistant] Still, very memorable. You’ll never forget that.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] It’s been about eight years since you’ve launched and gone to the ISS [International Space Station]. Are you preparing or approaching this mission any differently than you were the last time?

[User] I think we talked a little bit about training as an evolution [last time we spoke]. We have changed our training plans and our training flows since the beginning of the International Space Station in the 16 years we’ve been flying. So, as part of the training flow, my responsibilities [and] the details of my training have changed over that time. In addition, I also have probably a little bit more say, because I have some experience about what I do or don’t need more or less of. From my perspective of having lived up there a year, I can say, “You know, I don’t really need any more of that training. That’s sufficient. I feel comfortable. I feel refreshed on that. I don’t need any more.”\n\n Usually it’s a discussion with the instructors about, “These connectors are complex; I’d like to have a little bit more training on this,” and they’ll find the time in the schedule to do that, just as a refresher. They have a definitive plan that they want to follow, but they do individualize it to some degree based on previous experience and your own comfort level. I think that the biggest advantage of having flown before is that I know what to worry about and what not to worry about. As a rookie, I was always worrying, “I have to know everything,” and now it’s “Yes, I’ll be okay without any more training on that, because I’ll be able to do it from the procedure. It’ll be fine.” That perspective is very different. It’s a little more relaxed. You don’t have to get quite so stressed about what you don’t know.

[Assistant] So what are you focusing on, or what are your concerns as you get ready?


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

[User] Even with the HTV [H-II Transfer Vehicle] and the Cygnus, you can’t chuck it in, because you could throw off the center of gravity.

[Assistant] Oh, really?

[User] Yes, the ground team will even tell us how to pack the trash, based on its assumed mass, so that you will not mess with the center of gravity too much, and when the vehicle fires its thrusters it will go the direction that the ground team wants it to go, which we also want it to do as well.

[Assistant] That’s important, yes.

[User] So it’s still complex, but not nearly the level of detail that was required on the Orbiter.

[Assistant] So I have to ask: do you have to weigh the trash?


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

[User] Yes, the ground team will even tell us how to pack the trash, based on its assumed mass, so that you will not mess with the center of gravity too much, and when the vehicle fires its thrusters it will go the direction that the ground team wants it to go, which we also want it to do as well.

[Assistant] That’s important, yes.

[User] So it’s still complex, but not nearly the level of detail that was required on the Orbiter.

[Assistant] So I have to ask: do you have to weigh the trash?

[User] We can’t really weigh it, but it’s all known.

[Assistant] Oh, yes, that makes sense.


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

[User] So it’s still complex, but not nearly the level of detail that was required on the Orbiter.

[Assistant] So I have to ask: do you have to weigh the trash?

[User] We can’t really weigh it, but it’s all known.

[Assistant] Oh, yes, that makes sense.

[User] It’s all known because the ground team sent it up. We even get told onboard the Station, when you’re discarding a piece of hardware, “Okay, store this barcode in this particular trash bag, and then this piece of hardware that’s broken or whatever, put it into a different trash bag.” That keeps us from having to re-sort the bags prior to packing them in the vehicle, because they’ll know how much mass each bag has, and how to balance it. They figure that whole plan out here on the ground. It’s just amazingly complex; all the thought that has to go into even just burning up our trash.

[Assistant] Yes, I had no idea.


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

[User] We can’t really weigh it, but it’s all known.

[Assistant] Oh, yes, that makes sense.

[User] It’s all known because the ground team sent it up. We even get told onboard the Station, when you’re discarding a piece of hardware, “Okay, store this barcode in this particular trash bag, and then this piece of hardware that’s broken or whatever, put it into a different trash bag.” That keeps us from having to re-sort the bags prior to packing them in the vehicle, because they’ll know how much mass each bag has, and how to balance it. They figure that whole plan out here on the ground. It’s just amazingly complex; all the thought that has to go into even just burning up our trash.

[Assistant] Yes, I had no idea.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] So what else is new that you’ll be doing on that mission?


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

[User] You can, if you weekends while you are on travel. But there’s not a lot of other time, and the problem is I get tired of traveling. We do get vacations. My flow’s about 18 months, and I think I have five weeks in that timeframe to have vacation. Some of it’s pretty dictated. For instance, the two weeks of Christmas you get vacation, since there are no instructors available. Often, if we have a holiday here in the US, they’ll send us to another country so that we can train there.

[Assistant] Take advantage of that full week.

[User] Yes, instead of a partial week. So the training flow gets a little long, but we do have the week before the last trip to Russia when you would go for launch, there’s a week off. Typically, however, that week we spend getting ready to leave for, in essence, a six months mission plus the seven weeks before the flight. So you’re leaving for seven and a half months, and just taking care of “leaving the planet” stuff takes up that last week. I do get one other week in the earlier summer, before I launch, so we’ll try and do something fun for that one.

[Assistant] So you do get a little breather here and there.

[User] Yes, I do. You just need to make sure you take advantage of them.

[Assistant] Yes, good memories. I was looking at your Facebook or Tumblr page, I can’t remember which, but there was a statement that you have to travel to Russia nine times in preparation for this expedition, and I found that particularly interesting. How many times have you been there since you started training?


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

[User] Yes, instead of a partial week. So the training flow gets a little long, but we do have the week before the last trip to Russia when you would go for launch, there’s a week off. Typically, however, that week we spend getting ready to leave for, in essence, a six months mission plus the seven weeks before the flight. So you’re leaving for seven and a half months, and just taking care of “leaving the planet” stuff takes up that last week. I do get one other week in the earlier summer, before I launch, so we’ll try and do something fun for that one.

[Assistant] So you do get a little breather here and there.

[User] Yes, I do. You just need to make sure you take advantage of them.

[Assistant] Yes, good memories. I was looking at your Facebook or Tumblr page, I can’t remember which, but there was a statement that you have to travel to Russia nine times in preparation for this expedition, and I found that particularly interesting. How many times have you been there since you started training?

[User] I’ve been there twice so far, and I have one more trip this year, and next year I have four trips, so that’s eight times.

[Assistant] How long do you go when you go over to Russia?


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

[User] I’ve been there twice so far, and I have one more trip this year, and next year I have four trips, so that’s eight times.

[Assistant] How long do you go when you go over to Russia?

[User] Most of the trips are three to four weeks. However, two of the trips next year are tied to—and actually one this year was tied to ESA [European Space Agency]. I went to Russia for three weeks and then went to ESA for one week, so it ended up being a four-week trip. There’s two trips next year that are three weeks in Russia, and one to two weeks in Japan. So we’d go from Japan to Russia, and then back home. So an around-the-world trip, go west to get to Japan, go west to get to Moscow, and then go west to get back to the US.

[Assistant] Oh, goodness.

[User] It’s much easier from the Space Station going around the world. It only takes 90 minutes.

[Assistant] I wonder if you can talk a little bit about training in these countries. I imagine the culture is so vastly different from the US, and in Germany things have got to be different from Russia and Japan, and Canada.


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

[User] Mostly, it’s pretty 8:00 to 5:00. When we were doing all our work over in Building 9 for the emergency procedures, the days were a little bit longer. Sometimes a facility [or] capability that’s rare or harder to schedule, then your days might be a little longer. But in general, I think this training flow is the easiest one I’ve been in, and some of it is because our training has become more efficient. It doesn’t feel quite as compressed and busy as it did before, which is why I’m talking to you.

[Assistant] Right, yes.

[User] I’m able to do this, even though it’s on my lunch break.

[Assistant] Oh, I’m so sorry. I’m eating up your lunch break. We can go to the cafeteria, if you’d like.

[User] No, that’s all right.

[Assistant] We did that once with somebody. It didn’t work out very well.


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

[User] I’m able to do this, even though it’s on my lunch break.

[Assistant] Oh, I’m so sorry. I’m eating up your lunch break. We can go to the cafeteria, if you’d like.

[User] No, that’s all right.

[Assistant] We did that once with somebody. It didn’t work out very well.

[User] Yes, I’m thinking, lugging all this hardware might not be the right thing.

