Oh… And, I neglected to mention…. All this time I was also trying to build a library.

That is how I ended my last blog….. the one about my few months in Phan Rang. And, I think the word “try” is the key word in that sentence.

Shortly after I arrived in Phan Rang….It was probably the day I was transported there and dropped into the middle of things…..although I really can’t say for sure….I was told that one of my responsibilities would be to construct a public library.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The library would be a memorial to Peter Hunting. Peter was stationed in Phan Rang prior to my arrival. He was obviously a very knowledgeable young man, and he had become very well respected and well-liked. He was a member of the agriculture team, and in this capacity came into contact with many people during his tenure in Phan Rang. It was not at all unusual for people to ask me, “Did you know Peter Hunting? He was a good man.” In fact, it was a fairly common question during the time I spent teaching there.

Subsequent to living in Phan Rang, Peter was transferred to the southern delta region, also as a member of the agriculture team. It was in this region where he was killed….gunned down by unknown assailants….one morning while riding through the countryside in a Jeep. Of course, the people who killed him were never apprehended. If you want to read a fascinating account of his life in South Vietnam, his sister, Jill, has written a book called “Finding Peter”. It is well worth your time.

Peter’s parents contributed a sum of money to IVS to build a library in Phan Rang as a memorial to their son. The task of making the library to become a reality was passed on to me. Although this seemed to be more of a community development project, for some reason, the project became my responsibility. Maybe it was because I had already worked as a teacher for two and a half year here in Kansas…..in a real teaching job….and education and libraries are closely related. Or maybe it was because, at the time, the personnel in Phan Rang was in a state of transition. The agriculture volunteer was departing and the two new community development volunteers had yet to appear. Whatever the reason, it certainly was not because of my extensive background in construction.

Actually, I didn’t think much about the ramifications of the job I has just accepted. At the time, it seemed like an exciting challenge. And, it was. Like almost everything else that happened within the International Voluntary Services, there was little direction….few clear-cut lines of authority and decision making…..very little administrative support. This would have been fine with me….and I could have dealt with the problems which would certainly….and did….arise, and with the constant obstacles which had to be overcome on an almost daily basis.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The day that I was informed that overseeing the construction of the library would be my responsibility, I felt a sense of excitement. Why wouldn’t I? I was young; I was rather naive; certainly I had no prior experience in building anything. Well…. Unless one counts the end table, the telephone stand, some shelves and the stool that I built in shop class in junior high and high school…… or all the shelves that I have build over the years.  Also on my side were the facts that I knew how to read…..and that I was a frequent patron of the libraries in both Lyons and Sterling. Aside from that, I knew very little.

Basically, there were two issues involved in building the library: First of all, a building had to be constructed; and Second, the building had to be filled with books. There are other problems, of course, but those two problems were certainly basic. So…. As I began to make plans for the construction of the library, I made a list of the components that had to be accomplished. Things like, find building material, find a means to have the material transported to the construction site, find somebody to actually build the library, find books to put on the shelves, etc…..

You have to understand that back in those days….especially in a country that was fighting a war….there were no Lowes, or Sutherland’s or Menards….. In other words, “lumber yards” were difficult to find…..and certainly out in little province towns like Phan Rang.

To begin with, I had no control over spending the money the Hunting family donated for the purpose. Oh no…. Our chief of administration down in Saigon was not about to give up her power and control of the money…..not that money….or any money….even though she had zero participation or responsibility for constructing the library or making it a reality.

More than fifty five years have passed since the library was built. Looking back at these days is much like looking through a dirty rear view mirror. Most of the events are very dim and unclear, at best. I am not going to attempt to give a chronological account of the construction of the library. The memories in this blog are those which are vivid enough to stay on in the recesses of my brain for these past decades. These recollections, I am rather certain, are true…….and will, hopefully, give at least a glimpse of some of the problems, adventures and triumphs that comprised the endeavor.

The first problem to be solved was….. Where will the library be built? I met with the Province Chief and some of his staff. Of course, the American USAID (United States Agency for International Development) advisor in the province was in attendance. USAID, as I recall, made a very minimal….if any…..contribution to the project. But, in the spirit of the times, everybody wanted to have a piece of the action…..just in case the library happened to be a success. The Province Chief offered a choice between two parcels of land. One of the tracts of land was literally adjacent to the house where I lived…..and consequently also approximately adjacent to the Catholic high school. That is the site that I chose as the location for the library.

