Lynda Carver interviewed by Lois Boyd, May 4, 1977.

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    She's four and we're recording.
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    The stop here with the microphone and then we just tell
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    you
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    about
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    This is Lois Boyd in Philadelphia Pennsylvania. It's March the
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    fourth one nine hundred seventy seven and I'm talking
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    to. You you don't have to hold it. Just give your name and where
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    you live.
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    I'm Linda
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    Carver. I live in the Presbyterian retirment home
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    Prentice House in Philadelphia in downtown Philadelphia.
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    Ms Carver Can you just give me some biographical information? Did you, did you,
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    for instance did you come out of the Presbyterian family?
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    No actually I came
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    out of the Southern Methodist family. [Boyd] Where is your
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    hometown? [Carver] Baltimore Maryland. But I grew up in Alexandria
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    Virginia where I was confirmed in the
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    church.
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    Then, in the late
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    twenties, I accepted a teaching
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    position at a girls' private school in Lancaster
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    Pennsylvania. And, I became very interested in the First Presbyterian
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    Church there taught in the elementary department and decided that I would like to
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    join the
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    church and become a member. So that way I became a Presbyterian. I always
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    say I reformedand became a Presbyterian.
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    Were you teaching? Is this a high school?
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    This was a high school I was teaching
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    I was teaching social studies
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    [Boyd] Social Studies. Well, once you joined the church and you got active
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    in it, did you get involved in professional church work at any time? Not at that
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    time. A few years after that, I returned
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    home and had to accept a position in Silver
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    Spring, Maryland and lived at home because my mother had suffered a severe
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    automobile
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    accident and we didn't know whether she was going to be able to walk again so I thought I'd better come home.
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    I have only one sister, who was
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    married but I was the single one. So I came home and took this
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    teaching position in Silver Spring Maryland and then attended the, what was
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    then the first the
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    Covenant First Presbyterian Church of Washington. Although my family were going
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    to the Methodist church. And, I tried it out but I didn't find an age group
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    that particularly suited me so I went to the Covenant First
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    Presbyterian Church which
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    was served then by Dr Albert McCartney [McCartney, Albert J.]
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    and. Do you want me to go on? [Boyd]
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    Yes, please. [Carver] so I became quite
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    active. They had a very fine young people's group with all ages that met
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    on Sunday evening. And, I became active in
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    them in that room. You were in your twenty's
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    you know I guess I was in the thirty's or that time.
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    Yes and I wasn't old enough to be in senior
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    citizens groups and I wasn't a young person anymore. But this particular group a
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    cousin and church had people of all ages most of them government
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    workers and we met for devotional service on Sunday
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    night it was preceded by a light supper. Because many of the folks lived
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    in boarding houses and they didn't have any Sunday night supper. So the church gave a
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    light supper and we had a devotional service you want me to go
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    in. So it
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    was it was while I was
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    active, I eventually I became president of the group
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    and served in various capacities.
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    [Boyd] We we were talking about the church you
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    attended.
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    some of that year where well we're here in Philadelphia for the board meeting of the Presbyterian Historical Society.
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    Hold on
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    Well, at this
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    time, I was in my early forty's
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    and we had gone. In the meantime I
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    had become principal of the junior high
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    school where I had served for six years. and we've gone through
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    the period of the wa,r which
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    was a very difficult time with Junior High School youngsters.
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    So many of their fathers
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    away. Homes were broken. That sort
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    of thing. It seemed to me I had gone through a difficult time
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    personally. I had a good job. I had a car.
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    and was living at home and
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    had friends and so on, but it seemed just that there was something. I don't
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    know whether I was searching for
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    something or just what, but I just wasn't particularly satisfied by my life. [Boyd] Was your mother
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    still living? [Carver] Yes. My mother was living. She had made a good recovery from
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    the accident. And, my parents were
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    both living and we had a nice appartment there
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    and from all appearances, I should have been very
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    content, but somehow I didn't seem to be.
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    But, it so happened that at that time that Mary Donaldson [Donaldson, Mary Lois] had been in
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    China, had to come home from China. And, she came to our
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    church as a parish visitor. And, Mary and I became
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    friends and in course I suppose
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    of our relationship,
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    I told her that I wasn't exactly satisfied with what I was doing.
