Contributions by Floridians in the Foreign Service
People born, raised, or educated in Florida have made important contributions to America’s prosperity and security as members of the Foreign Service community. Here are some examples from ADST’s oral history collection:
- Raised near Titusville, Florida, Mary Seymour Olmsted joined the Foreign Service in 1945 and was soon reporting from post-war Amsterdam, helping Washington understand the economic hardships that would eventually be addressed by the Marshall Plan. She was posted to Iceland in 1949, where her reporting informed Washington of local attitudes toward the prospect of a U.S. airbase to support the newly formed NATO Alliance. Olmsted was appointed as the first American Ambassador to Papua New Guinea in 1975, becoming the first female ambassador to a Pacific Island nation. Here’s the rest of her story.
- Lino Gutierrez was born in Cuba but began his higher education in Miami and served Miami as a teacher for underserved students before entering the Foreign Service in 1977. After serving in assignments from Haiti to Portugal, Gutierrez was named Ambassador to Nicaragua in 1996, where he oversaw U.S. assistance efforts in response to the devastation of Hurricane Mitch. He later served as Ambassador to Argentina, where he secured agreements on counterterrorism and counternarcotics cooperation. Read his oral history here.
- Born and raised in Florida, William A. Helseth served with the U.S. Navy in the Pacific and entered the Foreign Service in 1950. He served in Turkey and covered tensions surrounding the independence of Cyprus, and analyzed economic reforms while posted in Iran. As Political Counselor in Kabul, he covered the overthrow of King Zahir Shah and helped establish relations with Afghanistan’s new civilian government. As Political Advisor to the Chief of Naval Operations at the Pentagon, Helseth helped design scenarios examining naval combat with the Soviet Union, and later represented the State Department on the faculty at West Point, developing and teaching the Academy’s first foreign policy course for cadets. Read more of his oral history.
- James W. Chamberlin was born in Miami, Florida and served as an artilleryman in the Vietnam war. He entered the Foreign Service in 1973 and, as the American Citizens Services officer in Brazil, he worked with a local court to reduce the prison sentence of a fellow Vietnam vet suffering from PTSD. Chamberlin became an expert on nuclear issues in the State Department’s Intelligence Bureau and helped employ export control measures to prevent weapons proliferation. There’s even more in his oral history.
- Thomas Carmichael spent much of his childhood in Florida and attended both the University of Florida and Florida State before joining the U.S. Information Agency as a Foreign Service Officer in 1984. He was serving in Poland when the Berlin Wall fell and Poland transitioned to democracy. He used the Embassy programs to bring in U.S. experts to help Poland write a new constitution, and built relationships with Polish teachers to promote American studies and the Fulbright program. Across his career, he also helped tell America’s story in Bolivia, Spain, Malaysia, Mongolia, and Vietnam. Here’s his full oral history to learn more.