{"id":446,"date":"2019-12-31T10:07:32","date_gmt":"2019-12-31T16:07:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.forgottensquadron.com\/?page_id=446"},"modified":"2021-04-18T19:07:33","modified_gmt":"2021-04-19T00:07:33","slug":"findley-william-s-9th-photo-reconnaissance-squadron","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.forgottensquadron.com\/?page_id=446","title":{"rendered":"Findley, William S. \u2014 9th Photo Reconnaissance Squadron"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Findley, William S. I Took the Long Way Home<\/em>. Unpublished, 1962.<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019d\nset a new world\u2019s record–100 yards in nine flat across a rain-slick rice\npaddy.  I stopped fleeing and turned to\nlook apprehensively at the smoking United State Air Corps P-38 plane I’d\nbelly-landed.  Any moment now, the few drops\nof gasoline remaining would explode.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But,\nwhy did the back of my legs ache so?  I\npeered over my shoulder, and grinned–a welcome relief from hours of\ntension.  My parachute was still strapped\nsecurely to me, and the seat pack had been thumping me every stride.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s\nhumorous now.  It wasn’t, that\nValentine’s Day, 1945. I’d made a routine takeoff from Myitkniya, Burma,\nclimbed on instruments through a thick overcast to 25,000 feet, flown\nover-the-top several hundred miles south into Japanese-held territory.  This was photo reconnaissance, solo, with\ncameras substituting for guns.  My\nmission?  To get pictures and scoot for\nhome.  Clouds obscured my target, so I\nu-turned and scooted, never dreaming I would take the long way home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As\nI descended, I could scarcely see my wingtips, twenty-five feet from my\ncockpit.  Dangerously heavy icing wobbled\nthe controls. My radio compass went crazy. \nI radioed fighter control for a homing compass bearing and got it.  Then, cautiously, I continued my\nvisibility-zero let-down over mountainous terrain, exact position unknown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Suddenly,\nmy blood chilled–through a break in the clouds I caught a terrifying glimpse\nof a tree-covered mountain hurtling toward me! \nI yanked the wheel, hit full throttle and right rudder, braced myself\nfor the crash and eternity–but it didn’t come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Minutes\nlater, soaked with sweat, my muscles rubbery, I leveled off higher than the\ncloud-shrouded peaks nearby.  I broadcast\nto anyone who would answer–standard, then emergency calls.  My earphones were silent–complete radio\nfailure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’d\nnever felt so alone–so helpless. I wondered: what now, hot pilot?  Those clouds cover most of Burma. Going to\nbail out?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And\ndies freezing on a mountain?  Negative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alternative?\nFly by magnetic compass toward Mytikniya, and hope for a miracle before the\nfuel is gone–just one hour from now!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roger.  It’s worth a try.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And\nsay…..I will ask God to help me.  They\nclaim He does in such a fix, if one is fervent enough.  And yet, I’ve not been so fair with God, have\nI?  Why should He help me,\nespecially?  Maybe a bargain, a deal with\nGod?  I’ve heard of this, too, from\ngenuine folks who were given that “second chance”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And\nso, “Dear God,” I prayed (hold that compass steady, fly-boy),.\n“please help me.  In fact, if you\ndo, I promise I’ll….” the words stuck in my throat.  Who was I to bargain with God?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead,\nI said simply, “Dear God, help me if you choose.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nrelaxed a bit, groped blindly on, and on. \nAnd it happened! A gaping hole broke in that white world!  I wheeled, dove for it, plunged two miles to\nlevel out in the mist above endless rice paddies.  Fuel? \nTanks nearly empty.  Then, the\ncrash landing, the sprint, and–thank You, God, for this good earth under my\nfeet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But\nwhere was I?  Enemy territory?  Could I escape?  Could I, in heaven’s name, possibly get home\nbefore the “missing in action” message was dutifully dispatched to my\nparents?  Who could help me know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Suddenly\nI was aware that, whichever way I turned, I looked full into the curious face\nof another person.  I smiled.  They smiled back.  But who were they, and where were we?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\nambled to a hamlet a quarter-mile from my now-burning plane.  