[Assistant] Well, it’s not too bad, it’s just all the noise. And when you eat, it’s hard to talk, because you don’t want to have food in your mouth and talk. The last time you were at the ISS, you were building the outpost. This time you won’t be, so do you think it will be more like working in an actual lab, like when you were an NRC [National Research Council] fellow, because you won’t have to be putting together these components in space?


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

[User] No, that’s all right.

[Assistant] We did that once with somebody. It didn’t work out very well.

[User] Yes, I’m thinking, lugging all this hardware might not be the right thing.

[Assistant] Well, it’s not too bad, it’s just all the noise. And when you eat, it’s hard to talk, because you don’t want to have food in your mouth and talk. The last time you were at the ISS, you were building the outpost. This time you won’t be, so do you think it will be more like working in an actual lab, like when you were an NRC [National Research Council] fellow, because you won’t have to be putting together these components in space?

[User] I do think it’s going to be much more laboratory science oriented this time around, which I don’t mind at all. I enjoy doing all the science. I’m interested in the different types of science that we do onboard, and I think that diversity of ideas that come up from all the investigators all over the world for us to try out on board is pretty exciting and fun. I like the experiments that require more hands on stuff, just because I’m used to working in a lab doing things on my own. A lot of the experiments are mechanized, automated, so that it doesn’t require a lot of crew time, but for me the most fun things are the ones that do require the crew to be involved a little more integrally. It’s just a little more interesting, exciting to do. It’s great that we have that many things going on onboard the Station, so I’m looking forward to it.

[Assistant] What are some of those experiments that require you to have more hands-on involvement?


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

[User] Not necessarily, we all do whatever experiments they timeline us to do. I think the crew will get attached to certain experiments, and you become more efficient at certain experiments. I remember during Expedition 16 Dan [Daniel Tani] and I traded tasks so that I could continue doing the one experiment that I was just talking about. I told him, “I’ll do this task for you if you do this one for me,” so we traded tasks, just because you get a little bit attached. You get good at it, you get efficient at it after you’ve done it a few times, and it saves time in the long run to be the same person doing it.

[Assistant] That makes sense. So do you work much with the PIs [Principal Investigators] on the ground before you go up?

[User] We will have briefings with them, usually. It depends on how complex the science is. We also can have on-orbit briefings, as well, or just written text briefings that we read before we do the investigation. All that’s good because that way when you do your public affairs events you can talk about the experiments, and have a little more background and reminders for what the potential benefits, or why we’re interested in looking at X or Y in zero gravity. So it helps us explain it better to the public.

[Assistant] When I opened JSC today there was a story about ISS and brain research. Are you involved in any of that research that’s going on?

[User] I’m doing the cognitive studies. Most people are, I think, but the one European study I’m not doing, because they prioritized a different US study for me, so Thomas may be doing that one. I don’t know for sure yet.

[Assistant] Do you get a chance when you come back from this increment to work with the PIs and maybe publish a paper, or is that their research? You were the operator in space.


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

[User] We will have briefings with them, usually. It depends on how complex the science is. We also can have on-orbit briefings, as well, or just written text briefings that we read before we do the investigation. All that’s good because that way when you do your public affairs events you can talk about the experiments, and have a little more background and reminders for what the potential benefits, or why we’re interested in looking at X or Y in zero gravity. So it helps us explain it better to the public.

[Assistant] When I opened JSC today there was a story about ISS and brain research. Are you involved in any of that research that’s going on?

[User] I’m doing the cognitive studies. Most people are, I think, but the one European study I’m not doing, because they prioritized a different US study for me, so Thomas may be doing that one. I don’t know for sure yet.

[Assistant] Do you get a chance when you come back from this increment to work with the PIs and maybe publish a paper, or is that their research? You were the operator in space.

[User] The reality is it’s their research, and most scientific disciplines require the intellectual input, as opposed to just being the hands, and I think many times we’re just the hands. I have been on a number of publications, some of which I felt like I did contribute to, and others which I felt, “That’s on the edge of whether or not I think I really was providing a lot of intellectual input in this,” other than just being your hands on orbit. So there are some opportunities, but I don’t think it should be done, except when we are providing that intellectual input.

[Assistant] I was just curious about that. It would be a nice opportunity for you to get a few more publications.


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

[User] I’m doing the cognitive studies. Most people are, I think, but the one European study I’m not doing, because they prioritized a different US study for me, so Thomas may be doing that one. I don’t know for sure yet.

[Assistant] Do you get a chance when you come back from this increment to work with the PIs and maybe publish a paper, or is that their research? You were the operator in space.

[User] The reality is it’s their research, and most scientific disciplines require the intellectual input, as opposed to just being the hands, and I think many times we’re just the hands. I have been on a number of publications, some of which I felt like I did contribute to, and others which I felt, “That’s on the edge of whether or not I think I really was providing a lot of intellectual input in this,” other than just being your hands on orbit. So there are some opportunities, but I don’t think it should be done, except when we are providing that intellectual input.

[Assistant] I was just curious about that. It would be a nice opportunity for you to get a few more publications.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] You talked a little bit about working out at the NBL. Have things changed at all? I know, for instance, the oil and gas industry is out there. Does that complicate things for training?


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

[User] The reality is it’s their research, and most scientific disciplines require the intellectual input, as opposed to just being the hands, and I think many times we’re just the hands. I have been on a number of publications, some of which I felt like I did contribute to, and others which I felt, “That’s on the edge of whether or not I think I really was providing a lot of intellectual input in this,” other than just being your hands on orbit. So there are some opportunities, but I don’t think it should be done, except when we are providing that intellectual input.

[Assistant] I was just curious about that. It would be a nice opportunity for you to get a few more publications.

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] You talked a little bit about working out at the NBL. Have things changed at all? I know, for instance, the oil and gas industry is out there. Does that complicate things for training?

[User] For our training, probably the biggest complication is the Station structure didn’t fit in the pool in one piece as it was before, and now they’ve closed off probably only 25 percent of the pool and given it to the oil and gas industry. That meant we had to take apart more of the other pieces of the truss structure; it’s doable. It’s not ideal. It didn’t fit in one piece before, so we were breaking it apart anyway. So it’s just now in more pieces, so you have to say, “Okay, now float me over to that next piece and then I’ll crawl across it. Now float me over to that next piece, and I’ll crawl across it.” So it takes a while to get out to piece six.

[Assistant] It sounds like it. So what sort of things are you simulating, since you don’t know for sure how many maintenance EVAs or things that you’ll be working on?


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

[User] I did on my first flight. When I was crew three, I had to train as a potential crew member to do EVAs during that timeframe. I also trained on Expedition 16, as well, so to do Orlan EVAs but not anymore. Now the USOS trains their crew for the EMU [Extravehicular Mobility Unit], and the Russian side trains their crew for the Orlan. So I have done one EVA in the Orlan on my first expedition, and then my second expedition I did five in the EMU.

[Assistant] That’s interesting. I was curious about that. When the Shuttle was flying, I’ve heard that it’s good to be prime crew. Is that still the case now? You get the best time on simulators, and, from what I understand, best parking spots, things like that? Is that the case for Station?

[User] That’s not the case. Being assigned crew now gives you higher priority, like to get T-83 flight time, because your schedule is much more limited, so you have higher priority for that. You don’t get a closer parking spot.

[Assistant] No?

[User] I mean, the only good part about being prime crew is you know you’re next. It’s good. That’s a good thing.

[Assistant] Yes, you’re assigned. Do you think there’s any significant or major challenges that you’re encountering as you prepare for this next expedition to go up, or things are just going really smoothly?


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

[User] That’s not the case. Being assigned crew now gives you higher priority, like to get T-83 flight time, because your schedule is much more limited, so you have higher priority for that. You don’t get a closer parking spot.

[Assistant] No?

[User] I mean, the only good part about being prime crew is you know you’re next. It’s good. That’s a good thing.

[Assistant] Yes, you’re assigned. Do you think there’s any significant or major challenges that you’re encountering as you prepare for this next expedition to go up, or things are just going really smoothly?

