AFS Janus - Spring 2011

SPRING 2011:

A Forum for World Peace Opens Doors for Collaboration in Argentina 6 AFS VIGNETTES by Stephen Galatti, Jr. 8 Letter from the AFS International President 9 Giving Back: An AFS Returnee’s Experience in the AFS Archives 10 AFS WWII Ambulance Drivers’ Last Post 11 The AFS Archives Goes Digital 12 A PUBLICATION OF THE ARCHIVES OF THE AMERICAN FIELD SERVICE AND AFS INTERCULTURAL PROGRAMS

Arthur Howe, Jr. Driving the Future of AFS

Arthur Howe, Jr. Driving the Future of AFS

A PUBLICATION OF THE ARCHIVES OF THE AMERICAN FIELD SERVICE AND AFS INTERCULTURAL PROGRAMS

Dear AFS Friend, When we were planning this issue of the AFS Janus we realized that we were long overdue in honoring Arthur Howe, Jr., AFS Ambulance Driver, former AFS International President, and AFS International Life Trustee.

Art’s contributions to AFS have spanned decades and his is truly a living and thriving legacy. We hope you enjoy reading about his extraordinary life of service as much as we enjoyed talking to Art in preparing the article.

We would like to bid goodbye to Eleanora Golobic, who served as AFS Archivist and Alumni Relations Manager from August 1988 to January 2011. Eleanora oversaw the Archives for 22 years and played a key role in the AFS Ambulance Drivers’ Benefits Project that resulted in over four hundred drivers receiving U.S. Army Veterans’ benefits.

Among her other achievements, she helped introduce the AFS Legacy Project to perpetuate the legacy of the AFS Ambulance Drivers. For twenty years, Eleanora edited this publication, which was originally conceived as the AFS Drivers’ outreach publication.

In this issue we are pleased to introduce a feature written by Stephen Galatti, Jr., “The AFS Vignettes,” in which he shares his reminiscences of AFS during its formative years and beyond. This will be a recurring feature and we invite our readers to contact the author via e-mail at sg@galatti.com if they would like to share some of their own stories about AFS with him.

Francisco “Tachi” Cazal updates us on recent AFS events in his “Letter from the AFS President” and Nicole Milano (Project Archivist) and Johnamarie Macias (Archives Intern) update us on the continued excitement that is being generated by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission grant project.

We hope you enjoy this issue of the AFS Janus.

Carlos Porro, Editor carlos.porro@afs.org

AFS Intercultural Programs, Inc. 71 West 23rd Street, 6th Floor New York, NY 10010-4102 USA tel: +1.212.807.8686 fax: +1.212.807.1001 www.afs.org

“Arthur Howe represents the spirit and soul of AFS. He is a constant inspiration to me and thousands of AFS’ers throughout the world.”

-Ward B. Chamberlin, Jr. AFS Ambulance Driver and AFS International Life Trustee

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n Yale University’s 25th reunion yearbook, published in 1968, Art Howe wrote, “Am I content with life?

Extremely so in my personal life, but most discontent over the condition in which most of mankind is forced to live and the apparently increasing chaos of relationships between nations…” This discontent about the state of the world sheds some light on why he dedicated so many years of his life to AFS, an organization he values for its ability to enable people to act as responsible global citizens working for peace and understanding in a diverse world.

Arthur Howe, Jr., was born on July 19, 1921, in Watertown, Connecticut. In 1926, Art’s father moved with his family to New Hampshire to work at Dartmouth College where Art became adept at ski jumping. “That was one of my few accomplishments in those years. There were criticisms, too.

My third grade teacher complained that I talked too much during class—an ominous prediction.”

Howe graduated from the Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Connecticut, in 1938. In 1938-1939 he was in England as an exchange student with the English Speaking Union program.

“That was the year war broke out in Europe,” Art reminisced.

“People in England were learning to dig slit trenches and generally preparing for the worst. This made a tremendous impression on me. I did not fully endorse pacifism, but

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Lieutenant Arthur Howe, Jr., in an AFS staff car in North Africa, undated.

Arthur Howe, Jr., (left) watching a “dog fight” with Kirk LeMoyne Billings (right) in Tunisia, 1943.