Our Chief of Party told me excitedly that he had enticed one of South Vietnam’s leading architects to design the library…..and that he had donated his time and talent to drawing the plans.

“Wow! That is great,” I said. And, I have to admit that it was indeed a generous and thoughtful gesture. However, when I saw the plans, the library that he designed was simply a building with one big room. Four walls, a roof, some windows and a door. That was it. It appeared to be a plan that any first year high school drafting student could have easily drawn. But, no big deal. At least, we had a plan.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The next step was to hire a contractor to construct the building. Maybe the term “contractor” is somewhat misleading…..overstating the truth a bit. Maybe builder or carpenter would be a more suitable description. This was South Vietnam; this was a small town; this was the 1960’s; there was a war in progress. There was not much major construction taking place in Phan Rang…..non-military construction, at least.

Through some source…USAID, one of my teacher friends, or maybe somebody in the Province Chief’s office…..I located or was introduced to the man who was to become our builder. He didn’t drive up in his shiny new pickup with the logo of his company painted on the sides, nor was he wearing a shirt and cap with the name of his company embossed on them. He came riding a bicycle, dressed in overalls and a floppy hat. He spoke only the most rudimentary form of English. At the time, I spoke only the most elementary form of Vietnamese. Between his very basic English and my even less basic Vietnamese, we depended heavily on the assistance of the Vietnamese interpreter who worked for us three volunteers in Phan Rang. (This was the same guy who was with me on the frightening trip to the air base when the guy with the weapon jumped out in front of us….an incident recounted in an earlier blog.)

Out of this conversation we hammered out an agreement that he would hire workers, and that he would construct the library to our satisfaction. We would furnish all the building materials….except for the basic tools normally involved in constructing a building…..things like hammers, shovels, trowels, a cement mixer, etc. One of our Vietnamese secretaries typed a formal agreement setting forth the terms of the agreement. This agreement would come in handy later on when he wanted more money…..as we had anticipated. However, we had been warned….as if we needed any warning…..to pay nothing in advance. You work….and then we pay.

The US military….somebody at the Phan Rang Air Base…..and too much time has passed for me to remember the specific unit…..furnished a large truck load of sand and some bags of cement mix. They dumped everything in front of the spot we had chosen to build the library. Like everything else in South Vietnam, we noticed that the pile of sand was slowly becoming smaller……and we had not even begun construction on the structure. One morning, we caught a man shoveling sand into a wheelbarrow. “What are you doing? That sand doesn’t belong to you,” I said….probably shouted….at the man. “Put the sand back…… Now!”

After some discussion….arguing…..it turned out that the guy we hired to build the library had told him to help himself to the sand. He was probably selling the sand to him…..or using it for some sort of barter. We told the apparent thief that we were going to report him to the police for stealing the sand. Actually, I didn’t report him. Chances are it would have done no good, anyway. The police were at least as corrupt as the guy taking the sand.

Needless to say I told our “contractor” that we were going to deduct the cost of any missing building supplies from the amount we had agreed to pay him. He, of course, expressed great remorse and promised never to do it again. And, from what we could see…. He never did. And…..I will add: We never deducted anything from his fee.

The money that the Hunting family donated covered the cost of buying the concrete blocks that were used to build the shell of the building. Somewhere and somehow, the builder came up with the concrete blocks. I am pretty sure they were locally made….somewhere and by somebody. Nevertheless, he surprisingly bought a sufficient amount of them to construct the walls of the building.

From the funds that the Hunting family had provided, we….actually, the contractor…..bought the lumber that was needed to build the shelves which would hold the books, also tables where the patrons could sit, and other assorted supplies and equipment such as chairs and lighting and shutters.

Constructing the physical building was the least of our problems. Peter Hunting’s family had provided well for these necessary things…..with some help from USAID and the US military. The main problem in this phase of the construction was keep the guy we hired to build the library on task….to make sure he showed up for work on a regular basis, with sufficient workers…..and that he used the material properly. That is…. To build the library and not to sell stuff for personal profit…..which, I must add, was a commonly accepted, or at least a commonly practiced….mode of operation in South Vietnam during that era.