[User] Well, knock on wood, it’s going very, very smoothly. I don’t anticipate any problems or issues. Obviously I hope we’re all very prepared for anything that can happen. We practice a lot on these emergencies and hope none of them ever happen. We need to be prepared, and I’m comfortable that we will be there. We’ve done a couple weeks of that training. We’ve got a few more weeks of that left, and I’m confident we’ll get there, because we just have really strong crews, so I’m happy about that.

[Assistant] I had read recently that there was a French documentary crew that came and did some filming. Can you talk about that and what they were interested in?


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

[User] I mean, the only good part about being prime crew is you know you’re next. It’s good. That’s a good thing.

[Assistant] Yes, you’re assigned. Do you think there’s any significant or major challenges that you’re encountering as you prepare for this next expedition to go up, or things are just going really smoothly?

[User] Well, knock on wood, it’s going very, very smoothly. I don’t anticipate any problems or issues. Obviously I hope we’re all very prepared for anything that can happen. We practice a lot on these emergencies and hope none of them ever happen. We need to be prepared, and I’m comfortable that we will be there. We’ve done a couple weeks of that training. We’ve got a few more weeks of that left, and I’m confident we’ll get there, because we just have really strong crews, so I’m happy about that.

[Assistant] I had read recently that there was a French documentary crew that came and did some filming. Can you talk about that and what they were interested in?

[User] They’re doing a documentary on Thomas, and I guess I am going to be involved in it, too. They did one previously with [G.] Reid [Wiseman] and Alex [Alexander] Gerst, and focusing on the fact that they were both rookie crewmembers, US and European, going up on their first flight. On mine, they want to focus on me being old and experienced.

[Assistant] That’s their thing.


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

[User] Well, knock on wood, it’s going very, very smoothly. I don’t anticipate any problems or issues. Obviously I hope we’re all very prepared for anything that can happen. We practice a lot on these emergencies and hope none of them ever happen. We need to be prepared, and I’m comfortable that we will be there. We’ve done a couple weeks of that training. We’ve got a few more weeks of that left, and I’m confident we’ll get there, because we just have really strong crews, so I’m happy about that.

[Assistant] I had read recently that there was a French documentary crew that came and did some filming. Can you talk about that and what they were interested in?

[User] They’re doing a documentary on Thomas, and I guess I am going to be involved in it, too. They did one previously with [G.] Reid [Wiseman] and Alex [Alexander] Gerst, and focusing on the fact that they were both rookie crewmembers, US and European, going up on their first flight. On mine, they want to focus on me being old and experienced.

[Assistant] That’s their thing.

[User] And Thomas being the new guy, so I’m not sure how it’s going to work out. All right, yes, I’m old.

[Assistant] “Seasoned,” I think is the term.


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

[User] They’re doing a documentary on Thomas, and I guess I am going to be involved in it, too. They did one previously with [G.] Reid [Wiseman] and Alex [Alexander] Gerst, and focusing on the fact that they were both rookie crewmembers, US and European, going up on their first flight. On mine, they want to focus on me being old and experienced.

[Assistant] That’s their thing.

[User] And Thomas being the new guy, so I’m not sure how it’s going to work out. All right, yes, I’m old.

[Assistant] “Seasoned,” I think is the term.

[User] Experienced.

[Assistant] Yes, there you go. Just depends on how you say it, right? Looking back since you’ve been selected for this mission, are there any fond memories that you have of things that might have happened, or just an experience here or there, maybe meeting someone?


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

[User] And Thomas being the new guy, so I’m not sure how it’s going to work out. All right, yes, I’m old.

[Assistant] “Seasoned,” I think is the term.

[User] Experienced.

[Assistant] Yes, there you go. Just depends on how you say it, right? Looking back since you’ve been selected for this mission, are there any fond memories that you have of things that might have happened, or just an experience here or there, maybe meeting someone?

[User] I don’t know, fond experience—a memorable one is that Oleg and I did water survival training in Russia, in the Soyuz capsule. Normally it’s done with all three crew, and they had asked me if I wanted to do it, because they weren’t going to require me to do it again. I said, “Only if I’m doing it with my crew.” So Oleg was there, and that was my first time to actually work together with him. It was great because we got to know each other. Again, like I was telling you about the National Outdoor Leadership thing with Thomas, you find out a little bit more about people when you’re not in optimal situations, and you’re inside of a small capsule. We’re changing clothes; you have to get out of your Sokol suit and into the flight suit, and into the thermal suit, and then into the Forel the water suit, the hydro suit that you get into.

[Assistant] In the Soyuz?


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

[User] Not just trainers. There are other folks that work in the program. One that’s already been posted is a young lady that works at Marshall [Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama], so we have many stories. Actually, I have a whole bunch of them; we’ve just got to post them as they go, to spread them out a little bit so that I could work on them when I had time and not have to worry about them when I don’t have time. It’s been fun writing all those down. We have flight directors. We have flight controllers. We have instructors, and folks that are working payloads, different people working throughout, engineers that work on exercise hardware. So there’s a pretty wide variety of people, and I’m interested in getting everybody’s story. One of the cool parts about being an astronaut is you get to meet this huge diversity of people as you go through a training flow, these engineers that built this hardware, that design some particular widget that does a particular thing. Everybody is very justifiably proud of everything they’ve done, and it’s cool to put all those pieces together.

[Assistant] Yes, that is. Who came up with the icon? It’s not quite, but it reminds me of—this is dating me, but like Charlie’s Angels, every time I see it.

[User] I didn’t think about that. It was Melanie Whiting, the intern that was working with us on social media.

[Assistant] It really stands out. It’s very colorful.

[User] Yes. She did a phenomenal job. She took some fantastic pictures with the trainers, less posed, less traditional things, which I think makes some of the pictures a little more interesting.

[Assistant] Yes, I was going to ask about that, about putting that together. You said you’re writing their stories.


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

[User] I didn’t think about that. It was Melanie Whiting, the intern that was working with us on social media.

[Assistant] It really stands out. It’s very colorful.

[User] Yes. She did a phenomenal job. She took some fantastic pictures with the trainers, less posed, less traditional things, which I think makes some of the pictures a little more interesting.

[Assistant] Yes, I was going to ask about that, about putting that together. You said you’re writing their stories.

[User] I have a webpage where I ask them to fill in different questions, like what was the biggest challenge you had to overcome, what’s a fun story about your job, what’s most interesting thing? I gave them several questions; they could fill in any of them, and then from that try to put a story together based on what they’ve said. How that relates, in some cases, to me, and how I’ve interacted with them, or how it played out in my life, which may be similar, or in contrast, just a way to give people a sense of how different people overcome different things to get where you are, and how cool the jobs are and all of that.

[Assistant] Yes. I’ve enjoyed reading them, myself.


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

[User] Yes. She did a phenomenal job. She took some fantastic pictures with the trainers, less posed, less traditional things, which I think makes some of the pictures a little more interesting.

[Assistant] Yes, I was going to ask about that, about putting that together. You said you’re writing their stories.

[User] I have a webpage where I ask them to fill in different questions, like what was the biggest challenge you had to overcome, what’s a fun story about your job, what’s most interesting thing? I gave them several questions; they could fill in any of them, and then from that try to put a story together based on what they’ve said. How that relates, in some cases, to me, and how I’ve interacted with them, or how it played out in my life, which may be similar, or in contrast, just a way to give people a sense of how different people overcome different things to get where you are, and how cool the jobs are and all of that.

[Assistant] Yes. I’ve enjoyed reading them, myself.

[User] Good.

[Assistant] What’s been the response to your campaign?


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

[User] I have a webpage where I ask them to fill in different questions, like what was the biggest challenge you had to overcome, what’s a fun story about your job, what’s most interesting thing? I gave them several questions; they could fill in any of them, and then from that try to put a story together based on what they’ve said. How that relates, in some cases, to me, and how I’ve interacted with them, or how it played out in my life, which may be similar, or in contrast, just a way to give people a sense of how different people overcome different things to get where you are, and how cool the jobs are and all of that.

[Assistant] Yes. I’ve enjoyed reading them, myself.

[User] Good.

[Assistant] What’s been the response to your campaign?

