The U.S. Foreign Service

My grandfather grew up in Athens, Georgia. After high school, he got his law degree in Georgia while simultaneously working full-time in Atlanta (at this point he'd become the bread-winner for his family, as both his parents couldn't work and he was the oldest child). Later he applied to the U.S. State Department with the dream of becoming a Foreign Service Officer. He received his acceptance letter along with a letter ordering him to report to Moscow immediately. Enclosed was a plane ticket. Upon seeing this, grandpa telephoned the State Department in Washington, D.C. and asked if he could stop there for a briefing. He was told no.

He arrived in Russia knowing only high school level French. He was good at picking up languages, so he quickly learned Russian from a French teacher as he was working for the U.S. Embassy. My grandpa was in charge of communications between Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill. In 1941, the Germans invaded Russia. As they got closer to Moscow, the Allies evacuated their Embassies, leaving five American men in the U.S. Embassy to be in charge of the war effort. My grandfather was left alone—with Germany within 20 kilometers of the city—while the other four men escorted the evacuees to the train station. They were supposed to be gone only a short while, but they got stuck in a snowstorm and my grandpa was left alone all day and all night, typing communications on his typewriter as the windows of the building were blown out by explosions. His orders were to destroy all important papers and codes if it looked as though they might be compromised, and he spent the night wondering whether it was time to do this or not. Luckily, at daylight the other men returned, and the documents remained.

In February 1945, my grandfather was in charge of typing up the minutes of the Yalta Conference, as well as deciding the logistics of the Conference (procuring all the labor force, typewriters, desks, etc.). There, the three leaders—Stalin, Churchill, and Roosevelt, concentrated on postwar issues. All of this was top secret. Later, he attended the Potsdam Conference—where he met my grandmother, who was there as a State Department secretary.