Even with all the problems and headaches, the physical construction was a relatively minor distraction compared to preparing the library for its intended use: that is to say, procuring books for the people to check out and read. And, even that does not state the problem accurately or completely. Finding “books” was a rather simply matter. All we had to do was make a trip to downtown Saigon to the JUSPAO (Joint United States Public Affairs Office) building. This was an agency set up by the United States Information Agency to manage information and, of course, propaganda, and “news” during the War from 1965-1972. Along with all the other information related activities and services, they had a huge “library” of books. Actually, it was more like a small warehouse packed with literally thousands of books……and they were all for free! Just come in and take whatever books you wanted. I was a regular visitor. I would spend an hour or two just wandering among the shelves and the boxes looking at the titles, occasionally reading a dust cover or leafing through a the pages to see what it contained. I rarely, if ever, took a book with me, though. Almost without exception, they were surplus or castoff books that publishers could no longer sell. Ninety-nine percent of them seemed to be old text books…..and college text books, at that. If they were not textbooks, they were technical books or highly specialized books. They were books that very few Americans…..including myself…..could understand. They were definitely not the kind of books that one would curl up in front of the fireplace and read…..or take with you to the beach!

 

 

 

 

 

And, of course…..and maybe most important…..they were written in English….not in Vietnamese. This really didn’t make a lot of difference to the IVS hierarchy…..which, I think only included one other person….my boss. To him these were free books….and a book was a book…..something to put on the shelves. This was the wisdom of the old, experienced expert who encouraged me to “just take the books”.

Even though I had only been in South Vietnam….in Phan Rang…..for a few months, I recognized immediately that this solution was foolish. Aside from the people who worked in the USAID and other US government offices and a handful of English teachers in the local schools, nobody spoke English….not beyond the most rudimentary elements. They certainly could not begin to read the books that JUSPAO was giving away……nor would they want to. As I said…. These were surplus books….books that somebody simply wanted to get rid of because they obviously could not sell them.

In addition to teaching in Phan Rang, I found it necessary to make several trips to Saigon in an attempt to find books….or a source of money to buy books. I think it was called “scrounging” back in those days. There was simply no money to buy books. IVS had no money to buy them; USAID apparently had no funds intended for this purpose. The military had been generous in donating some building materials, but they also were not in a position to give us any money to buy books. And, asking the Hunting family for more money was out of the question. They had already shown their generosity by donating money for the physical building.

The arrangements to build the library were made before I arrived in Phan Rang. I can’t prove it…..but I suspect that the Hunting family was assured that if they donated money to construct the library building, IVS would….and could….come up with the books. If, indeed, this was the arrangement, it had not been thought out very well. In the 1960s, it is doubtful if there were enough age appropriate and subject appropriate books written in the Vietnamese language to actually furnish a good sized library. Fortunately, our library was not a large one!

Book stores were not common in South Vietnam at in the 1960. There was no public library in Phan Rang, and none of the schools in Phan Rang had a school library. Even if there had been easy and ready access to books, the average, ordinary person did not have the money to buy books. The library we were building in Phan Rang was a unique facility. It would be a service that few, if any, other towns in the country had access to. The entire concept of building a public library was to introduce reading as a means of learning, a source of information and a form of pleasure and relaxation. And make it available for free to the residents of the town.

I was in daily contact with several teachers in the school system. They were excited about the prospect of their little town having a public library…..a place where they….and their students….could go and actually find books to read. For free! And, written in Vietnamese! None of them objected to having a few English language titles included in the library…. Sort of a “foreign language’ section….. a few English titles and even some French titles. But, this library was intended as a “Vietnamese” library.

As I mentioned previously, I made several trips to Saigon to develop contacts and to search for books or for funding to buy books. Begging for money is never a pleasant pastime….at least, not for me. This basically was what I was doing, however.

There were several non-profit charitable organizations operating in South Vietnam during the war years. Catholic Relief, Save the Children, CARE, Red Cross, Asia Foundation and a charitable arm of the Mennonite Church come to mind. This is, by no means, a complete or comprehensive list of such organizations. There were dozens, maybe even hundred, more.

Each organization basically had its own special interest, its own target demographic or group…..or mission…. that it was sent to serve. Not many of them were simply general charitable or philanthropic organizations. I clearly understood this. It didn’t make my job any easier, but I did understand it. Before each trip to Saigon, I would send a letter requesting an appointment to talk to a representative of its organization. I always stated what the purpose of the meeting would be. There was no point wasting a trip for nothing. In some cases, I received replies telling me quite frankly that they were unable to provide money for purchasing books. It was not their mission. These were dead ends. I was disappointed, but at least I knew in advance not to bother meeting with them.

However, I was able to arrange an appointment with each of the listed organizations. Some of them showed more interest than others. All of them took my proposal and promised that it would be considered. What more could I ask?

