FATE?

Posted: May 23, 2021 | Author: | Filed under: DODDS Europe, Europe, History, Memories, Military Family Museum, Museum of the American Military Family, School Stories, Schooling With Uncle Sam, Service | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

by Allen Dale Olson

It was one of those hot, muggy spring Sundays in Washington when I decided on the spur of the moment to take my wife and daughter for a drive through Rock Creek Park and follow the scenic street around the National Zoo to Connecticut Avenue to a little pizzeria for an early dinner. Traffic on Connecticut Avenue that evening seemed far more congested than ever, so on a hunch I turned onto a side street gambling that we would find a way to sneak into that little strip mall and find our pizza.

“Hey,” I shouted out, “that looks like Sue – and Doc.” Indeed it was Sue and Doc, and it had been at least three years since we had seen either of them. They were trying to push a car along the little street.

Dr. (Doc) Joseph A. Mason had been Director of the U.S. Air Force Dependents Schools System in Europe from 1956 through 1961 when he and his wife, Sue, had gone off to Uganda to head the A.I.D. mission there. During his years in Europe, I had been a teacher and principal in schools on U.S. Air Bases in Turkey, Germany, England, and France and had seen him several times but never on any sort of continuing basis. Coincidentally, when he left for Africa, I left Europe for a senior position on the staff of the National Education Association just up 16th Street from the White House.

Doc and Sue were glad to see us. They had borrowed a car from a friend in whose apartment they were staying, and it had run out of gas. They had seen a gas station at the end of the little street and had been hoping to shove the car to a pump. There were hugs and exclamations of surprise at the chance meeting and words of astonishment at how much our four-year-old had grown.

Together we eased the car to the curb, and I drove Doc to the gas station where we got a two-gallon can, filled it, and made sure the car would start. They, too, were ready for pizza, and our place was just past the gas station.

They had come to Washington because his tour with A.I.D. was over, and he wanted to claim his job rights to the Directorship of the Air Force schools as he had been promised when he took the Africa job. But there were complications.

The Congress had since mandated the Secretary of Defense to merge the Dependents Schools Systems of the Air Force, Army, and Navy in Europe into a single Directorate under the supervision of the Army. In effect, Doc would be competing with former Directors of the Army and Navy systems for the new Directorate.

I suggested he might consider applying for the Superintendency  of the Montgomery County Public Schools. He shook his head; his heart – and Sue’s – was set on getting back overseas, which caused him to ask me about how I felt about returning to Europe.

My wife and I both told him we missed overseas life and working with the military. He said  that he therefore assumed that if he got the appointment, I would consider joining his staff.

“It all depends,” he said on the U.S. Commander-in-Chief, Europe. “The Directorate would be in the same buildings used by the former Army school headquarters in Karlsruhe, Germany, and the Commander would make the appointment.” He explained that when it was decided to make the merger, the Army had hired a civilian superintendent who had had no military experience. It now seemed that both the superintendent and the three military service commanders were unhappy about the appointment. If he would leave, the position would be open for the Army commander to make a new appointment.

Doc was leaving for Germany the next week to be interviewed by the general and felt that  because of his previous experience with the Air Force school system and the A.I. D. appointment, he would be extremely competitive for the job.  Some six weeks later, he sent me a telegram that he was getting the job and would want to see me when he came “soon” to Washington.

“Soon” was right after New Year’s 1967. My wife and I met him at the Watergate Inn for dinner. (Yes, THE Watergate office/apartment complex of Nixon notoriety not too many years later. ) Over some good German wine, we talked as if I had already hired on. Since his appointment, he had been working to assure that the Directorate would properly serve Air Force and Navy installations as well as those on Army installations throughout the “European Area,” now described as Sub-Saharan Africa to the Arctic Circle, all of Western Europe and the Middle East, some 200 schools to operate, another couple hundred of international and host nation schools to whom we pay tuition for  military kids.

“Charlie Ross will stay as my deputy,” he said, “and I don’t think you know him, but I’ve made Tom Wilber my Chief of Staff; now I need an executive officer who can travel to military communities and interact with commanders and parent groups and the press.  Your recent exposure to national education issues and past work with the military makes you a natural for this.”

A month later, another telegram summoned me to an Army recruitment office in the Old Post Office Building on Pennsylvania Avenue (YES, the future Trump Hotel), where I met Doc’s personal chief recruiter, Helen Johanns, who walked me through all the Civilian Personnel offices necessary to sign me on.

Memorial Day in May 1967, my wife, daughter, and I flew to Frankfurt where we were met by a German driver in an Army sedan and driven to Karlsruhe and a new career I learned to love and which ended more than 20 years later as a senior staff member on the Heidelberg staff of the U.S. Army Europe Commander-in-Chief.

Oh, fate!  and a pizza pie and an empty gas tank.