On the cover: Arthur Howe, Jr., ca. 1943.

Insert 1: Taken from a wartime group photograph, ca. 1941-1943.

Insert 2: Standing by an AFS ambulance at the 2002 Baltimore AFS Driver Reunion.

it encouraged me to seek service without killing.” Upon his return from England, he entered Yale University in the fall of 1939.

While still a student at Yale, Art volunteered to serve in France as an Ambulance Driver with the American Field Service (AFS) in 1941 when he was 19. When that opportunity was cancelled due to the German occupation of France, Art applied for the AFS units being formed to join the British forces.

In early 1942, he was sent to the Middle East to serve with the British Army, first briefly in Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine. In late spring of 1942, he moved to the African western desert where he remained throughout the rest of that campaign with the British Eighth Army. While in Tobruk, Lybia, in June of 1942, he wrote to his parents, “The airplanes of the enemy are over off and on in the day time, but at

night they drone overhead continually, wantonly bombing, machine gunning and dropping flares. All of this keeps us on the go, and yet in a larger sense, this war is a horrible and terrible thing in the way it tears bodies to bits, breaks up families and destroys and kills. Certainly there must never be another one.”

Later that year the army retreated to Egypt where the British reorganized. At the Battle of El Alamein, the Eighth Army broke the Axis lines and drove the Germans and Italians back to Tunisia.

In May of 1943, Stephen Galatti wrote to Howe’s parents that Art was doing a “perfect job” in his commanding position while serving with the British Eighth Army, and that he “held his own with probably the finest army in the world today.”

Regarding his service with AFS and his relationship with Stephen Galatti,

during and after the war, Art said, “One of the strongest elements in my AFS involvement was my high admiration for and considerable difficulty in dealing personally with Steve Galatti, surely a giant of a man in leading and inspiring a multitude of young people in doing AFS’s work. My first contacts with him as an AFS officer responsible for many AFS Volunteers during World War II were challenging, to say the least. However, he became one of the most influential people in my long and privileged life—about 90 percent positive and 10 percent painful. His dominant style, known to some as ‘my way or no way’ was packaged in his powerful idealism and commitment to AFS, its purposes, and its people. No one could, or should have tried, to fill his shoes.”

Art arrived in Tunisia in June of 1943. The AFS Drivers spent the summer months of that year refitting

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the AFS ambulances. In September of 1943, Art and his full company of 120 ambulances plus 60 support vehicles and more than 200 men crossed the Mediterranean in Landing Ship Tanks (LSTs) for a beach in Taranto, Italy.

During his service with AFS, Art was made a section leader, promoted to lieutenant, and then shortly after the Battle of El Alamein held the rank of Major and commanded the 567th Ambulance Car Company of the Royal Army Service Corps. Art was well-liked by his fellow soldiers and highly praised for his service. Norm Eddy, fellow WWII Driver and AFS International Life Trustee, remembers Art as “my good companion who was always doing remarkable things.”

Brigadier Edward Phillips of the British Eighth Army, under whom Art served during the war, wrote a letter to Art’s mother in November of 1943, “You may like to know how full of praise everyone is for the way in which [Art] handles his unit, quite regardless of his own safety. The men too are wonderful and many a Britisher owes his life to the magnificent way in which, often under enemy fire, the AFS has brought them back to safety.”

Howe was awarded the Order of the British Empire by King George VI for his “unusual skill and devotion to duty” and received the 1939-1945 African Star with Eighth Army Clasp and the Italy Star for his services during the war. Art was medically discharged from AFS in December of 1943, after the Sangro River fighting along the Italian east coast, and returned to the United States.

In June of 1944, he married Margaret Mayo Burke (Peg), who also served as an active volunteer with AFS, and together they had one daughter and three sons. “I married the most wonderful girl in the world.

Many of the challenges I faced and whatever successes we had while I was working for AFS were shared with my wife, Peg,” said Art. “She was one of our saintly AFS Volunteers for years. She became coordinator of all AFS chapters in the New Haven area for many years. She later helped with

AFS activities for 50 miles around New York City, and put up with my many prolonged absences on overseas travel, caring for our children while I was away. She entertained literally thousands of AFSers in our homes.