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    although missionary
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    service had never been mentioned. And, in fact, I don't think I had ever thought of missionary service
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    in all my life. I never thought I was good enough to be a
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    missionary. I hadn't had any
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    contact much with mission people as a younger person, speakers and this
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    type of thing. Mission work didn't enter my thinking at all.
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    Well it happened at that time that the, that the Foreign
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    Board [Board of Foreign Missions] of
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    the Presbyterian Church was opening what they call a leader
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    service which was a library
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    service for people overseas
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    where they could write in and get magazines and books and so on because this is one of the things you miss on the foreign field.
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    So this was just opening up called Reader Service.
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    So Mary said I think I will
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    write in to New York, see if there might be something that would be available for you.
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    there..
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    I was very interested in religious
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    books. I had a friend, Elizabeth Cower who had a little book nook at the
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    YWCA. and I used to help her some in the summers when she would go on vacation.
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    So Mary wrote
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    in. And, a few weeks after
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    that. It was just prior to
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    Christmas. My mother and I were getting Sunday
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    dinner. And, in the meantime, my father had to be
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    hospitalized. He had gotten senile
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    The doctor said he couldn't conform to a home situation any more.
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    And so, we had to hospitalize him. But my mother and I were still together in the apartment, so
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    we were getting Sunday dinner. And, the phone rang, and it was Mary
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    Donaldson. And, she said then I've just gotten
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    a special delivery letter from New York. And she said, the Board [Board of Foreign Missions] wants you to
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    go out
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    to their girls' school in Baghdad. It was
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    just out of the blue. and of course I
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    was just
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    shocked. And so. Of course, there was more to the
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    conversation and so on, but that was the substance of that.
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    So, I went out in the kitchen and said, "Mama, they want me to go to Baghdad."
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    And my mother was a woman of great faith. She said, " Well of course you are going."
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    Well we had to get the geography out. Look up see where Baghdad
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    was. Well, it just seemed
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    that this sort of thing was impossible. and of course Mary let me
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    see the correspondence, which was
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    from Dr Herrick Young, [Young, Herrick B., Missionary Personnel Secretary, Board of Foreign Missions] who was the Personnel Secretary there then
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    of the Foreign Board and. He said that Mary's letter had been
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    an answer to prayer because they had been looking for somebody to go out and become principal of
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    the girls'
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    school in Baghdad for a long time. And, I seem to have the qualifications
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    to fit the job. [Boyd] Were they looking for a woman to go?
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    [Carver] Yes Yes because it was a girls school, you see. And, in an Arab country, that
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    was important.
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    well as I say. It just
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    seemed impossible that I could leave a good job
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    with an upcoming salary
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    raise and home responsibilities with my mother then
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    alone. My sister was living in York State, married. She wasn't at home. Leave
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    my mother alone? and
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    make arrangements to go and do work overseas. But my mother said well we just leave it
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    in God's
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    hands. And, if it is intended that this is what you are to, it will all
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    be worked out. Well, this was just before Christmas in forty-five.
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    nineteen forty-five. Well as it did turn
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    out in August of forty-six, I was on my way to Baghdad.
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    [Boyd] By boat? [Carver] Yes went out on the
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    old
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    Volcania, which had been stripped of everything by the
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    Germans in the war. And, in the
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    plans and the preparation for going,
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    it was simply marvelous the way things opened up. There wasn't
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    any obstacle that when we inquired into it,
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    The Board made provision to help with
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    my Mother's care. I had to rearrange
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    my insurance, this sort of thing, but many times
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    the plan was better than we had anticipated. So, of
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    course in the
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    meantime I had
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    to fill out all the required papers, interview with people from New York
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    And they sent me iformation
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    about the school and all this sort of thing. and as result
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    then in the spring I resigned my position as principal in the junior high
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    made plans in the summer
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    to leave that August. [Boyd] How did your friends react to this?
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    I think most of them
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    were very surprised and
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    interested and thought it was fine. and I think some of the
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    people in
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    my family thought I was very
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    foolish to take such a
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    great reduction in
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    salary and sort of pull up stakes at my age at that time
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    then I was
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    forty three, so you see I wasn't a young woman. but they wanted
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    a person with more
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    experience in order
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    to head the school.
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    but my father didn't. We simply told my
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    father that I was going away to teach for a while
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    while and he didn't raise any objection. But my sister thought it was a fine
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    opportunity and so did my mother. She was delighted.