[User] Less than I wanted. I had higher hopes. I think a lot of our folks are engineers, and not really used to sharing information, so it’s taken some encouragement to get folks to talk, and that was what was so great about having Melanie around. She’s unfortunately finishing up her school now, but when she was working here as an intern she could go back and get them to fill in some holes and tell a little more of their story. That really helped put the pieces together. Now it’s me working on it, and it’s going a lot slower.

[Assistant] Have you gotten any response from kids saying that they really appreciate these inspirational stories


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

[User] Good.

[Assistant] What’s been the response to your campaign?

[User] Less than I wanted. I had higher hopes. I think a lot of our folks are engineers, and not really used to sharing information, so it’s taken some encouragement to get folks to talk, and that was what was so great about having Melanie around. She’s unfortunately finishing up her school now, but when she was working here as an intern she could go back and get them to fill in some holes and tell a little more of their story. That really helped put the pieces together. Now it’s me working on it, and it’s going a lot slower.

[Assistant] Have you gotten any response from kids saying that they really appreciate these inspirational stories

[User] Yes, there are a few posted on there. I haven’t seen a lot. As I said, disappointed.

[Assistant] Yes. We’ll have to go out there. I did like the photo of you, I wanted to tell you. I thought that was nice.


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

[User] Less than I wanted. I had higher hopes. I think a lot of our folks are engineers, and not really used to sharing information, so it’s taken some encouragement to get folks to talk, and that was what was so great about having Melanie around. She’s unfortunately finishing up her school now, but when she was working here as an intern she could go back and get them to fill in some holes and tell a little more of their story. That really helped put the pieces together. Now it’s me working on it, and it’s going a lot slower.

[Assistant] Have you gotten any response from kids saying that they really appreciate these inspirational stories

[User] Yes, there are a few posted on there. I haven’t seen a lot. As I said, disappointed.

[Assistant] Yes. We’ll have to go out there. I did like the photo of you, I wanted to tell you. I thought that was nice.

[User] Which one?

[Assistant] Oh, yes, I guess I should be specific—I’m not sure about how old you are, maybe 8 or 10, on your family farm?


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

[User] Yes, there are a few posted on there. I haven’t seen a lot. As I said, disappointed.

[Assistant] Yes. We’ll have to go out there. I did like the photo of you, I wanted to tell you. I thought that was nice.

[User] Which one?

[Assistant] Oh, yes, I guess I should be specific—I’m not sure about how old you are, maybe 8 or 10, on your family farm?

[User] Oh, yes, yes.

[Assistant] Yes. I thought that was nice to include, and inspiration, again, for the younger crowd about making it where you are, and your work ethic, too. I thought that was nice to read. So, since you’re flying on Expedition 50, I was curious: is NASA planning anything big for the 50th increment at this point? NASA likes to celebrate those anniversaries.


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

[User] Which one?

[Assistant] Oh, yes, I guess I should be specific—I’m not sure about how old you are, maybe 8 or 10, on your family farm?

[User] Oh, yes, yes.

[Assistant] Yes. I thought that was nice to include, and inspiration, again, for the younger crowd about making it where you are, and your work ethic, too. I thought that was nice to read. So, since you’re flying on Expedition 50, I was curious: is NASA planning anything big for the 50th increment at this point? NASA likes to celebrate those anniversaries.

[User] I don’t know. Not that I’ve been told. Shane’s planning—I think the Superbowl is going to be during that time, so I know he’s thinking about some of those kind of things, but nothing that I know about.

[Assistant] Are you planning anything special for your command?


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

[User] Oh, yes, yes.

[Assistant] Yes. I thought that was nice to include, and inspiration, again, for the younger crowd about making it where you are, and your work ethic, too. I thought that was nice to read. So, since you’re flying on Expedition 50, I was curious: is NASA planning anything big for the 50th increment at this point? NASA likes to celebrate those anniversaries.

[User] I don’t know. Not that I’ve been told. Shane’s planning—I think the Superbowl is going to be during that time, so I know he’s thinking about some of those kind of things, but nothing that I know about.

[Assistant] Are you planning anything special for your command?

[User] No.

[Assistant] Planning on taking up anything special for an organization or history?


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

[User] I don’t know. Not that I’ve been told. Shane’s planning—I think the Superbowl is going to be during that time, so I know he’s thinking about some of those kind of things, but nothing that I know about.

[Assistant] Are you planning anything special for your command?

[User] No.

[Assistant] Planning on taking up anything special for an organization or history?

[User] I’ve flown a lot of things on my first two flights from my alma maters and from high school, so I’d flown the standard things for folks. There was one organization that I’d worked with since then. It’s the Iowa High School Girls Athletic Union. (I played basketball growing up and ran track.) They had worked with me on another project, and I had asked them if there was something that I could fly for their organization. The Iowa Aviation Hall of Fame had inducted me, and I asked them if there was something I could fly for their organization. And Character Counts, I think they’re nationwide, but there’s a chapter in Iowa that a former teacher of mine is involved with. So those are the three that I think right now that I have, and we’ll see if I can get anymore. We have to have all that stuff signed off and delivered by January or February of next year, so I don’t know that I’ll get anymore before then. I’ve flown numerous items for individuals before. I can’t be very big, so lots of regulations on what you can and can’t fly for people.

[Assistant] All right. Well, I think I’ve touched on all of the questions that I came up with, but I’m just curious if there’s anything else that we might talk about?


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

[User] No.

[Assistant] Planning on taking up anything special for an organization or history?

[User] I’ve flown a lot of things on my first two flights from my alma maters and from high school, so I’d flown the standard things for folks. There was one organization that I’d worked with since then. It’s the Iowa High School Girls Athletic Union. (I played basketball growing up and ran track.) They had worked with me on another project, and I had asked them if there was something that I could fly for their organization. The Iowa Aviation Hall of Fame had inducted me, and I asked them if there was something I could fly for their organization. And Character Counts, I think they’re nationwide, but there’s a chapter in Iowa that a former teacher of mine is involved with. So those are the three that I think right now that I have, and we’ll see if I can get anymore. We have to have all that stuff signed off and delivered by January or February of next year, so I don’t know that I’ll get anymore before then. I’ve flown numerous items for individuals before. I can’t be very big, so lots of regulations on what you can and can’t fly for people.

[Assistant] All right. Well, I think I’ve touched on all of the questions that I came up with, but I’m just curious if there’s anything else that we might talk about?

[User] I can’t think of anything specifically.

[Assistant] No. All right, well, I’ll get this transcribed and send it to you. Thank you very much for giving up your lunch hour.


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

[User] Suburban Boston. And I grew up in a public school in Brookline, Massachusetts, just west of Boston. And then high school. I went to a place called Milton Academy, a private school in the south, so that South Boston, which has, however, a strong service tradition in its nature and background and does to this day. And then I was fortunate enough to go to Harvard after that. And I might also mention that I was fortunate to go to Harvard on a full Navy scholarship, so I started out in life as a naval officer, which I consider several years on a destroyer at sea as being my internship in management and also some mismanagement.

[Assistant] Sure, you learned a lot from those mistakes and adventures. So did you, you were you already recruited in part of the Navy when you were an undergraduate or did you join? How did you get into the Navy?

[User] The Navy, as you many people know, the services have so- called ROTC programs, which are also training for the Navy. I think, to my knowledge, may or may not be right at that time, was the only one which tried to recruit officers who would go through ROTC programs. However, they would be required after graduating not to serve just a couple of years, but more a longer period of time in return for full scholarships. And the hope was that people in that program was called the Hollaway program after the admiral who designed it. I believe their hope was that they would continue on to make a career in the Navy to broaden the officer base of the Navy. I chose not to stay in for a career. Some people did. I don't know. I don't know over time how successful that was over as a whole. But I had the good fortune to be a regular naval officer, USN and not USNR for whatever that's worth. And so serve my full requirements.

[Assistant] And so how many years then were you?

[User] So I had three years and three years at sea as a destroyer officer right out of Newport, Rhode Island.

[Assistant] Right. Got to see the world. Everything.