Her unique combination of beauty, graciousness, and caring was, and still is, a source of joy and strength for AFSers everywhere she’s been.”

After the war, Art finished his B.A. at Yale and taught at the Hotchkiss School. In 1950 he studied at Lincoln College, Oxford. While abroad, he served as a representative of the AFS International Scholarships, which had been implemented in 1947 by Stephen Galatti and the AFS Ambulance Drivers of World Wars I and II. After returning from the United Kingdom, Howe held several administrative positions at Yale, including dean of admissions and student appointments.

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“My challenge was to modify without disrupting the best of Stephen Galatti’s work for AFS.” In 1964, a selection committee, of which he was the chairperson, was formed to find a new AFS President to replace Galatti who had died that summer. Three nominations were presented, but then Art left to work at Oxford University. While on board ship, he received a message from the Trustees asking him, rather than any of the nominees, to become the new president. Art accepted and while at Oxford for four months, he worked concurrently on AFS business, traveling throughout parts of Western Europe to establish AFS selection committees on the continent.

Of his service as AFS President, Art said, “My challenge was to modify without disrupting the best of Stephen Galatti’s work for AFS. One of my early tasks was to have the AFS veterans of two wars surrender their ownership of AFS as its voting ‘members’ in favor of a new specified group of AFS Trustees.

This new body was carefully balanced to preserve the great strengths of

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1. Arthur Howe, Jr., addressing staff and volunteers at the AFS World Congress in San Gimignano, Italy, 1968.

2. Peg Howe (left) with AFS Participants in Midway, Washington, ca. 1968-1969.

3. Outgoing President Arthur Howe, Jr., (left), with incoming President Stephen H. Rhinesmith (right) at AFS headquarters in New York, December 1971.

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the veterans, and their influence over AFS, while bringing into authority the people of the new AFS student programs. This meant volunteers, particularly women, in addition to influential educators, business leaders, philanthropists, politicians, and business professionals, many of whom were from outside the U.S.” “The AFS Staff, both in New York City and in offices overseas, needed stabilization with improved pay and career opportunities,” said Art. “In the process of strengthening the AFS structure, Ward Chamberlin [AFS Ambulance Driver and AFS International Life Trustee] spent endless hours on legal matters and Edward Masback [AFS Ambulance Driver and AFS International Life Trustee] on financial matters, along with a number of key administrators serving without pay.”

As AFS student programs matured, there was a growing interest in new kinds of program activity. Art said that his most important initiative may have been organizing the multinational programs allowing any AFS country to operate both sending and hosting activity. Previously all program activity operated to and from the U.S. Additionally, during Art’s presidency, AFS began a short-term “Educators Program” through which secondary school leaders were given a threeweek experience in widely varying school systems in other countries. This program flourished, and allowed AFS to develop new contacts in secondary schools. Solid communities of educators, united by AFS, developed in an era when the very idea of an AFS program was often considered a wasteful disruption of a time-honored system. Art’s reply to these naysayers always was, “You don’t lose a year, you gain a lifetime.”

Art has always been a steadfast believer in the value of AFS programs.

“An important lesson from the past 60 years,” he said, “is that the genius of AFS programs rests in the extraordinary learning that emerges from a young student’s placement in a family in a new culture for a protracted

From left to right: Ward B. Chamberlin, Jr., Ernesto Rey Moreno (AFS International Trustee), and Arthur Howe, Jr., at the AFS Board of Trustees Meeting in January 2011.

period of time, with further enrichment likely through language mastery, school attendance, volunteer service, or other involvements. How lasting and powerful an education that is!

How many host and natural families, plus schoolmates and volunteers, can be influenced by a single placement!

Most significantly, how many of the hundreds of thousands whose lives have been touched by AFS worldwide have contributed and still contribute to a more just and peaceful world.”

“He represents the best qualities of service to humanity and a sense of greater purpose that has sustained AFS over all these years.”

Stephen H. Rhinesmith, Art’s successor as AFS President and an AFS Returnee (U.S. to Germany, summer 1960) says, “Art was the perfect president for AFS as Steve Galatti’s successor. His background in admissions at Yale and his knowledge of organization was badly needed when he stepped in. He carried on Steve’s vision with dedication and commitment for a decade and built AFS into a strong global organization.