 

AFCENT FIELD TRIP

Posted: November 30, 2020 | Author: | Filed under: DODDS Europe, Europe, History, Memories, School Stories, Schooling With Uncle Sam, Teachers, Uncategorized | Tags: , , | 1 Comment

by Allen Dale Olson

Tuesday, November 30, 1976, was just like any other day until I got to my office. Joan Tucker, the overseer of all things front office, greeted me by saying I might as well go straight in to see the man as he’s been waiting for you. The man (Doc) was Joseph A. Mason, Director of United States Dependents Schools, European Area (USDESEA).

“Hey, I’m glad you’re here; looks like you’re going have to arrange for the whole AFCENT faculty to go to Washington.”  I knew he had spent yesterday with the Directors of the AFCENT school because of a number of problems, but I didn’t expect anything like what he had just said.

AFCENT (Allied Forces Central Command) had been established in Limburg Province, Holland, as part of the relocation of NATO forces from France into northern Germany and Holland and of the Supreme Headquarters Allied Forces from Paris to Brussels in 1966-67. The AFCENT military community, near Brunssum, consisted mostly of Americans, British, Canadian, and German forces with a sprinkling of Dutch, Scandinavian, and Belgian families.  It took a couple of years, but a school for the children of those forces was formed as one

complex, with four national units all sharing common areas, each unit headed by a principal with a teaching staff who would assure students received a national education but would jointly receive instruction in art, physical education, languages, and history.

Overall, the arrangement worked well, but in recent weeks there had been complaints that the American section had been using more than its fair share of time in the common areas, especially in the gymnasium and sports fields. In the beginning, that was acceptable because, after all, the Americans were paying the largest share of the common costs, and a little later, as the other nationals were told that the Americans had varsity sports programs with other USDESEA schools that required long hours of practice. Schools in the other nations did not have sports teams. They used their gym and sports field for physical education. Students wanting to play competitive sports joined local municipal or regional clubs.

At yesterday’s meeting, the German and British directors admitted they just did not understand the American school sports programs, and even the Canadian admitted that American schools were far more passionate about their school teams than anyone else.

Rudi Bewer, the former Director of the Free University of Berlin, and then Supervising Administrator of the AFCENT school, at yesterday’s meeting said it was a shame that the non-U.S. teachers could not actually see an American school with all of its many complexities so they could get a better feel for what school life is really like in the States. He thought the American local boards of education and parental involvement with PTAs and school volunteers would be very useful in understanding the American need for so much use of facilities.

Doc said the idea caught on, especially when the Luftwaffe representative opined that he might be able to persuade his Defense Minister to allow the faculty to fly on the daily courier to and from Washington. “I told him that if he could do that, I have the man who can make all the arrangements for school visits in the Washington area.” All the school chiefs excitedly signed up for giving it a try. Now I knew why Doc had been waiting for me that morning.

Next day Rudi called me to say the Ministry of Defense was amenable to providing the plane but needed a few details about the concept and what the teachers would actually do while in Washington. He proposed we plan it over the spring break.

Sunday, December 5, Pan Am took me from Frankfurt to Dulles, and next morning I caught up with John Wherry, Executive Director of the National School Public Relations Association (NSPRA) so we could spend the day conceptualizing with his staff. Because his office was in the building of the National Education Association, where I had worked for several years, I was able to scurry around to see former colleagues and solicit their thoughts.

Tuesday morning, December 7, I met with the manager of the Hotel Harrington on 11th Street NW in downtown D.C. and initiated a contract to house the group in April should the trip materialize. Back at NSPRA, we decided that at least a day would be given to seminar-style meetings and that most of the week would be devoted to visiting schools : Montgomery County as one of the nation’s most affluent school communities; Fairfax County, home to most military families assigned to the area; and Washington, D.C. as an example of struggling inner city schools.

Wednesday morning, I met with Dr. Wesley Carroll, Professor of Education at The George Washington University (and my doctoral advisor) about resources available from GWU. The rest of the day was spent with Ken Muir, Public Affairs Director of the Montgomery County Public Schools and with Jim Hussan, a coordinator of cultural relations studies in Fairfax County and former USDESEA employee. With a bulging notebook, I flew back to Frankfurt and home to USDESEA Headquarters in Karlsruhe.

On January 11, 1977, Rudi called to say he liked the draft concept and that the Luftwaffe plane was almost certain. A week later, in Heidelberg, I called on Lynn Whittacre, Dean of the University of Maryland Campus, Europe, to ask about awarding graduate credit to participating teachers on this study trip. She suggested some possible topics for research papers and said she would certify me as the instructor. While in Heidelberg, I met with USAREUR finance personnel about obtaining fund citations for the U.S. side and got their support for working with the British, Canadian, and German commands for their share.

Doc approved the completed plan on Tuesday, February 8, and on the 11th I drove to AFCENT to review it with Rudi and the four national directors, after which I discussed it with the representatives of the Overseas Education Association and Overseas Federation of Teachers, with whom Rudi had been in continuing contact. Meanwhile, Ken Muir and George Hamil (Montgomery County and Fairfax County) worked on arranging school visits, and John Wherry on locating seminar presenters and D.C. school visits. Read the rest of this entry »