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

[User] The Navy, as you many people know, the services have so- called ROTC programs, which are also training for the Navy. I think, to my knowledge, may or may not be right at that time, was the only one which tried to recruit officers who would go through ROTC programs. However, they would be required after graduating not to serve just a couple of years, but more a longer period of time in return for full scholarships. And the hope was that people in that program was called the Hollaway program after the admiral who designed it. I believe their hope was that they would continue on to make a career in the Navy to broaden the officer base of the Navy. I chose not to stay in for a career. Some people did. I don't know. I don't know over time how successful that was over as a whole. But I had the good fortune to be a regular naval officer, USN and not USNR for whatever that's worth. And so serve my full requirements.

[Assistant] And so how many years then were you?

[User] So I had three years and three years at sea as a destroyer officer right out of Newport, Rhode Island.

[Assistant] Right. Got to see the world. Everything.

[User] Well, parts of it, because this is in ’54 to ‘57. And we had the usual things up and down the East Coast. The Caribbean. Went down to Ecuador one time, but also we were out at sea in the North Atlantic in November, December 1956 during the Hungarian Egyptian crisis. And our job was to be part of a barrier patrol to check ships coming across the ocean. But then I had a couple of tours with the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean. So that was the see the world part, but also a little bit up in the North Sea.

[Assistant] So you were post Korean conflict.


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

[User] So I had three years and three years at sea as a destroyer officer right out of Newport, Rhode Island.

[Assistant] Right. Got to see the world. Everything.

[User] Well, parts of it, because this is in ’54 to ‘57. And we had the usual things up and down the East Coast. The Caribbean. Went down to Ecuador one time, but also we were out at sea in the North Atlantic in November, December 1956 during the Hungarian Egyptian crisis. And our job was to be part of a barrier patrol to check ships coming across the ocean. But then I had a couple of tours with the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean. So that was the see the world part, but also a little bit up in the North Sea.

[Assistant] So you were post Korean conflict.

[User] Yes. Post Korean active conflict.

[Assistant] Yes. Yeah, right. Right. Well, that's a really interesting prelude to your Peace Corps work in your development work, isn't it?


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

[User] Yes. Post Korean active conflict.

[Assistant] Yes. Yeah, right. Right. Well, that's a really interesting prelude to your Peace Corps work in your development work, isn't it?

[User] Well, I think it's valuable. People sometimes their eyebrows go up when I told them I was a naval officer. But Sargent Shriver, Warren Wiggins, a lot of other Peace Corps people were also military officers by virtue of being veterans from World War II. One of my close buddies in the Peace Corps was essentially a classmate from the Academy, Naval Academy. There were a number of people. So my teammates, volunteers, were veterans from World War II, including a 62 year old who had been a WAC officer at the time. So I think it's relevant because it gave me, you know, experience working in a large government organization, bureaucratic organization, for better or for worse. And so I had some experience dealing with government organizations. And then my professional training background at graduate school was, in fact, public administration. So I had the advantages in going to India and Pakistan of, A, knowing where they are, B, having talked to many, many government officers in those countries in relation to rural development projects, C, dealing with the Foreign Service. My first year of graduate school was at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, which was a training ground for the Foreign Service, which was my initial interest. The trouble is I became spoiled by the Peace Corps and so I never went into the Foreign Service.

[Assistant] So that's a great segue. Although before we leave your family of origin, how many siblings do you have?

[User] Two younger sisters.

[Assistant] So you were the oldest?


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

[User] Well, I think it's valuable. People sometimes their eyebrows go up when I told them I was a naval officer. But Sargent Shriver, Warren Wiggins, a lot of other Peace Corps people were also military officers by virtue of being veterans from World War II. One of my close buddies in the Peace Corps was essentially a classmate from the Academy, Naval Academy. There were a number of people. So my teammates, volunteers, were veterans from World War II, including a 62 year old who had been a WAC officer at the time. So I think it's relevant because it gave me, you know, experience working in a large government organization, bureaucratic organization, for better or for worse. And so I had some experience dealing with government organizations. And then my professional training background at graduate school was, in fact, public administration. So I had the advantages in going to India and Pakistan of, A, knowing where they are, B, having talked to many, many government officers in those countries in relation to rural development projects, C, dealing with the Foreign Service. My first year of graduate school was at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, which was a training ground for the Foreign Service, which was my initial interest. The trouble is I became spoiled by the Peace Corps and so I never went into the Foreign Service.

[Assistant] So that's a great segue. Although before we leave your family of origin, how many siblings do you have?

[User] Two younger sisters.

[Assistant] So you were the oldest?

[User] Yeah. Yeah, right.

[Assistant] So let's forge ahead here to the training that you were involved with at the Experiment for International Living and under contract with the Peace Corps. Tell us about that training and also being totally new Peace Corps. How did you recruit and select the people you brought in for that training? Did you have a hand in that?


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

[User] I think the answer is probably the most of them was probably post-World War II. However, the work of the American Friends Service Committee and the work of the Brethren Service Committee, the so-called peace churches, the Mennonites, those started in the previous, in the 1930s or in the 1920s even, in small ways.

[Assistant] Right after the first war. Yeah.

[User] Yeah. And then the Experiment in International Living, that program started. That was not as much of a work program as a cross- cultural educational program, that started back in 1932.

[Assistant] Oh it did, in ‘32. OK, yeah. This is really valuable.

[User] So the point I'm getting to finally is that so I get jazzed up, if you will, by meeting and talk with Henry Reuss in the car in the snow and on the ski slopes and hear him talk about the Peace Corps. So during that spring between February, March, April, May. As I said, I and other colleagues and friends of mine in the Cambridge area tracked what was going on with the Peace Corps.

[Assistant] Was Reuss already referring to it as Peace Corps?


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

[User] Yeah. And then the Experiment in International Living, that program started. That was not as much of a work program as a cross- cultural educational program, that started back in 1932.

[Assistant] Oh it did, in ‘32. OK, yeah. This is really valuable.

[User] So the point I'm getting to finally is that so I get jazzed up, if you will, by meeting and talk with Henry Reuss in the car in the snow and on the ski slopes and hear him talk about the Peace Corps. So during that spring between February, March, April, May. As I said, I and other colleagues and friends of mine in the Cambridge area tracked what was going on with the Peace Corps.

[Assistant] Was Reuss already referring to it as Peace Corps?

[User] Well, by that time, yes.

[Assistant] Did it have a brand yet?


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

[User] Yes, because, go back. Kennedy floated the idea, as you know.

[Assistant] In Michigan.

[User] As in Michigan, not in that term. But he said how many of you would be willing to give. But he did use the term Peace Corps in the formal proposal, which he made at the Cow Palace in San Francisco about 10 days before the election in 1960.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] November. Then the trouble. So by that time, the term Peace Corps. And the other point is that Hubert Humphrey had also developed the idea and there's a story behind that, too, with one of my colleagues somewhat independently of Reuss, but they were sort of working in parallel. And a colleague, a young staffer for Hubert Humphrey came up with a suggestion of the term Peace Corps, which and then Humphrey and Reuss turned over their work to the Kennedy team, Shriver and his team, when they'd started to work on it. So the answer to your question is yes, by that time the term Peace Corps was a standard term.

[Assistant] And the students who worked on it, the students from Michigan sponsored a conference at American University in March.


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

[User] As in Michigan, not in that term. But he said how many of you would be willing to give. But he did use the term Peace Corps in the formal proposal, which he made at the Cow Palace in San Francisco about 10 days before the election in 1960.

[Assistant] Right.

[User] November. Then the trouble. So by that time, the term Peace Corps. And the other point is that Hubert Humphrey had also developed the idea and there's a story behind that, too, with one of my colleagues somewhat independently of Reuss, but they were sort of working in parallel. And a colleague, a young staffer for Hubert Humphrey came up with a suggestion of the term Peace Corps, which and then Humphrey and Reuss turned over their work to the Kennedy team, Shriver and his team, when they'd started to work on it. So the answer to your question is yes, by that time the term Peace Corps was a standard term.

[Assistant] And the students who worked on it, the students from Michigan sponsored a conference at American University in March.

[User] Which I attended.

[Assistant] And you attended that conference in March of 1961?