He represents the best qualities of service to humanity and a sense of greater purpose that has sustained AFS over all these years.”

Art was a master negotiator of change. He was a consensus-builder and was adamant that volunteers be trained, treated with respect, and involved more directly in student placement and counseling. Hundreds of regional meetings centered on

workshops using a case-study approach were held during his tenure. He also established offices to meet regional concerns, such as area offices in the U.S., Europe, and Central and Latin America. Additionally, Art addressed tensions arising from the contrasting lifestyles of parents and youth, both of whom shared in the large volunteer efforts that made AFS possible. As AFS President, Art spent long working hours dedicated to fundraising, government relations, and organizational needs.

Since the end of his tenure as AFS President in December of 1971, when he retired for health reasons, Art has served on various committees and boards for AFS, including the AFS Veterans Committee. This group ultimately helped obtain U.S. veterans benefits for many AFS World War II Ambulance Drivers.

Art said, “These benefits helped provide significant medical care for those needy AFS veterans who were seriously handicapped by their wartime activities.” He continues to stay involved with AFS Intercultural Programs as a Life Trustee and attends the AFS International Board Meetings.

The Howes currently live in Connecticut. To see more letters written

by Galatti or Art during World War II, contact the AFS Archives to schedule an appointment to view RG2/006, the Arthur Howe, Jr., Collection. For a video clip of his 2002 Legacy Project interview, please see the “Item of the Month” on the AFS Archives Web site at: (www.afs.org/archives).

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A Forum for World Peace Opens Doors for Collaboration in Argentina

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even months after AFS Programas Interculturales Argentina held a World Peace Forum in Buenos Aires this past October 2010, the positive effects of the event are still being felt in the region. “It was the largest external event organized by AFS in Argentina.

We had the opportunity to hear a number of very well-known speakers who shared their thoughts about the peace-building process,” said Juan Medici, the partner director of AFS in Argentina. “This event allowed us to connect with dozens of nongovernmental and media companies.

In addition, we had a number of corporations, private entitites, and government agencies that sponsored the event and this allowed AFS to cement or, in some instances, to begin to have productive relationships with these entities, not only in Argentina but in the wider Southern Cone region as well.”

“The World Peace Forum engaged the members of the public and private sectors, who attended the event, in discussions about how to promote, support, and maintain peaceful processes,” continued Medici. “This helps immensely in highlighting AFS’s role in building civil society and helping to create a more just world. As a result, we have created lasting connections that have proved valuable in obtaining support for our work and in highlighting the importance of intercultural education and youth exchanges.”

Among the distinguished speakers at the Forum were Tadatoshi Akiba, the mayor of Hiroshima; Ole Danbolt Mjos, former chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee; Jorge Argüello, Permanent Representative of Argentina to the United Nations;

Enriqueta Estela de Carlotto, president of the Association of the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo; Don Mohanlal, president and CEO of the Nand & Jeet Khemka Foundation and AFS International Trustee; and Rogelio Pfirter, former directorgeneral of the Organization for the Prohibition for Chemical Weapons.

The speakers addressed timely concerns such as global threats that imperil peace-building processes and how to actively combat such threats standing in the way of peaceful coexistence.

More than 400 guests attended the event, including 50 representatives from the AFS Worldwide Network, 100 students from local secondary schools in Buenos Aires, and numerous members of the general public.

“One of our priorities is to raise the profile of AFS as an organization that actively seeks vital alliances,” said Francisco Cazal, president and CEO of AFS Intercultural Programs. “We seek these alliances to accomplish the important work of forging intercultural connections that help people develop the skills, knowledge, and understanding that are needed to create a more just and peaceful world. The World Peace Forum in Argentina was an excellent example of an event that effectively addressed this priority; it was exciting and engaging.”

1. Juan Medici, partner director, AFS Argentina addressing the audience at the World Peace Forum.

2. Don Mohanlal, AFS International Trustee, one of the presenters at the Forum.

3. World Peace Forum Poster.

4. From left to right: Nils Haugstveit, Norwegian Ambassador to Argentina and former AFS Participant; Ambassador Rogelio Pfirter, former director-general of the Organization for the Prohibition for Chemical Weapons, and former AFS Participant; Jorge Argüello, Permanent Representative of Argentina to the United Nations and former AFS Participant; Jorge Elías, journalist.