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    She said the only thing that could have made it better was that I'd gone out on the
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    Methodist Board.
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    But she was wonderful and in fact she was so brave
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    that after I left, she
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    went and took a little job for a while.
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    And, she rented the room in the apartment where
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    we lived in order
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    to help her income. and Oh! She was a
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    marvelous for it. The one thing that I regretted through all
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    my years overseas was that her health never permitted her to come overseas.
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    I had always wished maybe winter she would come out and
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    spend with me, but I think probably
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    as a result of this severe accident she had had, she developed a sort of
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    paralysis. And, the last seven yearsm she was in a
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    wheelchair but she never waivered
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    in her faith that this was thing I was supposed to do.
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    and I remember once
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    when I came home on furlough, she said,
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    "Oh, Lynda, you have grown so!"she was she was really great.
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    I still miss her.
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    They say. So you're on a ship headed for Baghdad.
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    I don't know how much you want in the way in any
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    detail so or maybe I'm well to too much [Boyd] maybe just go on to
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    Baghdad and the situation patient there. but let me ask you before we've gone there.Did they
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    give you any preparation for the mission field? Did you have to go to any
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    training? Did you have to go to a school or?
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    [Carver] Yes. Let's see
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    what did we do.
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    What was it? The Hartford School of Missions?
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    Does that ring a bell with you? [Boyd] No, it doesn't. [Carver] in Hartford, Connecticut.
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    I can look it up. As far as the Board was concerned, they didn't give me
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    any particular preparation. They may have sent me material to
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    read. That isn't clear right now, but a
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    number of denominations at that time, were sending their new
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    people to this Hartford School of
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    Missions. and. We went up there for a
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    week and we were given all kinds of lectures. This was not
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    strictly Presbyterian.
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    I know other denominational people were
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    there. But we were given, oh, information
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    about studying a foreign
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    language and about health conditions we
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    might meet and to meet the customs of another
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    country and trying to understand
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    the culture there
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    and this type of thing. But that really
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    was just about the only preparation that you had.
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    [Boyd] Now, you were to be conducting this school in English language?
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    No. The actual leaning was Arabic.
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    Although, you see, English was taught as a foreign
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    language in the school.and then as far as we could,
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    we had all the Bible places in English.
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    As many of the girls as could understand a Bible at
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    the lower
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    places studied English just as aforeign language, but they take their Bible work in Arabic.
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    because they really couldn't, because they really didn't have enough English.
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    to actually to do in the way of
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    preparation at that time in the Presbyterian Church. at least in our
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    mission you spent two years in
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    language study, before you ever got into a
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    job and you
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    devoted full time to language studies. That is all you did.
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    [Boyd] Two years! [Carver] Two years. Two years in the country?
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    mean man was it
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    The plan was at first that I was to go to Jerusalem to the Newman language school which
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    was an interdenominational school where a lot of foreign folks
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    went then, to study arabic, but the situation became
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    so tense in the Middle East because the
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    Arab and the Jewish
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    situation becoming more intensified, you see. They finally switched
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    my
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    plan and told me to go direct to
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    Baghdad. There I was to be given because I was
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    the only person in the mission studying language. So I was given a
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    private tutor and devoted
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    my whole time to language studies. [Boyd] For two years. [Carver] for eighteen months.
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    Then the situation in the school required that somebody had to come in.
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    So, they cut my language
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    short. And, I had to go into the school and take over and help with some of the teaching.
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    [Boyd] Were the teachers English
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    speaking only? [Carver] Only as a second language. [Boyd] Only as a second language. [Carver] Yeah.
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    That is, of course, any other
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    Americans. We usually had what we call the short termers
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    in the school, a younger American girl.
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    out on a three-year term.
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    And, she would be English-speaking.
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    The native teachers were all Arabic-
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    speaking, and only spoke English as a second language.
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    so I lived then in Baghdad.
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    At first, I lived in a house
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    with the acting principal.
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    The
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    couple to whom this house really belonged came home, cambe back from furlough.
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    and the acting principal went back to Japan. She had been out of Japan because
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    of the WAr. And so, I moved
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    then tp the YWCA.
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    and took a room there, and stayed
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    there for a while until we had a couple of
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    short term teachers come out.