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

[User] November. Then the trouble. So by that time, the term Peace Corps. And the other point is that Hubert Humphrey had also developed the idea and there's a story behind that, too, with one of my colleagues somewhat independently of Reuss, but they were sort of working in parallel. And a colleague, a young staffer for Hubert Humphrey came up with a suggestion of the term Peace Corps, which and then Humphrey and Reuss turned over their work to the Kennedy team, Shriver and his team, when they'd started to work on it. So the answer to your question is yes, by that time the term Peace Corps was a standard term.

[Assistant] And the students who worked on it, the students from Michigan sponsored a conference at American University in March.

[User] Which I attended.

[Assistant] And you attended that conference in March of 1961?

[User] American University, right?

[Assistant] Right. Well, that would be.


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

[User] Which I attended.

[Assistant] And you attended that conference in March of 1961?

[User] American University, right?

[Assistant] Right. Well, that would be.

[User] I still have the document of it.

[Assistant] Uh huh. That is very valuable.


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

[User] American University, right?

[Assistant] Right. Well, that would be.

[User] I still have the document of it.

[Assistant] Uh huh. That is very valuable.

[User] And I think I chaired one of the working sessions.

[Assistant] Right. Right. Yeah. That's a very important document in terms also of student activism around peace.


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

[User] I still have the document of it.

[Assistant] Uh huh. That is very valuable.

[User] And I think I chaired one of the working sessions.

[Assistant] Right. Right. Yeah. That's a very important document in terms also of student activism around peace.

[User] Well, this is my view, but by no means original. And Sarge says the same thing. And you know very well as who’s who. At 2:00 in the morning, no press. Kennedy popped off the idea. Harris Wofford described it as an idea in the air. It just came out with it. And it could have died right then.

[Assistant] Absolutely. Except for the students.


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

[User] And I think I chaired one of the working sessions.

[Assistant] Right. Right. Yeah. That's a very important document in terms also of student activism around peace.

[User] Well, this is my view, but by no means original. And Sarge says the same thing. And you know very well as who’s who. At 2:00 in the morning, no press. Kennedy popped off the idea. Harris Wofford described it as an idea in the air. It just came out with it. And it could have died right then.

[Assistant] Absolutely. Except for the students.

[User] Exactly. So, and this is, in fact, in my view, looking at a number of these programs over the years. Typically, it's the servers, the people want to get into the program, who are ahead of the sort of leaders, so- called, who are putting it together. And you get, it's a common pattern that you get all of these volunteer programs have, I think it's fair to say, far more applicants than there are places available. That's true then, that’s true now.

[Assistant] Right. You know, this is extremely interesting. And I know you're working on a book on this in this regard that will include some of this. Let's get back to the training. You know, so you were standing in the right place at the right time. You'd had a great experience with the Experiment in International Living. They knew you. You knew them, and you were ready to help.


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

[User] Well, it varied from place to place. It would take more time than you want to listen to. And I wouldn't remember all the details anyway at this point. But I mean, so that nurses went to some hospitals in Boston, Washington and in New York, for example, and others went to other places. And at some of it worked out probably better than others, but they had at least some audition. Of course, one of the problems was not surprising. The kinds of job descriptions that we had to work with were quite general, because in all fairness, neither David McEachran on the Peace Corps staff people nor the Pakistanis really had much of a clear concept as to how this is going to work in great detail. So nowadays, of course, is far more sophisticated. But we had to work with fairly general descriptions.

[Assistant] Actually, you know.

[User] And there was also a librarian, a couple of librarians.

[Assistant] Yes, right. You know, Peace Corps still doesn't always get it targeted. It's just the ambiguities of life changes. So, so and I know many of the programs were very ambiguous in those particularly in those early years. But so you had a challenge in training. So what kinds of courses then were you able to offer to all? Did you have, did you say you had 29 recruits?

[User] Well, no, we had I think their training the original number was 33 or so. And I recall one trainee dropped out voluntarily, a woman who was, and I do not know the details, but I know she was considerably overweight. So we put it that way. Another one was a bricklayer and he was touted as the best damn bricklayer in the city he came from. And he was a vet, Navy, middle aged 36. I was at that time 29. Had lived overseas, as well as a quick and very attractive guy, well-spoken. And one morning we woke up in the dorm and he wasn't there. And he packed up his trowel and drove his car and never and never showed back again. He just so, yeah, self selection.

[Assistant] Self selection. Right.


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

[User] The answer is yes, but probably not to the extent that you remember. Did you go to Camp Bradley?

[Assistant] And I did not go to Camp Bradley, but I was at the University of New Mexico where they had a replicated program.

[User] You know, the camp in Puerto Rico, which is on the record, also was set up, particularly with the advice of the Outward Bound program in the U.K. But the answer was we had a good deal of that too also, you know, life saving exercise, of course, physical checkups with our medical doctor. And indeed, there were very subtle, amusing accents. The men, Tom McMahon I mentioned, who almost didn't get in and then did get in. And he survived and became a great story. He broke a nose because he didn't, he wasn't used to playing soccer. He was tall and he had a vulnerable nose. And then the 62 year old somehow got in a van. They were going somewhere on those doggone hills and she somehow fell out of the van.

[Assistant] No seatbelts back in those days.

[User] No seatbelts, no. Picked herself up, got back in the van, went on. So sort of things that makes you mutter and cut your teeth now. But anyway.

[Assistant] So training had its challenges. Tell us now what happens when you welcome this group. You said you went a few weeks ahead of time to East Pakistan, you know, to set that helped set things up. And now what happens when they arrive? How do they get there? And what do they do in those first few weeks?


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

[User] No seatbelts, no. Picked herself up, got back in the van, went on. So sort of things that makes you mutter and cut your teeth now. But anyway.

[Assistant] So training had its challenges. Tell us now what happens when you welcome this group. You said you went a few weeks ahead of time to East Pakistan, you know, to set that helped set things up. And now what happens when they arrive? How do they get there? And what do they do in those first few weeks?

[User] Well, first, just a slight before that, after the formal training period was about a week or ten days home leave. And they all went home and then came back to New York. At that point, they became volunteers, not trainees. And indeed, they were all loaded on a Pan American flight at Idle, then called Idlewild Airport. I am not in that picture because I was already overseas, but they were all loaded on the plane and absolutely crazy. The Peace Corps said you're going to fly straight through against the sun from New York to Calcutta and Dhaka, and we hope you're alive when you get there. That was, of course, before many people had had much experience flying around the world and people didn't realize that flying east is a hell of a lot more difficult on the body than flying west. But I had done a little of that. So to answer your question, I went ahead by a week or two. And that's for you?

[Assistant] Oh, this is for me. Sure. OK, I want to. We're talking about a photograph that Bob has just handed me. It's a photograph of the 28, 29 or so trainees who have just become volunteers in New York and they're high handed, all holding a large banner that says Pan American, which makes me think perhaps they were flying Pan American.

[User] Pan Am One I think it was called.

[Assistant] Right. And it says, well, it says Pan American Welcomes Peace Corps, The Experiment in International Living Pakistan Training Project. And they all are dressed in the costumes of the sixties.


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

[User] Well, first, just a slight before that, after the formal training period was about a week or ten days home leave. And they all went home and then came back to New York. At that point, they became volunteers, not trainees. And indeed, they were all loaded on a Pan American flight at Idle, then called Idlewild Airport. I am not in that picture because I was already overseas, but they were all loaded on the plane and absolutely crazy. The Peace Corps said you're going to fly straight through against the sun from New York to Calcutta and Dhaka, and we hope you're alive when you get there. That was, of course, before many people had had much experience flying around the world and people didn't realize that flying east is a hell of a lot more difficult on the body than flying west. But I had done a little of that. So to answer your question, I went ahead by a week or two. And that's for you?

[Assistant] Oh, this is for me. Sure. OK, I want to. We're talking about a photograph that Bob has just handed me. It's a photograph of the 28, 29 or so trainees who have just become volunteers in New York and they're high handed, all holding a large banner that says Pan American, which makes me think perhaps they were flying Pan American.

[User] Pan Am One I think it was called.

[Assistant] Right. And it says, well, it says Pan American Welcomes Peace Corps, The Experiment in International Living Pakistan Training Project. And they all are dressed in the costumes of the sixties.

[User] Yes, look how they’re dressed. Everybody is dressed to the nines.