5. Ole Danbolt Mjos answers questions from the audience.

6. Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba of Hiroshima addresses the audience while Roberto Rufinno, secretary general of AFS Intercultura Italy, looks on.

7. Enriqueta Estela de Carlotto, president of the Association of the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo.

8. Peace Forum audience listening to one of the presenters.

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AFS VIGNETTES I

t has come to my attention as we steadily approach the 100th anniversary of AFS’s founding, that memories (at least for some of us) are perhaps becoming a bit dim, and events and happenings that we used to recount over glasses of wine are being lost through lack of recording.

Thus, while attending the President’s Awards Luncheon on November 19, 2010, I thought it might be fun to compile a record of happenings not normally a subject of “official” history, but episodes that were fun, or poignant, or by their very nature give a flavor of the “early days” of the evolution of AFS from the two world wars through the establishment of the student programsbasically the period from 1914 through 1964.

I asked Tachi Cazal (President of AFS Intercultural Programs) and Carlos Porro (Editor of the AFS Janus) if I could submit some of my remembrances and seek other individuals involved with AFS from that period to submit some of theirs to me for eventual compilation in a book, which would hopefully be financially beneficial to AFS. I received an enthusiastic reception.

I more than welcome your input, ideas, suggestions, and—especially—your memories.

I can be reached at sg@galatti.com.

In the present issue, I have submitted two vignettes describing the early days of AFS.While I cannot submit proof of my attendance at the depicted events, I rest assured that no one is able to contradict me! Please let your memories wander over the fun, poignant, and memorable happenings and experiences.

- Stephen Galatti, Jr.

Editor’s Note: Stephen Galatti’s son, Stephen Galatti, Jr., has been actively involved with AFS and its programs for many years.

A graduate of St. Mark’s School and Harvard University, he worked as a volunteer for AFS in the 1950’s and served as a key member of the AFS Staff in the years following. We are pleased to share his personal recollections of AFS in these vignettes.

A. PIATT ANDREW “He certainly can hold his liquor,” A. Piatt Andrew thought to himself as he sat in the back room of the café on the Rue de Rivoli in Paris with two French army officers. One was a Captain, while the other, raising a glass of cognac to his lips, appeared to be a senior officer. Indeed, he was the commander of one of the French Army’s sixteen divisions. The Captain was his aide and a longtime friend and distant cousin of the American, Andrew, an ardent Francophile, who had been a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, representing Gloucester and its environs in Massachusetts.

Ever since the war of 1870, when the Germans had insinuated spies from Alsace within French army lines, the French Army had banned all but French nationals from the battle zone. Andrew had journeyed to France in hopes of finding some means of serving in the war that had broken out in August, 1914.

Being denied direct service with the French Army, all he had been able to involve himself with was organizing the treatment of French soldiers by the American Hospital at Neuilly. The major problem was that, lacking ambulances or motor transport, the wounded soldiers were for the most part placed on empty horse-drawn ammunition wagons returning from the front. Upon reaching the outskirts of Paris, the wounded were unloaded and left on the depot grounds, thence awaiting pick-up by the various hospitals.

Andrew had dragooned a number

of French taxis to transport the wounded to the American Hospital, but the taxis were limited in number and not equipped to carry the more serious cases. Frustrated, he dreamed of developing a force of ambulances and drivers. He had already contacted well-connected people, like William Sleeper, a successful businessman in New England, who were eager to assist in his plan. The major obstacle that he faced was the delays in getting the wounded to treatment. The more seriously wounded tended not to survive the rigorous trips on the wagons and even those less damaged had their wounds aggravated.

Andrew’s solution was to prevail upon his friend and cousin, the Captain, to invite his Division Commander to dinner and, well-stoked with liquid refreshment, to attempt to use his renowned powers of persuasion to convince the General to permit the as yet non-existent ambulances and American drivers to enter the battle zone and retrieve the wounded from the front lines in violation of French Army regulations.

No records of the amount of fortification or bottles consumed have been found, but legend states the “dinner” lasted well into dawn. In any event, Andrew received the General’s assent and the American Field Service was born, eventually servicing 15 of the French Army divisions and numbering some 2,500 drivers.

