Training for Sierra Leone: June-August, 1962
In June of 1962 I was accepted into a Peace Corps group entitled Sierra Leone Project 11. I had never heard of the country, and going by the name, looked for it on a map of Latin America. When that failed, I soon learned that Sierra Leone was a recently-independent former British Colony in West Africa. I left for New Paltz, New York, where the preparation training was to take place at SUNY-New Paltz.
I arrived on June 18th. Looking back on my year in the Peace Corps, I am reminded of Teddy Roosevelt’s letter to his friend Henry Cabot Lodge that spoke of his crowded hour charging up San Juan Hill. It changed Roosevelt’s life. Nobody was going to shoot at me in West Africa, but the experience would be with me for the rest of my life.
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