[Assistant] Dressed to the nines.


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

[User] Pan Am One I think it was called.

[Assistant] Right. And it says, well, it says Pan American Welcomes Peace Corps, The Experiment in International Living Pakistan Training Project. And they all are dressed in the costumes of the sixties.

[User] Yes, look how they’re dressed. Everybody is dressed to the nines.

[Assistant] Dressed to the nines.

[User] Nowadays, they wouldn't be.

[Assistant] The ladies have hose and high heels and the men all have coats and ties and overcoats because this was probably chilly by October when they were on their way.


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

[User] Yes, look how they’re dressed. Everybody is dressed to the nines.

[Assistant] Dressed to the nines.

[User] Nowadays, they wouldn't be.

[Assistant] The ladies have hose and high heels and the men all have coats and ties and overcoats because this was probably chilly by October when they were on their way.

[User] Some hats.

[Assistant] And hats, yes. I don't see any hats on the women, but there are hats on a number of the men. So anyway, it's a great photograph. And I know you’ll put this in the archives.


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

[User] Nowadays, they wouldn't be.

[Assistant] The ladies have hose and high heels and the men all have coats and ties and overcoats because this was probably chilly by October when they were on their way.

[User] Some hats.

[Assistant] And hats, yes. I don't see any hats on the women, but there are hats on a number of the men. So anyway, it's a great photograph. And I know you’ll put this in the archives.

[User] I can do that. Moreover, I do have a bit of the identification of each of the faces and I have some other photographs later on to that too.

[Assistant] This is great.


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

[User] Thank you.

[Assistant] Very important fact for the listener to remember.

[User] So as a result, I often refer to it as East Bengal, which is politically and culturally and historically accurate. But you're absolutely right. Thank you. It was called East Pakistan, but essentially in brief, Pakistan was created in 1947 at partition when the British left British India to make a separate new country where there was a Muslim majority population. The larger part in the West, consisting of about five provinces and many different local languages and genetic backgrounds and things like that, it's called West Pakistan, which is today called Pakistan, and the other is called East Pakistan. On the east side, again, a Muslim majority area, which historically had been during British period, there was friction between Hindu West Bengal and Muslim East Bengal. So East Pakistan was carved out from that. And by contrast to West Pakistan, East Pakistan was homogenous. Everybody spoke Bengali. They had a common historical and racial background as well, unlike the West. So there's a long history there. And as for the record, of course, East Pakistan rose up in rebellion and the war of 1971 made it independent as Bangladesh.

[Assistant] In ‘97.

[User] Sorry, in 1971.

[Assistant] ‘71. Excuse me. Yes.


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

[User] So as a result, I often refer to it as East Bengal, which is politically and culturally and historically accurate. But you're absolutely right. Thank you. It was called East Pakistan, but essentially in brief, Pakistan was created in 1947 at partition when the British left British India to make a separate new country where there was a Muslim majority population. The larger part in the West, consisting of about five provinces and many different local languages and genetic backgrounds and things like that, it's called West Pakistan, which is today called Pakistan, and the other is called East Pakistan. On the east side, again, a Muslim majority area, which historically had been during British period, there was friction between Hindu West Bengal and Muslim East Bengal. So East Pakistan was carved out from that. And by contrast to West Pakistan, East Pakistan was homogenous. Everybody spoke Bengali. They had a common historical and racial background as well, unlike the West. So there's a long history there. And as for the record, of course, East Pakistan rose up in rebellion and the war of 1971 made it independent as Bangladesh.

[Assistant] In ‘97.

[User] Sorry, in 1971.

[Assistant] ‘71. Excuse me. Yes.

[User] So that at that time when we were there, there were intimations already of tensions. But those kind of tensions were not a significant factor in our project, unfortunately. But then I spent many years in Bangladesh since then. And I'm sorry, capacity's that's not the story later on. But still.

[Assistant] So we've got our volunteers.


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

[User] So that at that time when we were there, there were intimations already of tensions. But those kind of tensions were not a significant factor in our project, unfortunately. But then I spent many years in Bangladesh since then. And I'm sorry, capacity's that's not the story later on. But still.

[Assistant] So we've got our volunteers.

[User] However, there is a point where we had a bit of a problem, because at that time in 1961, I lived with the family at his request of the chief secretary, the chief secretary. There's no corresponding person in the United States under that title. But in the British administrative system, he was the chief civil officer in a province or a state. And he, there was over him was a governor who was appointed politically by the powers that be. But he was the chief civil servant. And the family I lived with, the chief secretary, was the first Bengali chief secretary. The previous chief secretaries and senior officials and governors of East Pakistan came from guess where?

[Assistant] India?

[User] West Pakistan.

[Assistant] Oh, West Pakistan. Interesting.


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

[User] However, there is a point where we had a bit of a problem, because at that time in 1961, I lived with the family at his request of the chief secretary, the chief secretary. There's no corresponding person in the United States under that title. But in the British administrative system, he was the chief civil officer in a province or a state. And he, there was over him was a governor who was appointed politically by the powers that be. But he was the chief civil servant. And the family I lived with, the chief secretary, was the first Bengali chief secretary. The previous chief secretaries and senior officials and governors of East Pakistan came from guess where?

[Assistant] India?

[User] West Pakistan.

[Assistant] Oh, West Pakistan. Interesting.

[User] Right. So we were already, and when it came to a matter of homestays, it created a problem also because a number of families who, it was not an easy matter for Dr. Watt to do this. He and I worked on it together, but he was the leader to, the concept of living with a Pakistani family, that was new to them. And there was new also to American officials at the time, and a number of them were very skeptical of it. But to make a long story short, what happened was eventually that the service clubs, Rotary Club and Kiwanis and the Lions particularly said, we'll take these people in. But the problem arose in the sense that a number of the elite of East Pakistan were not Bengalis. They were business people or civil servants or people from West Pakistan. So they didn't speak Bengali. They had to speak in English. So we had some problems in a way because some of the volunteers were placed in yes, they were Pakistanis, but B, they were not Bengalis.

[Assistant] So they weren’t going to learn the Bengali language, for example, among other things.


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

[User] West Pakistan.

[Assistant] Oh, West Pakistan. Interesting.

[User] Right. So we were already, and when it came to a matter of homestays, it created a problem also because a number of families who, it was not an easy matter for Dr. Watt to do this. He and I worked on it together, but he was the leader to, the concept of living with a Pakistani family, that was new to them. And there was new also to American officials at the time, and a number of them were very skeptical of it. But to make a long story short, what happened was eventually that the service clubs, Rotary Club and Kiwanis and the Lions particularly said, we'll take these people in. But the problem arose in the sense that a number of the elite of East Pakistan were not Bengalis. They were business people or civil servants or people from West Pakistan. So they didn't speak Bengali. They had to speak in English. So we had some problems in a way because some of the volunteers were placed in yes, they were Pakistanis, but B, they were not Bengalis.

[Assistant] So they weren’t going to learn the Bengali language, for example, among other things.

[User] We started learning a little bit about the east-west difficulties and problems on the spot right there, then and there, but so that the training in-country ranged from in terms of time from about November 1st of 1961 to about December 15th, and consisted of two parts, a training and language, continued language training at Dhaka University in Dhaka. And then the other part was two or three weeks living at the Academy for Rural Development in Comilla with an absolutely brilliant leader and faculty to get oriented to. It was basically a very rural country. And so not everybody working in villages, but almost everybody was working people with those backgrounds. So having that kind of rural background was. And what happened was that when Shriver went and visited the Academy, he was highly impressed by the Academy's director. Everybody else was, too. And he was a man of genius.

[Assistant] Was he a Pakistani?


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

[User] Right. So we were already, and when it came to a matter of homestays, it created a problem also because a number of families who, it was not an easy matter for Dr. Watt to do this. He and I worked on it together, but he was the leader to, the concept of living with a Pakistani family, that was new to them. And there was new also to American officials at the time, and a number of them were very skeptical of it. But to make a long story short, what happened was eventually that the service clubs, Rotary Club and Kiwanis and the Lions particularly said, we'll take these people in. But the problem arose in the sense that a number of the elite of East Pakistan were not Bengalis. They were business people or civil servants or people from West Pakistan. So they didn't speak Bengali. They had to speak in English. So we had some problems in a way because some of the volunteers were placed in yes, they were Pakistanis, but B, they were not Bengalis.