After the United States entered the conflict, in 1917, it became evident that its generals had neglected to provide for casualties. After a lengthy recruitment campaign, most of the AFS Drivers agreed to form the American Ambulance Corps and were, more or less, integrated into the U.S. Army.

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by Stephen Galatti, Jr.

Letter from the AFS International President

I STEPHEN GALATTI About the time that Andrew was persuading the French General, a 24-year-old American who was working for his father’s cotton importing firm in London and finding it very boring, awoke one morning after a long country weekend involving tennis, bridge, and port. He had been told that the American Embassy was looking for volunteers to provide assistance of some kind to American citizens remaining in France. Following a leisurely breakfast of kippers, he ambled over to the U.S. Embassy, where he was directed to a line outside an office on the second floor.

The person in front of him in line was a stocky, unprepossessing, and rather taciturn man about his own age, but not too friendly.

The man was called into the office and shortly came out in the company of a person who was obviously an Embassy official and went on down the hall.

The 24-year-old peered into the office, saw someone at a desk, and entered. The man at the desk looked up and said, “I am sorry, but we just gave our last volunteer position to the gentleman ahead of you. He is to coordinate the assistance for Americans stuck in France who want to leave. I do have something here about the American Hospital in Paris needing drivers. It doesn’t sound too interesting, but you are welcome to contact them.”

My father, Stephen Galatti, was the 24-yearold at the U.S. Embassy that day, and Herbert Hoover was the the stocky, unprepossessing, and rather taciturn man, who was in front of him in the line. He always wondered whether if he had skipped eating the second kipper at breakfast, he might have become the President of the United States instead of Mr. Hoover.

In any event, he always took me to the train station long before departure time.

t is a great pleasure to once again write this letter to the readers of the AFS Janus and to give you an update on AFS news, especially since the lead article in this issue celebrates the remarkable life and contributions to AFS of Life Trustee Arthur (Art) Howe, Jr. It would take volumes filled with many pages to fully describe Art’s life and achievements, as an AFS Ambulance Driver, AFS President and in the roles he’s had beyond AFS. For those of you who may not know him as well as I do, I hope that we have provided you with a snapshot of the breadth and scope of his fascinating and purpose-driven life in the article. All of us at AFS are very grateful for his continued support and for his lifelong contributions to our organization.

Early in 2011, AFS faced serious challenges with the political crises in Tunisia and Egypt and with the natural disasters in New Zealand and Japan, all countries in which we have hosting programs. Our most important priority is the safety and well-being of our participants. The AFS Risk Management Unit at AFS International and our AFS Partners in the affected countries each did a superb job of ensuring that our participants did, in fact, remain safe and expediting their returns home when that course of action was called for.

AFS International was busy hosting and participating in a number of key trainings in March: the Brand-Based Marketing Training (New York, U.S.), with the goals of helping participants to internalize the AFS Brand and develop brand-based marketing plans; the High Growth Potential Partners Meeting (New York, U.S.), where AFS Partner Representatives discussed program growth strategies; and a Fundraising Seminar (Ittre, Belgium) jointly organized by the European Federation for Intercultural Learning and AFS International to help participants develop solid fundraising skills and strategies.

We had some very good news this past February when the Supreme Court of New York approved the gift of USD 1.5 million to AFS from the Caravan Institute, a New York-based nonprofit organization. We are delighted with this large grant to AFS International. It will not only provide support for the diversity of our participants, but will help us move more quickly in implementing the activities planned in support of achieving our strategic goals, such as the AFS World Café, the development of new programs and business models, the implementation of planned intercultural learning activities, the establisment of the Franca Pironti Lally AFS Scholar Program, scholarship fund, and the realization of the AFS Global Brand in brandbased marketing activities in support of program growth.

With best wishes,

Francisco “Tachi” Cazal President and CEO, AFS Intercultural Programs, Inc.

