Browse Items (1041 total)

Kenneth reads an account of his ordination from the Meadville newspaper. It was May 10, 1927 (contra an earlier account in which Kenneth insists that it was April 19, 1926). The articles describes the hymns, the sermon, and the ordination prayer…

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Kenneth speaks of the disturbance in China that started in March of 1927 and filled the country. It was a civil war between the Kuomingtang forces of Chiang Kai Shek and the various warlords of the country. It has been a guerrilla area ever since.

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In Bangkok Al Seigle, a missionary, came to meet the Landons, at their amazement. The Landons stayed with the Seigles for some time. 

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Paul Fuller invited the Landons to his house for tea and to meet the Prince and his daughter, who was an expert tennis player and who asked Margaret to be her tennis partner in a tournament in February. Kenneth also was asked to become member of the…

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The Landons were learning about 30 new words a day, and memorizing two verses from the Siamese New Testament. Each week was a significant advance in their learning of the Siamese language.

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The Landons inadvertently paid their servants more than necessary. By the time they left the town, one of their servants, Ah Sim, owned three shops on the marketplace. She hadn't owned any when she came to the Landons. 

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When Kenneth tried to have Harvard take Prince Damrong's library he got on the telephone and called the heads of various departments, including Dr. Keyes DeWitt Metcalf, the head of the library and the most famous librarian in the U.S. at that time…

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One of the reasons Margaret and Kenneth resigned from mission work had to do with the role of the national church in Thailand vis-a-vis the missionaries. They both believed the mission was absolutely backward and without vision, that the mission…

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Kenneth recalls the Siamese wedding he attended. After blessing the hand of the couple, he sat down at the stairs. This caused quite some dilemma, as many of the bigwigs of the town were there. As to not be impolite and through confusion, they ended…

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Kenneth tells of the lak muang. This post was supposed to hold a spirit who would protect the city. Traditionally, someone was crushed or impaled by the lak muang, and their spirit would stay in the area. Kenneth recalls seeing many of these in his…

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Upon being asked about Thailand in the modern day, Kenneth makes his assessment. He reports that they will always survive and be independent, as they really know how to get along.

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Kenneth tells of the Landon's different career spurts. He describes them as quite fortuitous, as Margaret wrote her book, and the war spurred great interest in Southeast Asia. Kenneth was also fortunate in that he was the only one in the Foreign…

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After the British-Thai negotiations ended in Bangkok, Kenneth travelled over to Saigon and called on the High Commissioner, who was Admiral Georges Thierry d'Argenlieu. He had been sent out by DeGaulle. The Admiral gave Kenneth a nice lunch, with a…

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Kenneth had been working for several years, off and on, on a book about an American adventurer named Walter Gibson. Gibson had gotten crosswise with the Dutch, and they had thrown him into a prison called Weldebreton. He had been tried for various…

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The Weldebreton Prison had originally been the Prins Hendrik Fort, which was built to defend against the British. Once the need for it had passed they turned it into a prison.

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There was no regular transportation between Saigon and Hanoi except under the authority of the French Admiral or the British General Gracie. At the time, there was only one plane in Saigon, a C-47, with bucket seats down the aisles. One of our OSS…

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One of the OSS men, the son of a US senator, was murdered at the airport in Hanoi. He was mistaken for a Frenchman because he was brought up in France. When Kenneth was in Hanoi the senator called him to ask him to try to find out more about the…

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Kenneth was going to fly to Hanoi, so he went to the airport but found no one there. He waited for hours before General Salan showed up, well fed and smelling of wine. The plane took off and Kenneth tried to have a conversation with the General. He…

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The conversation with General Salan played out after a while. There was nothing to eat or drink on board. The plane arrived in Hanoi late in the afternoon. By this point, Kenneth was "just miserable," dehydrated, having had nothing to eat or drink…

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Kenneth asked a soldier if he could help Kenneth get into Hanoi, twenty miles away. The soldier answered that many soldiers would be going into town for rest and recreation, that is to eat and be merry with the girls. As a way to get to Hanoi,…

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The soldiers dumped Kenneth off in front of the Hotel Metropole. Kenneth hauled his little tin trunk in to find out who was in charge to ask about getting a room. Well, all the rooms were filled. The manager said that here was no place that he could…

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Kenneth walked across the street and into the old high commissioner's palace, which was just a few hundred yards from the hotel. He asked to see Ho Chi Minh, and the staff people asked him who he was, which he told them. No one asked him to prove it.…

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In Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh arranged for Kenneth to stay longer than he initially intended, in order to give Kenneth a good opportunity to move around Hanoi and see how conditions were. He also assigned Kenneth a car with a driver.

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Kenneth's driver took him to a large house and spoke with some women before Kenneth was told to come on up. So he went up and was escorted to a bedroom. This house, or mansion, was the dwelling of an American graves mission that was out there hunting…

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Ho needed the help of the Americans to keep the French out of Indochina. Kenneth told Ho that he was the man who had drafted that policy, which really put him in tight with Ho. Many of the discussions Kenneth had with Ho were in the field of…

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