Nobody in the IVS office in Saigon displayed much interest or concern about the library. The organization had zero interest in making any contribution toward its completion. And, there was definitely no intention of offering any monetary support. The only time I can remember even a slight interest in the project were the times that the Hunting family inquired about the progress. Their inquiries were never directed or passed along to me. Actually, nobody in the Saigon office…..and this boils down to the only two IVS people who worked there….knew anything about the library. But that apparently did not deter them from giving an “authoritative” answer.

As I look back, I can see clearly that the mere fact that they were completely uninformed about any detail of the construction, progress or funding of the library was not going to prevent them from answering questions from the Hunting family…..and giving the false illusion that they were intimately involved in each detail and each step of its development. Since I had no idea of what information was being fed to the Hunting family, I really have no idea of what their feelings were toward the progress being made.

In the meantime I had developed a few promising relationships with a couple non-profit charitable organizations in Saigon who were interested in providing either books written in Vietnamese or donating money to buy books written in Vietnamese. These two organizations were CARE (Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere) and the Asia Foundation. Their mission was more general than most of the others, and their money less targeted toward specific expenditures as required by their organization’s mission.

In the meantime, major changes were looming in my life.

Sometime in the fall of my first year….and only…..year of teaching in Phan Rang, I began to notice a definite change in my physical condition. Each day I began to lose energy…..to feel tired and worn out….depleted, one might say. In the beginning, I didn’t pay much attention to these feelings. I simply chalked it up to overwork and the results or aftermath of my rather over-busy schedule. I thought that I was working too hard and too much. I was trying to do too many things, and it was all catching up with me.

It seems that I just could not say “No” when a school or an organization or a friend or acquaintance asked me to teach an English class or form an English club or help them “improve” their English. At the urging of English teachers and their principals, I was teaching in all four of Phan Rang’s high schools: the public high school, which was my primary job; the semi-public school, a public supported high school, but for the second-tier students; the Catholic high school; and the Buddhist high school. In these high school, I was teaching 25 or 30 classes a week….often racing from one school to the other to maintain a rather crazy, disjointed schedule.

During this time, I also was sponsoring a couple English clubs (if one can properly call them that). At the urging of the chief of police, I formed an English class for the town’s police force….which was made up of a room full of policemen who had the maturity of special education kindergartners. I assumed my former colleague’s job of working with the National Voluntary Service….a public service organization for young men and women similar to and patterned after our own International Voluntary Service.

In addition to these teaching activities, I was also working on the library, trying to make it a reality. This meant frequent weekend trips to Saigon to meet with the contacts from the organizations I mentioned earlier. And, yes…. I even tried to maintain some sort of social life, if one wants to use the term loosely. I had a few friends among the people I worked with….especially English teachers and principals. I also had friends about my age….and, please remember that I was actually a young man then!…who worked for USAID. We spent time hanging out in our free time….especially at the beach, which was basically the only comfortable place to meet and hang out.

At first I wasn’t very concerned. I tried going to bed a little earlier at night…..getting a little more sleep….. Then, a lot earlier. This didn’t seem to help much. My usually healthy appetite began to disappear, never a good sign for me. I found myself having to lean on the podium while I was teaching….either that, or just remain sitting at my desk for the duration of the class. It was almost impossible to remain standing without some sort of support. Then came the nausea….actually it felt like I had a metal softball in the pit of my stomach. Finally, I could barely get out of bed. I just lay there, feeling miserable, feeling sick, my body hurting….with no appetite.

My two station mates were concerned. But, what could they do? Our cook/housekeeper would come up to my room….shake her head and say, “You must eat something.” But, I couldn’t. I was just too sick.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally, after about a week….a week of lying in my bed just sleeping and doing nothing….I started to feel a little better. Well enough to rouse myself from bed, get into my Jeep and drive to the USAID compound to see a military doctor. He looked at my eyes….and then said, “Step out on the front porch. Take off your shirt. Turn around and let me see your back.” Then he said, I thought, rather casually, “You’ve got hepatitis.”

I was rather startled. That possibility had never occurred to me, but it made sense. Contracting hepatitis was sort of rite of passage in South Vietnam. Thousands of soldiers and civilians who served or worked there had suffered from it. It was fairly common. Nobody really considered it to be a big deal, especially considering the common unsanitary conditions that existed there at the time. “What should I do?” I asked the doctor.

“There is nothing you can do except go home and rest…..and do absolutely nothing,” he told me. “Don’t eat any fried food. And, don’t drink any alcohol.”

