President's Message September 2017

First some sad news:  David Elliott former Peace Corps Director in India died on
at home on April 16, 2017 at the age of 87.  He was a businessman who joined Peace Corps staff in the 1960s  and directed two of the largest Peace Corps programs overseas, first in Nigeria and then in India. Many of us fondly remember him for his encouragement and support of us as Volunteers in the field as well as supporting the growth of Peace Corps projects in India in its early years. His full obituary can be found on the FOI website (http://ganga633.squarespace.com)

I have just returned from an India 3 group reunion held in St Paul MN where we received our language, cross-cultural and technical training at the University of Minnesota.  Given the age of the group we had a good turnout of about 10 former volunteers and several spouses. We are all in or 70s (or a bit older) and had a wonderful opportunity to reminisce and to plan our next reunion in early 2019 in Puerto Rico where we had received our initial outward-bound training in the early 1960s.

I know other India Peace Corps groups have had similar reunions but would like to encourage those who have not to do so.  In a real way it is a wonderful support group.

I would also encourage all India groups, if not done so already, to get your group on the FOI website.  If your group is already on a different website, Maureen Nichols (FOI webmaster) can put a link to that site on the FOI India website front page. A few other India groups have already done this.  Maureen can be contacted by email at mnichols@austin.rr.com.

With warm regards and good health,

Jack Slattery