Kenneth and Margaret did a fair bit of diplomatic entertaining. One evening they had Queen Ramphai Barni and Prince Supsowat over for dinner. The Queen's brother was sure to note that he was the member of the royal family that likes Margaret's book…
Kenneth tells of his serving on the admissions committee of the Cosmos Club. Customarily, one would only serve for three years. However, after replacing a member who resigned, and finishing that members two years on the committee, he was able to stay…
Kenneth tells of his time in Washington working for the government on Foreign Affairs. He recalls a co-worker set to fire him (and did fire him) but later found out Kenneth had become the Dean of Area Studies at Foreign Services Institute. He tells…
Kenneth and his family were in Gull Lake vacationing when the call from Washington came in. The person was inquiring about Kenneth's knowledge of Souteast Asia and the Japanese intentions for Thailand. The caller ended by promising to send Kenneth a…
Kenneth and Margaret tell about Kenneth's earliest exchanges with the government about Southeast Asia. They talked about when the Japanese could attack Thailand, why the Japanese were in Indochina and how far, if they attack Thailand, they could…
During that initial three weeks, Kenneth had two offices, one in the Triangle Building, and one in the Library of Congress, a research office, with full facilities and the availability of the stacks. That was when he discovered all of the Thai…
Margaret explains how, in World War I, President Wilson discovered that the US had no such thing as an intelligence service, and so began to address this issue, but the little that he did at that time had probably disappeared when WWII started. The…
Margaret returns to the name of Baxter, looking up the Baxters in a biographical dictionary. James Phinney Baxter III. She reads about his work as president and lecturer at several colleges. When the OCI became the OSS, he became Deputy Director of…
Kenneth left the OCI for the BEW in part because the Harvard folks couldn't get along with him about the Chinese he spoke. Margaret points out that Kenneth spoke the Swatow dialect, Taichu, that was commonly spoken among the diaspora of Chinese in…
Margaret returns to Kenneth's first weeks in Washington and the report he presented, based on his knowledge of the terrain in Thailand. She says that when she and Kenneth were in the final years of their second tour in Siam that the Japanese were…
Kenneth recalls going up to stay at a British hill station after his operation for appendicitis and listening to British gentlemen there discussing what they would do when the Japanese attacked, and of how easily a small group of them could link…
In October, 1941, Kenneth had a tooth pulled at a "speed dentist's." The man had six chairs and was working them all at the same time, pulling out teeth. It was like a barber shop. The procedure cost $2. Kenneth recalls the dentists he used in…
In 1941 Kenneth Landon kept an office in the Library of Congress, where he enlisted the help of Shio Sakanishi, a Tokyo-born Japanese expert working in the Division of Orientalia. Horace Poleman, who became one of Landon’s best friends, worked with…
In March of 1942 Kenneth delivered the Taft lectures at Cincinnati. That was his beginning as a professor of Oriental philosophy. The event was stimulated by the course in Chinese philosophy that he had presented at Earlham. The lectures were…
Kenneth was standing in line for more than an hour to get his car checked. The car passed the inspection and the man who was supposed to change the sticker on the windshield just ignored him. Kenneth pulled out a book and started reading, completely…
Kenneth and Margaret were awoken one night by a call from the security system office, saying that the alarm had gone off twice (though the Landons couldn't hear any alarm sound). Kenneth got up, took his weapon, went downstairs and this time he…
Margaret recalls visiting (with Kenneth) the house in which she was born and raised, at 8412 Highway E, Somers, Wisconsin. The house was altered and enlarged, but the room she was born in was still there. They had tea with Mrs. Tabbert, the wife of…
Kenneth and Margaret recount the story of the Madonna and child statue. They wanted the statue to be quite elaborate, and through some trouble and climbing found a man to do the job. The statue was to be of high quality marble, and the sculptor…
Kenneth discusses a conversation he had with Colonel Charles Hostler. Hostler was explaining to Kenneth that he brought his own destruction by not complying with the military. Kenneth told Hostler that he was quite satifsfied and proud of the job he…
Margaret recalls her beginnings at Wheaton, the first people she met, her first impressions of the campus, registration and classes she took, and the network of friends that began to shape.
Margaret's mother had planned to move to Wheaton long before they actually did. They eventually moved there in September 1923. Wheaton was provincial compared to Evanston, but Margaret was impressed by the quality of people that lived there, which…
When Kenneth and Margaret started dating she once commented about a girl that she thought was pretty, to which Kenneth remarked that the girl's neck was dirty. The next time he saw Margaret her neck was red: she had washed it to the point of…
Margaret's senior year was not a good one: Kenneth was away, dad was ill, so life wasn't fun anymore. Kenneth and Margaret wrote letters quite often. Margaret tried in vain to turn Kenneth on to poetry. Margaret remembers the commencement events and…