Sargent Shriver

Sargent Shriver, the founding father of the Peace Corps, passed away earlier this week. I’ve read about Peace Corps history and about him before, but reading about him again and learning new things makes me proud to have been a Peace Corps volunteer and proud to be about to serve again. You can read the Peace Corps version here - http://shriver.peacecorps.gov/ - and the New York Times obituary here - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/19/us/politics/19shriver.html?_r=1&scp=4&sq=sargent%20shriver&st=cse, and here's a nice Times op-ed piece about him - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/22/opinion/22herbert.html?hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1295716727-r1hKgRpswRuEjLcl3psuyA. Or go to sargentshriver.org for even more. I’ll post some excerpts from these that struck me, and also some quotes of his that friends posted. Note that he did much more other than serve as the first Peace Corps director – he also led Johnson’s War on Poverty and ran for vice president in 1972 – but I’ll focus on the Peace Corps here.

From the Times: Senator Kennedy broached the idea for a volunteer corps in a speech at the University of Michigan and crystallized it as the Peace Corps in an appearance in San Francisco. Mr. Shriver, who as a young man had guided American students on work-and-learn programs in Europe, seemed a natural to initiate it.
After the inauguration, Mr. Shriver, who scouted talent for the incoming administration — people who came to be known as “the best and the brightest” — was assigned to the task of designing the Peace Corps, which was established by executive order in March 1961.
As director, he laid the foundations for what arguably became the most lasting accomplishment of the Kennedy presidency. As the Peace Corps approaches its 50th anniversary this year, more than 200,000 Americans have served as corps volunteers in 139 countries.

From peacecorps.gov: The idea of the Peace Corps was born out of the optimism, idealism, and energy that coalesced around the presidential candidacy of President John F. Kennedy. It was on Oct.14, 1960, when then-Sen. Kennedy issued a challenge to students at the University of Michigan to serve their country and live and work in the developing world. Kennedy’s speech lasted only a few minutes, but he outlined a vision that would become the Peace Corps.
A few months later, President Kennedy was sworn-in and his inaugural address reverberated throughout the country and the world when he said, “Let the word go forth that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans…To those peoples in the huts and villages of half the globe struggling to break the bonds of mass misery, we pledge our best efforts to help them help themselves…” A large part of “our best efforts to help” would be realized through the Peace Corps, which was still a vague idea until President Kennedy called on his brother in law, Sargent Shriver, the next day, asking him to lead a task force to establish the agency.
Fifty years later, it seems all but unimaginable that Shriver and his task force, in just one month, could draft a report outlining the current mission and design of the agency and submit it to the White House. Soon thereafter, on March 1, President Kennedy signed Executive Order 10924, establishing the Peace Corps, and on March 4, he named Shriver the agency’s first director.
Then in August 1961 – just 10 months after President Kennedy’s speech at the University of Michigan – the first group of Peace Corps volunteers headed to their assignments in Ghana. Between March and September, Shriver found the time to travel to developing countries to ask foreign leaders to host Peace Corps Volunteers, to persuade Congress to pass legislation to fund and operate the Peace Corps, to oversee the initial staffing and running of a federal agency, and to ensure the agency’s independence from the foreign policy establishment. In September 1961, Congress approved legislation for the Peace Corps, giving us the mandate to “promote world peace and friendship.” Our mission remains the same today.
By December of 1961, there were more than 500 Peace Corps volunteers serving in nine host countries: Chile, Colombia, Ghana, India, Nigeria, the Philippines, St. Lucia, Tanzania, and Pakistan, with an additional 200 Americans in training for service across the U.S.
By 1963, Shriver was leading an agency with more than 6,500 volunteers serving in nearly 50 countries. It was an extraordinary effort that only could have been accomplished by a leader with immense skill, audacious vision, and indefatigable energy. Shriver’s idealism and enthusiasm were essential to the creation and character of the agency; he is the founding father of the Peace Corps.

From various sources: “The Peace Corps represents some, if not all, of the best virtues in this society. It stands for everything that America has ever stood for. It stands for everything we believe in and hope to achieve in the world.”

“Be servants of peace. Weep with those who are sorrowful, rejoice with those who are joyful, teach those who are ignorant. Care for those who are sick. Serve your families. Serve your neighbors. Serve your cities. Serve the poor. Join others who serve. Serve, serve, serve! That’s the challenge. For in the end it will be the servants who save us all.” Speech on the 25th Anniversary of Peace Corps
"It is well to be prepared for life as it is, but it is better to be prepared to make life better than it is."
"It is not what you get out of life that counts. It's what you give and what is given from the heart."
‎"The cure is care. Caring for others is the practice of peace. Caring becomes as important as curing. Caring produces the cure, not the reverse. . Peace does not come through strength. Quite the opposite: Strength comes through peace. . . . . The task is immense!" Sargent Shriver, 1981 speech to Peace Corps volunteers
Break mirrors, Mr. Shriver advised graduating students at Yale in 1994. “Yes, indeed,” he said. “Shatter the glass. In our society that is so self-absorbed, begin to look less at yourself and more at each other. Learn more about the face of your neighbor and less about your own.”