“Can I go lie on the beach?”

“You can lie on the beach all day, if you want to. Just don’t go into the water or do anything else while you are there.”

I drove back to our house and told our housekeeper. She immediately fixed me some breakfast and told me to go back to bed. I think she was relieved to know that I was going to live a little while longer. The doctor had told me not to go back to work for a few weeks. I was pretty much prepared to just sit around the house and read and talk to my station mates when they were not working…..and to spend time at the beach with friends. There were not a lot of choices….. No TV, one radio station (Armed Forces Radio). There was a theater in town, but it showed only movies in Vietnamese and Chinese. I couldn’t drink any alcohol, so hanging out in a bar didn’t make much sense.

That day while I was at the USAID office, they informed me of some good news….exciting news….that brightened my spirits and probably renewed my positive outlook on life. I received the news that one of the orgnizations was donating a sizable amount of money for us to use to purchase books for the library. I was elated…..and I almost forgot that I was sick! The news was relayed to me through the USAID office, since we had no telephone in our IVS house in Phan Rang. They were happy for me. They knew how hard I had been working…..and worrying…..to locate money to buy books. They also understood the concept of “What is a Library with No Books”!

Before returning to our house, I stopped by the office of the Deputy Province Chief for Administration….a good friend of mine…..and told him the news. He, too, was happy and excited. The completion and opening of the library in his province was also going to make him look good…..and “face” is everything in the Orient. He pulled out a bottle of bourbon and a celebratory drink, an immediate and major violation of the doctor’s orders. But… It was only a tiny sip! A major problem has been solved…at least partially. A major hurdle to opening the library had been cleared.

Later that day, the senior American in our province…..the head of the USAID office…..stopped by the house to tell me they were evacuating me to Saigon…..and that an airplane had already been reserved for the flight. This news startled me more than learning that I had hepatitis. Evacuating me to Saigon? Why? Having hepatitis was not a big deal…. Not if you followed the doctor’s orders.

Nevertheless, the evacuation information was apparently not given to me as a suggestion. It was more in the form of “Get your bags packed and be at the air base at 7:00 tonight.” On the other hand, I was rather excited and flattered that “they”…..meaning, I had no idea who made this decision…..would charter an aircraft just for me. The sense of feeling important faded when I arrived at the Phan Rang Airbase. Also waiting there were the USAID director and wife and another ranking American.

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Since they are evacuating you to Saigon, we figured that we may as well ride along,” he told me. It didn’t take me long to put the pieces of this coincidence together and figure out that they wanted transportation to Saigon for themselves…..and what better excuse to commandeer an airplane than to “evacuate” a “seriously ill American”.

My boss met me at the airport, which, in itself, was a mild to moderate surprise. On our drive back to the IVS house, he casually asked me if I would like to become the next Associate Chief of Party for Education. More about this later…..

Not long after I had arrived in Saigon to “recuperate”…..and to wait for the out-going Chief of Education to leave, I was sitting at the table in our common dining area waiting for lunch to be served….talking and listening to the chatter and conversation of the other Saigon staff members and of the volunteers who had come to Saigon for some reason or other. I was still quite new in the organization, especially as an administrator. The vast amount of my time was spent in Phan Rang where I had been assigned. I really didn’t now most of the people at the table, personally at least.

Before the meal was served, our Chief of Party entered the dining room, and with a slight smirk on his face, looked at me…..but, of course, was speaking to everybody at the table, and announced in (what was to become) self-righteous voice, “Well, you can tell the (international charity organization) that we don’t want their money. Everybody knows they are working with the CIA.”

Most of the people at the table didn’t know what he was talking about. I doubt if any of them knew that I was building a library in Phan Rang. Most of them didn’t even know who I was at the time…..or what I was doing….or where I was from. But, now…. They obviously knew that I had accepted some money from the CIA! And, looking back, I am not sure why the Chief of Party chose the dining room…..and lunch….to make his announcement. Maybe to make himself look good? To sort of feed his Ego? To reinforce his anti-war, anti-Johnson feelings?

There wasn’t much of a reaction to his pronouncement….except for maybe a slight murmur. Nobody knew what he was talking about. But… I knew! I knew very well. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Naive me!  “This renowned international organization is controlled by the CIA?” (It wasn’t….and isn’t, of course!)

I immediately recognized that we had just lost the most important source of funding which was available to us….one which I no longer had the time….or the desire….to deal with any longer.

