In Memoriam: Peter Skinner and Paul Weinstein

In Memoriam (from news October 2006) 

The information below about India PCVs who have passed away is what I have received from others and from my own recollections. Jack Slattery President, FOI 

India 38:
Pete Skinner - Pete was a PCV in Raichur District, Karnataka State in a district-wide village-level agriculture program. Upon returning to the States, he entered politics and was a member of the Florida State Senate. 

Paul Weinstein - Paul was also a PCV in Raichur District in the same program. I remember visiting Paul's village and having a delicious Indian meal with Paul and his host family, sitting on the floor of the kitchen. The visit was memorable both for the food and the fact that Paul's host farmer slapped Paul's left hand as it reached for food. Paul and his host family had an excellent relationship.the slap was not hard, just a reminder of Indian rituals around food.

In Memoriam: Leonard H. Robinson, Jr.

Leonard H. Robinson, Jr., president and CEO of the Africa Society, a leading Washington D.C.-based advocacy group, died early Tuesday, July 25, 2006 at Washington Hospital Center following a short illness. He was an India 9 Volunteer and served on PC/India staff.  We will miss him.  His life will be celebrated on Tuesday, August 15 at 10:30 a.m. at the Washington National Cathedral. 

Africa Society Staff
Leonard H. Robinson, Jr.
President and CEO
The Africa Society of The National Summit on Africa

Leonard Robinson has more than 30 years working and living experience in international affairs, with Africa and Asia as regions of specialization. He served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, from 1983-85 where he was responsible for economic and commercial policy. And, as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State from 1990-1993, he was responsible for U.S. policy toward Central and West Africa. His other portfolios for Africa included Narcotics, Terrorism, Democracy and the Peace Corps. He also directed U.S. diplomatic initiatives to help in the resolution of the Liberia civil war. 

Robinson spent six years as President of the U.S. African Development Foundation, established by Congress in 1981 to provide official assistance to community-based organizations and grassroots enterprises throughout Africa. During his tenure, annual Congressional appropriations increased from an initial $1m to $17m. He has also worked with the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Battelle Memorial Institute, and the Peace Corps where he served as a volunteer, Associate Director for India and as Director of Minority Recruitment for the United States. 

A native of North Carolina, Robinson received a BA from Ohio State University; and attended graduate school at the State University of New York, Binghamton, and post graduate school at the American University, Washington, DC, and Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. He is the recipient of two honorary doctoral degrees. 

He is professor of African Studies at the University of Massachusetts --Boston, and Senior Fellow at the Center for Development and Democracy at the John W. McCormack Institute, the University's think tank. He founded LHR International Group, Inc. in 1997, a political policy consulting firm specializing in the analysis of U.S. foreign policy for the heads of state and foreign ministers of African and Asian nations. 

Mr. Robinson and colleagues founded The Africa Society in 2001 as a direct outgrowth of the historic National Summit on Africa. The mission of the Africa Society is to educate and inform all Americans about the great and diverse continent of Africa. With a grant supported by the Ford Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the National Summit on Africa was established in 1997 to educate all Americans about Africa, to build a broad constituency of support for Africa in the United States, and to formulate a National Policy Plan of Action on U.S.-Africa Relations in the Twenty-First Century-- the Summit held a historic conference on Africa in Washington, D.C., February 16-20, 2000. Over 8,000 Americans from every state, as well as continental Africans, attended. Robinson will continue to serve as President and CEO of the newly established Africa Society of The National Summit on Africa. 

Robinson is the author of several articles and publications, and serves on a number of boards and advisory councils including the National Peace Corps Association, and Discovery Channel's Global Education Fund. In 2005 Mayor Anthony Williams appointed and swore in Robinson to the Board of Trustees of the University of the District of Columbia. A frequent speaker, he has made presentations at World Affairs Councils throughout the U.S., the Economic Commission for Africa in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, at UNC-Chapel Hill, UMass-Boston, Eastern Connecticut University, UCLA, The Monterey Language Institute and the Miller Center at he University of Virginia. 

The University of Virginia appointed Robinson as its first Diplomat Scholar in Residence in August 2004. He has been listed in Who's Who in America since 1985. 

From: The Africa Society of The National Summit on Africa website 8/11/2006
For more information about Robinson's life and work see:
Welcome to the Africa Society of the National Summit on Africa 

A Tribute to the Life of George Pothen Thekaekara

George Pothen Thekaekara, father, grandfather and finally Catholic priest, arrived in Bangalore from Changanacherry, Kerala, with the first pioneering Malayalis, in 1937, to teach physics and maths in St. Josephs Indian High School and then St. Josephs College. 

Almost six feet tall, ramrod straight and endowed with a penchant for speeches peppered with home-grown humour, and a joke for all seasons, he soon became a well known personality in Bangalore by the 60's. 