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Giving Back: An AFS Returnee’s Experience in the AFS Archives

by Johnamarie Macias

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n the summer of 2003, when I was seventeen, I boarded a plane to New Zealand as an AFS Participant and came back with rich experiences, lifelong friends, and memories that will never be forgotten. Seven years later, I found myself back with AFS as an intern at the Archives of the American Field Service and AFS Intercultural Programs (AFS Archives), working to arrange and describe the American Field Service Fellowships for the French Universities Collection. This project has been made possible by a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission.

This collection includes material related to the scholarship program established in December 1919 by A. Piatt Andrew and other American Field Service Ambulance Drivers who had served during World War I. The purpose of the scholarship program was to continue the peaceful ties between the United States and France after the war. The fellowships, awarded in honor of AFS Ambulance Drivers who had died during the war, funded American and French students on the graduate level for advanced study.

Although the goal of 127 fellowships per year was never reached, 222 fellowships were awarded between 1919 and 1952, when the program was discontinued. The scholarships were awarded to a number of students who went on to very distiguished careers,

including Grayson Kirk (1928-1929 fellowship), who was the president of Columbia University during the student protests of 1968; and Maurice Perouse (1936-1937 fellowship), who became the first French student of the fellowship program and later was a financial leader in Europe.

To make the collection available for research, I surveyed the content, which revealed organizational records related to administration of the fellowships, correspondence, photographs, newspaper clippings, and personal material of individuals affiliated with the program. After the survey, I applied basic preservation techniques to the material, which included the removal of corroded paper clips as well as the transfer of material into acid-free folders and boxes. The final and most important task in arranging the collection was the development of a finding aid, which is a written description and partial inventory that places the material within the historical context of AFS and assists researchers in gaining intellectual access to the material. To view the finding aid of the AFS Fellowships for French Universities Collection, please go to (www.afs.org/archon).

As an AFS Returnee, my work in the AFS Archives has been a wonderful opportunity to give back to the organization and to be immersed in one aspect of its fascinating history.

1. Nicole Milano (left) and Johnamarie Macias (right) standing among the acidfree boxes housing the archival collections, March 2011.

2. Johnamarie Macias drafting an archival finding aid for the new AFS Archives Web site, March 2011.

In Memoriam

In Remembrance

AFS is saddened to report the deaths of two former Trustees, Thurlow A. West of Palm Beach, FL, and David Patzman of Mission, KS. Also noted with sadness are the passings of former Beaver Street staff member, Louise (Weezie) Williams Devine; Doris Terrano, former AFS Dorm Parent; and Nancy Thouron Nash, former Head of Bus Trips.

WWII Drivers who attended the reunion in Baltimore in 2002 will remember the talk by Alice Lucy (Koppel) Kern, a survivor of Bergen-Belsen.

Born in Sighet, Romania, in 1923, she died in Oregon in December, 2010 at the age of 87.

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AFS WWII Ambulance Drivers Last Post Richard W. Christian (1919-2010)

Robert W. Curry (1920-2010)

Donald S. McCreary (1925-2010)

ME 16

ME 2, FFC

CM 93, IB 59-T

Richard Witwer Christian passed away November 9, 2010, in Grand Rapids, MI. He was born October 4, 1919. After graduating from Woodland High School and obtaining his undergraduate degree at MSU, he served with the British Eighth Army as an AFS Ambulance Driver in North Africa. Returning to the States in 1943, he joined the U.S. Army and finished the war in the India-ChinaBurma theatre. His long career as a manager, appraiser loan officer, and banker ended with retirement in 1983.

Richard was preceded in death by his wife of 55 years, Ruth, in 2005. He is survived by three sons, a daughter, and seven grandchildren.

Robert W. Curry died September 25, 2010. He attended Sewickley Academy, then graduated from Greenfields Academy in Tucson, AZ. He was a Psi-U at Kenyon College in Ohio but left to join AFS in North Africa and was present at the battle of El Alamein. He then joined the U.S. Army and worked in intelligence in Europe during the remainder of WWII. After the war, he worked in the oil industry until moving to Tucson in 1971. He is survived by his wife of 61 years, Catharine, his two sons and a daughter, six grandsons, and three great-grandchildren.

Donald Sprague McCreary died October 2, 2010. He was born in Nantucket, MA, and grew up in Cleveland, OH. He was a 1949 graduate of Kenyon College in Gambier, OH, and was awarded a Fulbright scholarship that allowed him to study at the University of Florence, Italy.