A couple days later, I used my open-ended air transportation pass to catch a flight to Phan Rang. One of the volunteers met me at the airport at the Phan Rang Airbase. I told him of the decision….or ultimatum….that had been handed down. He took me to the office of the Deputy Province Chief for Administration so I could tell him the bad news. He was at first puzzled….then angry. “Why didn’t he ask us first? It is going to be our library? We don’t care where the money comes from. We don’t care if the CIA wants to give us money. We welcome it. Where are we going to get the money?” I was embarrassed…..and I felt very badly about the situation. It was indeed a huge setback, and I had no answers.

Before catching a flight back to Saigon, I stopped by the USAID office and told them. They offered their sympathy, but there was really nothing they could do…..or probably wanted to do. It was not their problem.

I also told a few of my friends in the schools that I worked in. They were probably the most angry and upset of all. They had counted on the library. They had told many people in the town about it. People were anticipating its opening in a big way. The best answer I could offer was that the remaining volunteers would do their best to find alternative funding.

One of the strange….and ironic….twists in this affair is that probably 90% of the people I knew in Phan Rang……and even later in Saigon…..were convinced that I was working for the CIA…..and the IVS organization was merely my “front” or “cover”. Some people….teachers and students, mostly…..even asked me directly if I was working for the CIA. Come on now…. What other American would come to South Vietnam….live in a typical Vietnamese house….eat Vietnamese food….hang out with Vietnamese people….learn to speak the Vietnamese language….drive a vehicle provided by the USA government…..have free access to the Province Chief and be good friends with the Deputy Province Chief….have unlimited privileges of riding on USA aircraft….

Yes, in their mind, there was no doubt about it. When I denied it, they would just smile. “It’s OK….. I will keep your little secret.” It wasn’t until later when I had been working in Saigon as the Associate Chief of Party for Education that I would learn that some of leadership’s personal beliefs and biases took major precedence over the needs and desires of the Vietnamese people.

As I said…. This realization would….and did….come later. As for the immediate situation…..the completion of the library…. Well, there was little more that I could do. I was living in Saigon. I had a new position. I no longer had the time or the will to continue with the library. A new volunteer had arrived in Phan Rang. He did not have any assigned duties yet. This was a good project for him….to initiate him into the community….to give him something to work on.

My involvement with the library had ended. I returned to Phan Rang one or two more times to take care of some details involved with my teaching responsibilities. The schools in Phan Rang were left with no IVS English teacher….and I felt badly about it. It took a couple trips to pack and transport my belongings to Saigon. In the meantime, I had a brief relapse in the hepatitis recovery. The doctor was very emphatic: Stay at home! Period.

Yes…. The library finally opened. And, apparently there were some books on the shelves. Most of them were donated by JUSPAO. They were predominately the castoff books that the publishers wanted to get rid of. But…. They were books.

I was not able to travel to the “grand opening” of the library. The new guy was ostensibly in charge of the library now. Somehow, the Chief of Administration woman ended up being the Big Dog….making a speech, turning over the keys, presumably acting like she had build the library single handed. But, that is OK. All the people in Phan Rang knew the history of the construction. I doubt if they were fooled.

I began to receive “Thank You” messages in the mail….and even a couple telegrams….from people in Phan Rang….teachers, principals, parents, students….thanking me for the effort I had put into making the library a reality. That made me feel good.

If you are wondering what happened to the library…. I really have no idea. The following year….1968….the year of the TET Offensive….was the “beginning of the end” for South Vietnam. I heard, on good authority, although I have no real proof…..that the library was taken over by the South Vietnamese army and was being used as a barracks to house military troops. I don’t know if this is true or not. I never returned to Phan Rang again. The three volunteers who were stationed there were removed because of security concerns. A short time later, the Viet Cong overran and occupied Phan Rang. There was no reason to return.

The project started out full of hope and in anticipation of creating a lasting monument to Peter Hunting…..and to providing the town of Phan Rang with a library that would be a source of pride and opportunity for the students and people who lived there. It would, in addition, would have been a lasting gift from Peter’s family….and would have been an indication of the IVS’s mission in South Vietnam….as agents of change and peace.

I was naive back in those days. As I left the sleepy province capital and moved to Saigon, I would become wiser, and I would learn that things aren’t always as they seem, that Americans, who matter who they are, were there largely to further their own self-interests….and the line between their self-interest and the desires and welfare and desires of the Vietnamese people are not always the same.

But….. I tried; I did my best. It was the first….and last….library that I have ever built. One is enough.