George moved to the Government of Karnataka as Director, Physical Education and was selected to represent the state with a scholarship to the US. Piqued by being unfairly dropped from the list, he resigned, only to find himself in the envious position of being snapped up by the USIS (United States Information Services) with a three fold salary hike. He served as Deputy Director and was at the heart of many USIS sponsored cultural events in the city. He welcomed eminent personalities such as Ambassador John Galbraith and Jazz legend Duke Ellington to his farmhouse in Banswadi and had many inside stories to tell of famous visitors to his home. 

His wife and soulmate Mary was Headmistress and Superintendent of Schools. She was imbued with even more energy, combining her exacting job with running a farm with 1000 chickens, a dairy of Jersey, Holstein cows, goats, pigs and beautiful flowers which were the talk of the town. 

Teaching was George's first love so he took a sabbatical in the mid 1960's to teach high school math in N.J. Just as he was planning to return to India, Mary and he were offered an assignment with the Peace Corps and always ready for a new challenge, he accepted. Off they went to St. Croix to assist in training India 33, the group that was coming to Kerala to help out in poultry farming. Mary taught them Malayalam and George everything else! Once back in India, the group became extended family. Mary and George's home in Banswadi, Bangalore was home away from home for the PCV's. George and Mary maintained their connection with many of their "boys" over the years. 

In the 1970's he moved from centre stage Bangalore life, to Baltimore, where he taught high school maths and physics. He had fascinating stories to tell about working in a special school for drop out inner city kids serving jail sentences whom he considered specially challenging and exciting. At the other end of the spectrum he taught privileged Jewish kids in a rabbinical school. He attacked both jobs with his legendary enthusiasm, discipline and sense of humour. 

Mary's death by cancer in 1982 was a painful blow, but George did not give up. Instead he returned from the US at 70 to begin theology and philosophy studies at St. Peters Seminary, Bangalore. He went to classes every day dutifully from 9 am to 4pm like his grandchildren, a 70 year old among 20 year olds, and fought diligently for his right to a student's bus pass!! In the seminary with failing eyesight he battled Greek, Latin and Hebrew and passed his exams in spite of everyone's dire predictions. He had a hard time finding a Bishop willing to take this highly critical student but finally Bishop Frederick D'Souza of Jhansi accepted him on trial. It was difficult for the seventy five plus former Director to bow down to vows of obedience and poverty but he made the transition to the extreme heat and cold of Jhansi, the different cuisine etc. and was ordained a priest at the age of 83, narrowly escaping making it to the Guiness Book of records. A few years later he retired and returned to Bangalore. 

He leaves behind his four children Merlyn, Alpheen, Phillip and Stan. And grandchildren Nimmi, David, Allan, Matthew, Tahira, Tarshish and Tariq. 

Till his mid 80's he remained ramrod straight, absolutely fit, insisting on doing some manual work everyday in his much loved garden. A fall in the bathroom just before his 89th birthday, was his undoing. The broken hip healed but began a downward spiral and he succumbed to diabetic related complications months before his 90th birthday. It was a measure of the man, his extraordinary fighting spirit, determination and resilience, that all who knew him were shocked by his death. He remained in spirit a very young 89 year old. 

Mari Marcel Thekaekara

In Memoriam: Daniel Foley (1943-2001)

Dan Foley (born Milwaukee, WI 7 July 1943) died 17 November 2001 while teaching a one-day workshop on MARC cataloging for the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee School of Information Studies. He received his MLS in 1983 the of the UWM SOIS, having previously completed Bachelor and Master degrees in Anthropology at the University of Chicago. Dan returned to Milwaukee and UWM in September 2000 as the nonbook cataloger and metadata librarian after nearly 20 years in a variety of cataloging jobs in Louisiana. He served in the Peace Corps in the Indian state of Carrola in the 1960s and had a deep love of Louisiana Jazz. He is survived by his mother, a brother, and a sister.

In Memoriam: Ms. Ann McCreary Burns (January 30, 1934 - March 11, 2005)

The family of Ms. Ann McCreary Burns informed us that Ann passed away on March 11, 2005 at home in Encinitas, CA. She passed very peacefully and in a manner befitting the way she lived life--surrounded by family and friends. Many of us in Peace Corps know Ms. Ann McCreary Burns as the wife of Jack Burns who was on Peace Corps/India staff in the late 60s. Ann was a tremendous support to the young and no-so-young Peace Corps Volunteers serving at that time. 

After leaving India in 1970 she and her family moved to Boston, MA. And then to Cleveland Heights, OH where Ann began a career in real estate. 

In 1981, the family relocated to San Diego, CA where Ann continued her career in real estate and began a second career in residential interior design. She remained in contact with many of her India friends over the years.