Mr. McCreary worked in the USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service for more than 20 years before retiring in 1985.

Before joining the USDA, Mr. McCreary was a mission chief in Poland and Yugoslavia for CARE. He was recognized by the Yugoslav Red Cross for his relief work during the 1963 earthquake that destroyed much of the Yugoslav city of Skopje. He is survived by his wife, Janet, a son, a daughter and a brother.

Jaime P. Salinas (1925-2011)

James E. C. Walker (1926-2011)

Grant B. Myers (1918-2009)

FR 4

CM 99, IB 59-T

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Jaime Salinas, an outstanding figure of the Spanish editorial world of the second half of the 20th century, died January 25, 2011, at 84, in Iceland.

Jaime Salinas was born in MaisónCarrée, Argelia, in 1925. During the Second World War, he served in Europe in the ambulance corps of the American Field Service (AFS).

He played a key role in Seix Barral in Barcelona, a publishing house, and he was co-founder of Alianza Editorial.

In 2003 he won the Premio Comillas de Biografia for his memoir, Travesías.

Memorias (1925-1955).

James Elliot Cabot Walker, MD, passed away on January 6, 2011. He received his BA from Williams College, an MD from the University of Pennsylvania, and an MS in Hygiene from Harvard University. After serving with AFS, he also served in the U.S. Army during the Korean Conflict. In 1965 he became one of the founding fathers of the new UConn Medical Health Center.

He enjoyed working outdoors and was an avid sailor, circumnavigating the Atlantic in a 40-foot boat with his children. He is survived by his wife of 46 years, a son, a daughter, six grandchildren, a sister and brother, and numerous nieces and nephews.

Grant Myers died on June 12, 2009. He was born in Seattle, WA on January 26, 1918. He drove ambulances for AFS during World War II in North Africa. After the war, he was vice president of operations for Evergreen and Trailways Bus Companies. He also worked as the area claims adjuster and accident investigator for the Seattle and Tacoma Locals of the Longshoreman and Warehouseman’s Union. He was a lifelong supporter of the Boy Scouts of America. He is survived by his ex-wife Margaret Doreen Myers, four step-daughters and a son.

AFS JANUS • SPRING 2011 • 11

The AFS Archives Goes Digital Update on the NHPRC Grant Project

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n 2010, AFS Intercultural Programs, Inc., was awarded a coveted National Historical Publications and Records Commission grant, which allowed for the basic arrangement, description, and publicity of the World War I and II archival collections housed in the Archives of the American Field Service and AFS Intercultural Programs (AFS Archives).

One of the most exciting elements of this grant project has been the creation of the AFS Archives Web site, a collaborative effort on the part of Nicole Milano, the Project Archivist hired under the grant, and Luis Cisneros, the Media Specialist for AFS International. The Web site home page allows for quick access to important information. This includes details about the history of AFS and easily accessible links to the latest news updates from the AFS Archives. The archival finding aids, which contain basic information and inventories for the archival collections, constitute one of the most important features of

the new Web site. In addition to the prominent links on the home page, the Web site also includes the information that is most commonly requested by our archival researchers, including contact information, details about the archival record groups, methods for contributing archival material, and guidelines for conducting research in the AFS Archives. We expect that the availability of this electronic information will allow researchers and the interested general public an unprecedented ease of access to information about the history and legacy of AFS, as represented in the archival collections.

The current “Item of the Month” on the AFS Archives Web site features a video clip from an interview with Arthur Howe, Jr., conducted at the Driver Reunion in Baltimore, Maryland, on September 21, 2002. This clip is just one sample of the more than 150 hours of oral history interviews with World War II Drivers, former AFS Staff, and prominent Returnees conducted as part of the AFS Legacy Project, which is now part of the Oral History Collection (RG4/002) in the AFS Archives.

In the future, the AFS Archives

Nicole Milano, NHPRC Project Archivist, March 2011.

will seek funding to digitize the Oral History Collection, as well as other photographs and historic documents, and will place the material online through the new Web site.

To view the “Item of the Month” video clip of Arthur Howe, Jr., visit (www.afs.org/archives).

To view the digital finding aid for the Oral History Collection, visit (www.afs.org/archon).