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    And, the three of us took a house together
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    in one of the suburban areas of the city. But, I still continued with the language
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    study. They went on to study in school
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    The mission at one time wanted me to go tO
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    Basrah, which is
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    the large, fairly large city in the south of the
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    country because there's less English spoken there.
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    And I did find that this was a real problem in Baghdad because so many of the people that
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    I associated with wanted to speak English that I didn't have a chance to
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    speak Arabic as much as I should have had, you
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    see. But I had gotten settled with my
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    teacher and although I wasn't actively engaged in the school.
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    I did attend functions at the school. I got to meet many of the girls and
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    their families. And, I felt that that was a better introduction for my
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    eventually going into the school. If I had gone to another
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    community and come back entirely
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    new and I really think that had an advantage. And, I was always
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    glad afterwards because I think that the
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    transition moving into the school was much easier
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    because people knew me. And, I was glad that I hadn't made
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    that decision to go down
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    there although I don't think I will I always say, I only learned kitchen Arabic.
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    Because I really never did master the language. Of course, it is a difficult language, but
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    I never felt that I did as well in the language as I
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    probably would have if I'd gone to Basrah, but it had
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    its advantages too. [Boyd] Were you, in meeting the
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    family of these students, were you respected as a
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    woman and a teacher? [Carver] Oh yes! Very much so. [Boyd] Is?
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    How do they view women in that country?
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    [Carver] Well of course specially because it's a Muslim country, women's lives are very
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    restricted. But the
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    families felt really very grateful to the mission and
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    to the school for coming and providing the school for girls
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    because our school was one of the few private schools in the
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    city. And it
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    had a higher standard particularly
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    in the teaching of English than the government school. Now the government
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    schools do not begin the teaching of English I think until about fifth grade
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    elementary school, but we started right off with first
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    grade and although the Moslem families.
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    I've never heard anybody admit, the Moslems families, a Moslem family admit that that their
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    daughters were sent to our school because it was a
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    Christian school,but they respected the Christian values
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    that we taught. They appreciated the character traits that we
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    stressed. They felt that their their girls were safe with
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    us. And then that they also recognized that we did have a better foundation in English.
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    [Boyd] Now was this a Presbyterian school? This was
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    a in the old days it was all
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    the United Mission of
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    Iraq and. No. I beg your pardon. It's
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    called the United Nation of
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    Mesopotamia then because Mesopotamia was so much of a difficult term
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    that people weren't acquainted with after the war when
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    these little countries were all organized, and I think it became known
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    as the United
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    Mission of Iraq. In nineteen twenty-
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    four the Presbyterian
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    Church, this was the northern Presbyterian Church, Presbyterian
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    Church USA, not united at that time. The Presbyterian Church USA
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    particularly because it had. It already had mission work in
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    Lebanon and
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    Syria. Had been there a good many years. They were asked by the
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    Church Missionary Society of Great Britain to take over their work in
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    Iraq
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    and the Presbyterian Church did
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    it with the combined help of the
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    old Evangelical and Reformed
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    Church, old E and R Church. So some of our
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    people in the field, on the field, were E and R people and some were
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    Presbyterian. Now, later, it came to be known as the United
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    Mission of
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    Iraq. By that time
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    the Southern church had come in with some financial
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    help. and of course the old
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    E and R Church had gone into the Uniting Church of Christ.
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    So we always felt a little bit like a step child
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    as far as denominations were concerned because we really didn't get too much
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    publicity from any one church because we were supported
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    by these different denominations.
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    But on the field, nor difference was made. Everybody got the same salary. everybody was
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    treated exactly the
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    same, but it's it just happened that one denomination had
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    a desirable recruit who was needed. The person was
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    brought from that denomination. There was never any attempt as far as I know
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    to keep any balance particularly. It was just whoever was available to come.
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    but this is had a certain advantage I
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    think the
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    ecumenical aspect of it because it did mean we got people from different
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    backgrounds not just Presbyterians. [Boyd] Now these were all
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    women? [Carver] No. As far as the mission was concerned, there were men and women,
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    but [Boyd] Not teaching?] [Carver] No, not in the school. No, in the school,
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    it was all women. [Boyd] What did the men do?
