Victor Masbayi was born in Nairobi, Kenya in 1951; he lived there with his family throughout his undergraduate college education…
Back to Back—U.S. and Honduran Election Highlights
While U.S. politics can be contentious, American elections themselves tend to run smoothly. Usually, voters cast their ballots, numbers are…
Duty and Danger: Escaping the Burning U.S. Embassy in 1979 Libya
On December 2nd, 1979, thousands of anti-American demonstrators attacked the U.S. Embassy; protesters broke down the door and set fires…
Freezing in the Dark: the First Years of the USAID Mission in Ukraine
Using candles for light, huddling into the warmest room, tapping into government telephone lines to make calls—these were the conditions…
Duty and Danger: A Diplomatic Spouse Recounts Narrow Escapes from Uganda and Cambodia
Louise Keeley waited and worried in neighboring countries when her husband, American diplomat Robert V. “Bob” Keeley, faced the encircling…
Sheila Platt: A Diplomatic Life Bridging Both Sides of China’s Divide
Few Americans have met personally with the leadership of both Mao Zedong’s China and Chiang Kai-shek’s Taiwan. Sheila Platt, and…
CNN, Tanks, and Glass Walls: The August 1991 Coup
In August of 1991, hard-liners opposed to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev initiated a coup attempt to overthrow him. The rebellion…
When One of “The Murrow Boys” Became a Foreign Service Wife
Mary Marvin Breckinridge Patterson was the only female member of the original generation of CBS Radio war correspondents known as…
Negotiating the Mexican-American Border: the Case of Chamizal
Defining the border between Mexico and the United States has not always been in the hands of politicians; at one…
Rooted in the Good Earth: White, Protestant “China Brats” in the Foreign Service
A confluence of two rising movements in the early 1800s, Western outreach to China and reinvigorated Christian evangelism, led to…