[Assistant] So they weren’t going to learn the Bengali language, for example, among other things.

[User] We started learning a little bit about the east-west difficulties and problems on the spot right there, then and there, but so that the training in-country ranged from in terms of time from about November 1st of 1961 to about December 15th, and consisted of two parts, a training and language, continued language training at Dhaka University in Dhaka. And then the other part was two or three weeks living at the Academy for Rural Development in Comilla with an absolutely brilliant leader and faculty to get oriented to. It was basically a very rural country. And so not everybody working in villages, but almost everybody was working people with those backgrounds. So having that kind of rural background was. And what happened was that when Shriver went and visited the Academy, he was highly impressed by the Academy's director. Everybody else was, too. And he was a man of genius.

[Assistant] Was he a Pakistani?

[User] Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

[Assistant] So this was a Pakistani founded or organization? A research organization and education for rural development?


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

[User] Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

[Assistant] So this was a Pakistani founded or organization? A research organization and education for rural development?

[User] Right. He was a very interesting person, a Muslim, obviously. He was originally an ICS officer. ICS has referred to the India Civil Service, which is the elite civil organization in the government of British India, and later both Pakistan and India. And he was so disappointed by the behavior, what happened in the Bengal famine of 1943 when there was horrible, three million Bengalis die because of famine, partly brought on by World War II and Japanese bombardment and partly through some government mismanagement. He did the unheard of thing of resigning from the ICS, went to work for two or three years as a common tradesman. He was very much interested in Tolstoy and his ideas. Eventually became a teacher and became the principal of a college in Victoria. It, in Columbia, in Comilla, became a government. So the reason going that background was that he was a man who had high status as an educator, high status as a former government officer, as well as his own learning. And he was put in charge of the Academy, which was founded in large measure by the Ford Foundation, by the way, both academies. And he was a man of enormous influence and respect. The volunteers loved him. I loved him, everybody. And he had anyway. So we had this period of time.

[Assistant] What was his name? I didn't get his name.

[User] His name is difficult. Akhtar Hameed Khan. I'll spell it. A-K-H-T-A-R, Akhtar. Second name Hameed, H-A-M-E-E-D. And Khan, K-H-A-N. Khan is a common name for, of stemming from Central Asia, the Mongols of a chief or chief or headmen. So Khan is a much respected title, but now it's become a common family name as well. But so Akhtar Hameed Khan was the name of the director of the Academy for Rural Development.

[Assistant] Thank you very much.


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

[User] Health centers, right. So a large program of rural public works was built. And there's a literature about this for whatever purposes. And if you want later on, I can provide a lot of citations to support these things. So when the University of Minnesota produced, they ran a whole project, maybe a couple of them focused on rural public works, which came out of the essentially pioneering work, which is done by a combination of our two or three of the engineer people in my group, together with the director and the Academy of Rural Development, had come along. So in answer to your question, a group came for nurses. Another group came for rural public works, another group came for the high schools, and then some came after I had left. But far from based on our work and I think something in the area of the exact number, I think about 150 or 200 or so volunteers followed us in the years afterwards.

[Assistant] So about you said about 200.

[User] Yes. The exact number I'm not dead sure of, but.

[Assistant] Right. So well.

[User] Coincidentally, just to pitch one thing. One of the things I did was to, being a writer and a journalist of background, and because our people were scattered, my project was to put together a national sort of newspaper, if you will. I got a bunch of people in the local community who would volunteer to, for example, the wife of the CARE director and somebody else from the Asia Foundation, who are still friends today, and gave them assignments to go around and talk with the volunteers, do stories of the work they were doing, the nurses, the schoolteachers, the engineers, and so on. Other projects in other countries have also various kinds of journals. I'm well familiar with that, but this is one we put out.

[Assistant] And so there were newsletters that were compiled between July 1962 and July 1963 by people living in and working in East Pakistan.


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

[User] Yes. The exact number I'm not dead sure of, but.

[Assistant] Right. So well.

[User] Coincidentally, just to pitch one thing. One of the things I did was to, being a writer and a journalist of background, and because our people were scattered, my project was to put together a national sort of newspaper, if you will. I got a bunch of people in the local community who would volunteer to, for example, the wife of the CARE director and somebody else from the Asia Foundation, who are still friends today, and gave them assignments to go around and talk with the volunteers, do stories of the work they were doing, the nurses, the schoolteachers, the engineers, and so on. Other projects in other countries have also various kinds of journals. I'm well familiar with that, but this is one we put out.

[Assistant] And so there were newsletters that were compiled between July 1962 and July 1963 by people living in and working in East Pakistan.

[User] Yeah, that was my in my calling, I was the editor. And then had staff people I had running around and some of the volunteers wrote articles in some of the staff people wrote articles.

[Assistant] So I'm looking at something that is titled East Pakistan Peace Corps Journal. It's a bound volume of about two and a half inches thick. It's made of, the pages are some of them a carbon copy writing style. Some of the mimeographs, some of them newspaper reprints or photographs that have been pasted in. It's a wonderful wealth of information about that one year period.


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

[User] Coincidentally, just to pitch one thing. One of the things I did was to, being a writer and a journalist of background, and because our people were scattered, my project was to put together a national sort of newspaper, if you will. I got a bunch of people in the local community who would volunteer to, for example, the wife of the CARE director and somebody else from the Asia Foundation, who are still friends today, and gave them assignments to go around and talk with the volunteers, do stories of the work they were doing, the nurses, the schoolteachers, the engineers, and so on. Other projects in other countries have also various kinds of journals. I'm well familiar with that, but this is one we put out.

[Assistant] And so there were newsletters that were compiled between July 1962 and July 1963 by people living in and working in East Pakistan.

[User] Yeah, that was my in my calling, I was the editor. And then had staff people I had running around and some of the volunteers wrote articles in some of the staff people wrote articles.

[Assistant] So I'm looking at something that is titled East Pakistan Peace Corps Journal. It's a bound volume of about two and a half inches thick. It's made of, the pages are some of them a carbon copy writing style. Some of the mimeographs, some of them newspaper reprints or photographs that have been pasted in. It's a wonderful wealth of information about that one year period.

[User] And I'll pass this on eventually to Karen up at the, uh.

[Assistant] The Kennedy Library. It will go into your, with your papers. That is going to be a wonderful addition.


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

[User] Yeah, that was my in my calling, I was the editor. And then had staff people I had running around and some of the volunteers wrote articles in some of the staff people wrote articles.

[Assistant] So I'm looking at something that is titled East Pakistan Peace Corps Journal. It's a bound volume of about two and a half inches thick. It's made of, the pages are some of them a carbon copy writing style. Some of the mimeographs, some of them newspaper reprints or photographs that have been pasted in. It's a wonderful wealth of information about that one year period.

[User] And I'll pass this on eventually to Karen up at the, uh.

[Assistant] The Kennedy Library. It will go into your, with your papers. That is going to be a wonderful addition.

[User] And there are other projects in other countries that have done similar kinds of things.

[Assistant] Yes, yes. Yes. But we don't always have them available to us. That's really, really a great thing. So, you know, we are, we've done a really pretty in-depth look at those two years and your role in helping to get Peace Corps started in East Pakistan. And so it's really time for you to leave. But I have a personal question for you. Were you in East Pakistan alone as a bachelor, if you will?


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

[User] And I'll pass this on eventually to Karen up at the, uh.

[Assistant] The Kennedy Library. It will go into your, with your papers. That is going to be a wonderful addition.

[User] And there are other projects in other countries that have done similar kinds of things.

[Assistant] Yes, yes. Yes. But we don't always have them available to us. That's really, really a great thing. So, you know, we are, we've done a really pretty in-depth look at those two years and your role in helping to get Peace Corps started in East Pakistan. And so it's really time for you to leave. But I have a personal question for you. Were you in East Pakistan alone as a bachelor, if you will?

[User] Yes.

[Assistant] You didn't have a family at that point?