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    [Carver] In Iraq. Because we never in the mission we never had any
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    medical work. The men in the
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    mission engaged mostly in so-called evangelistic
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    work in that
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    day. When I went out to the field in
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    forty-six then, usually the work consisted of three different
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    parts on the field. You were either in medical work, educational work, or evangelistic
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    work. But this has changed very much.
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    of course, through the years.
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    [Boyd] Well. Let me ask you this. In the evangelistic work, were there women in it?
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    in evangelistic work, or was this primarily handled by the
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    men?
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    [Carver] As I think of it now, primarily by the men.
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    Mainly because I suppose they were ordained and they could if
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    necessary perform baptisms and give communion and form
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    the sacraments of the church. Although particularly up in
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    Mosul which is one of the larger cities in Iraq
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    in the north we did have what we called a Bible
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    woman who did so-called evangelistic
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    work, tried to organize a Sunday school and this type of thing
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    but we didn't have any
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    any folks
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    from overseas who actually did evangelistic
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    work. As far as Iraq was concerned, they came
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    in as educators and worked in the
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    schools. [Boyd] but in the medical then you would have doctors and nurses. [Carver] That's right.
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    [Boyd] They were both mail and female. [Carver] Yeah. [Boyd] In that area and in the educational then it was to be
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    determined by the nature of the school?
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    [Carver] That's right. That's right. right. [Boyd] Now, in the school then
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    you were Principal or Head Mistress or what was your title? [Carver] that is
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    right. Yes. That would be. I mean we called it principal.
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    And when
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    I went into the school we were at we were housed in what had been the
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    old Egyptian embassy in Baghdad, a very old private
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    residence large, but
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    the rooms were sometimes very crowded.
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    And, it was an old
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    building, but we managed.
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    and the second floor on the second floor which I
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    suppose had been the drawing room of the of the embassy. We turned. We used that as
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    an assembly room.
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    And, we. Of course we
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    had to follow the government program laid out by the Department
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    of Education in the country although we did make some changes.
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    and sometimes. And there was never any question particularly about
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    it. Being a Christian school we had
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    school five days a week. And, we closed Saturday and Sunday just same as
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    the American plan.
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    And then sometimes, if the government would
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    require so many classes per week in a
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    subject, for instancehistory, four days a week if we could do it in three or
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    something of this sort, we made those changes. And, we always gained more places in
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    English because we thought that was one of our strong points.
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    So
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    I just tried to think maybe of some of the changes that we made when we got into that, when
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    I got into the school. I remember one thing in particular that we did. We
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    formed a student
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    council and we felt that this gave the
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    girls some experience in voting
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    and choosing candidates in this type of
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    thing. And, then we began to stress athletics,
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    volleyball was the great game for them because we didn't have much playground space.
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    So we had good volleyball teams and the girls enjoyed that very
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    much. And, we had chapel every
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    morning. And, we always made a great deal of Christmas and
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    Easter in the school. At Christmas,
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    we usually had about three celebrations of Christmas. We used to have a fun
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    time when one of the girls would dress up as Father Christmas. They call it Father
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    Christmas and we always gave candy, sweets, and
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    so on to the little ones. Not everybody. So we had this fun
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    program. And, then we always had a special carol
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    program where each class was to present a carol. And, it was a musical
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    program based on the Christmas carols. And, then we had our religious program
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    We didn't make any differentiation there
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    in choosing the characters except we always
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    chose a Christian for
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    Mary. That seemed to be a tradition in the school that
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    Mary had to, was supposed to be a Christian girl. But, the Moslem
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    girls entered into the spirit of the thing beautifully. Of course, it usually
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    was a presentation of the Christmas
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    story. And, then at Easter we always had a
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    special Easter program and this centered or some past some way
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    around the resurrection.
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    I remember one
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    year we had very fine
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    pla. I can't remember now whether that was written by one of the
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    girls or one of the teachers. Perhaps one of the one of the teachers, but it centered
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    around Pilate's
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    wife and her suspicions and
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    fear. I'm still in
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    touch. i remember I am still in touch with the girl who took the part of
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    Pilate's wife at that time. And one of the things that we
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    did at Easter. We had a small wooden cross about five feet.
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    And about a week before Christmas we
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    used to drape that either in black or dark purple
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    color. And then, at the Easter
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    program, we covered that
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    with fresh
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    flowers. And, one year, one of
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    the girls' fathers happened to be in the north. And, he sent
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    down fresh freesias and
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    this whole cross was covered with these white
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    freesias. It was beautiful. And when we finally get to our new
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    school I used to get up at five o'clock on
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    that morning and cover that
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    cross with light blue stock
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    and it was beautiful. You would
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    get ohs and ahs when the girls would come
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    near
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    [Rustling sound]
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    continent
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    [Boyd] Well. One interesting thing about this whole description
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    is well. For instance, starting with the student
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    council,
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    the letting of the women be
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    creative. Was this a new experience for these girls? [Carver] Oh, very much.
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    [Boyd] And what was
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    your motivation in preparing these women for a.
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    Let me rephrase it. When they got into Moslem society, their role would be
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    more restricted. But you were causing them to
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    think very
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    un at that time, were you
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    not? [Carver] that's right.
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    Well, there were several factors there.
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    Women werre. Women were being recognized more
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    as
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    person and were going in more and more for
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    higher education.
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    Most of our girls, not all of them, but most of our girls went
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    on to colleges or universities because they were very interested in education.
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    The other thing that was happening in the culture there was that as the young men,
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    the boys, got more education, they didn't want a dumb bunny for a
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    wife. They wanted somebody who knew something about
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    running a home,
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    rearing the
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    family and somebody
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    who was more
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    companionable with them. And as so
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    I think in a way we were preparing our girls for this type
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    of relationship in their married lives. That we wanted them
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    to to have more
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    independence and to be more qualified as
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    homemakers this type of thing. [Boyd] Now when they went on in
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    higher education, did they usually leave the
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    country? [Carver] Not always. Sometimes they were, they stayed in the country.
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    A few of them would go abroad to the States. Some went to
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    England. And a number went to Beirut College for
  • speaker
    Women, which was the outstanding women's college
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    in Beirut, Lebanon at that time.
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    [Boyd] Did any of them enter into
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    Christian work? Into church work, let me say that. [Carver] No.
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    No. None of them went into church work.
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    Some of them. Well, one of
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    the girls particularly went into medicine.
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    She was our first woman doctor. We were always very
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    proud of her and she specialized in pediatrics.
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    And she set up
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    a clinic, a service there in Baghdad. We
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    were very proud of her. Eventually several of the girls went into
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    law but they didn't have much opportunity at that time to do anything on their own
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    in law.
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    A good many of course went into teaching. That was still the
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    primary vocation
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    profession for a girl. Very few
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    girls went into office
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    work because of that that was
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    considered almost prohibitive for women because of their close association with
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    men. They they didn't have the contacts that men that women do
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    here in
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    West. So teaching was really considered the
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    safest and that was looked upon as safe as that is the most
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    perfect respected profession at that
  • speaker
    that time. [Boyd] Could I
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    just ask you a personal question. As you dealt with these young
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    women did you try, did you try to to encourage
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    them to think of
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    themselves as persons? This is. It is sounds like
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    a loaded question but what it is is from all you've said to me you're very
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    independent person, who had
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    been independently and professionally
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    occupied. You've made this very independent move. You must've been a
  • speaker
    model of a very capable and independent woman. Was this emphasized in the school at all?
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    [Carver]
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    I. i am not conscious of it. It wasn't emphasized per se, no.
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    [Boyd] Were most of the teachers
  • speaker
    fairly independent persons? [Carver] You mean, with the idea that we would encourage a
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    girl, for instance, to break with tradition or anything of that kind. [Boyd] Not break
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    with tradition, but to think of herself
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    as it having something to contribute, I think to. [Carver] Oh, I think. yes,
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    definitely.
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    Very definitely as having something to contribute.
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    Yes. and I think as I say
  • speaker
    back now through the years I think this has been one of the great strengths of the
  • speaker
    school is the training that the girls got and the contribution that even
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    they are making now to this day to society and to their
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    families
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    [Boyd] But you worked within the context of the culture.
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    [Carver] Right right. You. You really have to do
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    that. You have to do that
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    because we always considered that we were
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    guests in the country. And, of course, we never entered
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    into anything
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    political. We were always very circumspect about any
  • speaker
    criticism of any kind. We we always through the years, we
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    had the finest cooperation from the
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    government. And, they never questioned anything that we did.
  • speaker
    Athough in the latter years after the
  • speaker
    so-called revolution in nineteen fifty-eight in
  • speaker
    Iraq, the spirit
  • speaker
    changed remarkably. [Boyd] Were you still there? [Carver] I had been away during
  • speaker
    the revolution and I came
  • speaker
    back. And, there was a tremendous
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    contrast in the feeling
  • speaker
    in the country and even in
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    school. in the mean
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    time before I had left the
  • speaker
    country we entered into a building program
  • speaker
    among our supporting denominations that was quite a drive put
  • speaker
    on here in the States to raise money to build a new
  • speaker
    building. As I said, we had been in this small rented building and every time
  • speaker
    the lease was reviewed, the rent went up. We really didn't have adequate quarters.
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    So the denominations agreed, particularly through the women's groups of the church.
  • speaker
    I remember in the Reformed Church, they had bags for Baghdad. And in their
  • speaker
    Sunday schools they had little bags where the youngsters were encouraged to put their
  • speaker
    nickels. So we raised enough money and went across the
  • speaker
    river and bought a sizeable piece of ground and built a beautiful new
  • speaker
    school
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    and then but by the time
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    we moved into the new school and got that underway.
  • speaker
    I almost suffered a nervous breakdown at that time because it was a tremendous job
  • speaker
    that we had
  • speaker
    moving into a new building. The building wasn't finished
  • speaker
    yet. still the playground was so muddy and you know what little youngsters
  • speaker
    are with mud around, and so on and so forth. We had to begin
  • speaker
    school buses because we were in the suburban
  • speaker
    area and it meant hiring the bus drivers and all this kind of thing.
  • speaker
    It presented in a great many
  • speaker
    problems. so I had come
  • speaker
    home for a furlough
  • speaker
    year and then, because of my mother's health. I asked for a year's leave of
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    absence and then when it was possible after my
  • speaker
    mother finally
  • speaker
    died to go back to the field.
  • speaker
    I just didn't think I would assume the principalship again right then,o I had.
  • speaker
    I had an opportunity to go to
  • speaker
    Teheran to the Iran Bethel School just as a teacher.
  • speaker
    So I went there for three years as a short-
  • speaker
    term teacher but I never felt at home in Iran.
  • speaker
    I suppose that when you. I think this is true of most people who go overseas. The
  • speaker
    first country you go to visit when you always feel the closest to. so I had
  • speaker
    come back to
  • speaker
    Baghdad for spring vacation on a
  • speaker
    visit and by that time they had built a new auditorium
  • speaker
    completed and the school was pleased to hear that playground was
  • speaker
    all
  • speaker
    asphalted and it just seemed to me that that's where my heart
  • speaker
    was. So It so happened that the acting principal
  • speaker
    had to go on furlough and they were looking for somebody to take over the
  • speaker
    school. So they said Lynda, you'd come back on your own terms. [Boyd] How
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    wonderful! [Carver]
  • speaker
    so I asked permission to
  • speaker
    return and I went back and
  • speaker
    served as principal two
  • speaker
    years. And this, is when I found such a
  • speaker
    vast difference in the school.
  • speaker
    Then I came for a short furlough.
  • speaker
    And one of the things that I found when I came back to Baghdad was that
  • speaker
    the older girls were not coming to the new building.
  • speaker
    Now the older girls were not coming to the new
  • speaker
    building because they said so many of the teachers were
  • speaker
    new. And, it didn't seem like school to them, their
  • speaker
    old
  • speaker
    school. So I asked them to
  • speaker
    resign as
  • speaker
    principal and to do part time teaching and to work with the alumnae
  • speaker
    society of the school. Try to build that
  • speaker
    up. And I did that for two years, and it was very gratifying.
  • speaker
    I got classes together that hadn't been together since they had been at the
  • speaker
    school and we had several special
  • speaker
    occasions at the school, teas and so on for the alumnae.
  • speaker
    It was really very
  • speaker
    gratifying. At that time we started a letter
  • speaker
    trying to contact the girls who had gone overseas, the graduates
  • speaker
    who were overseas.
  • speaker
    Well that didn't work out too wel. We did keep in touch with quite a few girls
  • speaker
    in the States or England or so on
  • speaker
    and but interestingly enough, now that
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    I am
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    retired, I kept up that
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    letter
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    and let
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    me.

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