Excitedly they pointed to the American flag\non my jacket, and their smiles broadened. \nIt was time for me to dip into my “escape kit.”  We’d dutifully endured lectures about this\nbag of tricks, and had lackadaisically suffered the extra weight.  And now I knew why.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nproduced the “blood chits,” cards introducing me as a friend.  “If you will lead me to the nearest\nAllied Military post, my Government will give you a reward,” it promised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Card\nby card, language by language, I flashed these chits.  My hosts shrugged with blank stares. Then I\nheld up one in a Chinese dialect–this was it! their frantic tones and gestures\nannounced.  We had communicated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not\none word of English did they comprehend. \nI’d tried.  Not one word of\nChinese did I know.  They’d tried.  Ironically, the “pointie-talkie” in\nChinese was missing from my kit. What we shared was a slim thread, a simple\nmessage on a card, and those unmistakable gestures common to humans of every\ntongue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So,\nwe were friends.  But, where? We put our\nheads together over my silk escape maps, spread on a rough table in a Chinese farmer’s\nhome.  My new friends stroked their chins\nprofoundly, gazing up and down the length of the land portrayed before\nthem.  One by one the looked up at me\nempty-eyed as if to say, “Nice silk, but what’s it say?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\ntried another tack, saying names of towns. \n“Mytikniya,” I began. \n“Ai, ai,” they chorused. \nI pointed, boxing the compass, until they caught on and point west.  Kunming? \n“Ai, ai,” came the response with fingers pointing east.  Mandalay, Bhamo, Salon, Tali, Yungping?  No response. \nThen Tengchung rang the big bell, southwest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My\nvector lines intersected in the Salween river valley, about 100 miles east of\nmy home base, but over those rugged “hump route” mountains,\nimpassable, except by air.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After\na conference, they led me to a town an hour’s walk away.  When they had settled me in the finest home,\na dignified and honored man appeared. \nAfter smiles and bows, I learned why he was honored.  He owned Chinese-English and English-Chinese\ndictionaries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two\nhours and much page-thumbing later, I learned that he was a fine fellow; his\ntown was Kito, sixty miles from Tengchung’s Allied emergency landing strip; and\nthat he would see that I got there–sometime. \nTime, I soon learned, was to be enjoyed, not made the most of or\nsaved.  This was China, not Main Street,\nUSA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Feeling\nsafe now, I began to actually enjoy the unfolding drama of my\n“walk-out” from backwoods China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nwas an oddity for them, and the focus of curiosity and tittering.  As word spread, people came in droves to get\na glimpse of the foreigner who had swooped from the sky in the big silver\nbird.  They jammed the tiny room and\nsurrounded it.  The doorways, the\nwindows, the room–all were full of faces. \nI could see nothing but smiling oriental faces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A\ncrinkly-faced old woman brought food, but I refused, afraid of dysentery or\nworse.  They seemed hurt.  So I feigned a stomach injury from the crash,\nand they clucked sympathetically.  I did\nask for boiling water, made bouillon from cubes in my kit, and gratefully\nsavored some of their tea, the finest I ever drank.  They smiled at my genuine compliments, and\nour bonds deepened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Late\nafternoon brought the inevitable–I hadn’t seen a men’s room since before my\ntakeoff at 0920. Now, nature would have her way.  So, with dozens of pairs of eyes and ears\nalerted for every word and gesture, I found the appropriate words in the\nEnglish-Chinese dictionary until my literate friend got the point.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He\nfairly exploded with glee, and muttered in his highly tonal language to the\nnearest male, who guffawed and passed on the joke.  When all were convulsed with laughter, my\ndignity collapsed, and I roared with them through my pain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nthe nick of time, one noble soul shooed away the throngs and led me down a\nwinding loggia to a bare stall about three feet square with an irregular hole\nin the floor.  He ceremonially closed the\ndoor.  I groped in the dark, then opened\nthe door and protested that this must not be the place.  “Oh, yes it is,” his knowing smile\nreassured me, and again he shut me in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ten\nminutes later, I emerged, victorious, certain some new sort of medal should be\nstruck, and pinned on my breast above my silver wings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At\nlast I slept, protected from the curious by several men, and one large boy who\nimportantly kept at ready a rusty relic of an army rifle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nwoke at dawn, drank more soup and tea, downed some chocolate rations, and\nstepped into the sunshine eager to be off. \nHours later, my guide–he knows the way to Tengchung, Mr. Dictionary\nassured me–appeared with two burros, a huge smile, and a cheery,\n“Ding-hi!” Uttered with a grin and the right thumb up, this was a\nstandard greeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With\nmy parachute strapped to one burro and me perched on the other in the squarest\nwooden saddle I’d ever seen, we embarked amid cheers and tears and ding hi’s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mid-morning\nI insisted that my guide “rest” a while on that saddle while I\nwalked.  Nothing doing.  I was the honored one.  The old stomach injury bit did the trick\nagain, and I gratefully walked and rested my battered posterior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

About\nnoon, we met a Chinese army outfit. \nTheir Colonel halted them. \n“So there you are!” he said. \nI never knew how wonderful simple English could sound!  I babbled until I was hoarse, and he listened\npatiently.  He had been searching for me\nwhile on another mission.  He wrote a\nmessage for me in Chinese characters.  It\nwas magic.  From then on I got action and\na mite more speed.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\nhiked level plains, climbed steep paths, waded rocky fords, paddled precarious\nferries.  We came at dusk to a\ncomparatively prosperous village.  All\nhands turned out smilingly eager to help. \nThe best house in town was mine, with elders in white array, boiling\nwater ready for my tea and bouillon, and a clean bed made up.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\nhad a companionable evening, including a floor show by the town’s talent.  I wowed them with a display of shadow\npictures and animal calls to match.  It\nwas quite a party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Abruptly,\nhowever, the mood changed from levity to solemnity. My guide was recounting an\nevent of that afternoon.  Walking\nbarefooted, he’d gashed his foot on a sharp rock, leaving a bloody trail in the\ndust. I’d insisted that we pause at a stream where I bathed the ugly deep\ncut–it should have been stitched–swabbed it with iodine, and fashioned a shoe\nfrom a huge compress in my kit.  He’d\nbeen dubious, stepping gingerly at first, then dancing down the road.  Now he proudly displayed his\n“shoe”, and pointed at me with mystic awe in his voice and eyes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then\nthey came to me, the sick, the maimed, the blind, and with rising panic and\npity, I knew–they expected me to heal them! \nI could neither shatter nor ignore this poignant hope.  What could I do?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally\nI remembered.  In my kit were potassium\npermanganate crystals for disinfectant. \nDissolved in water, they dye anything it touches an impressive deep\npurple.  By coincidence, I’d recently\nread A.J. Cronin’s novel The Keys of the Kingdom, in which a young\nmissionary in China used such a solution with dramatic effect.  It could not help elephantiasis–and there\nwas some in that room with me that night–but it could subdue infection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\npantomimed the need for hot water and cloths, then sprinkled in the crystals\nwhile all watched hypnotized.  Volunteers\nstepped forward, moved among the ailing, tenderly bathing gangrenous sores,\nswollen eyes and limbs, painful and ghastly tumors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nread their gratitude in their eyes when the rite was ended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nlay awake for some time that night, feeling overwhelming compassion, and\ncursing my inability really to help these tortured persons.  Humbly, I begged God to help them, and to\nforgive me for my partial hoax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\nlunched the next day at a hilltop village. \nOur portly and voluble host, flanked by a pipe-smoking crony–both\nstraight from a Pearl Buck novel–grandiously offered his home brew as an\nafter-lunch cordial.  I could tell five\nfeet away that the alcoholic content was near saturation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Thank\nyou, no.  I’ve a long walk ahead\ntoday,” I protested with gestures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Ha!  Phony excuse,” he leered in Chinese, I\nthink.  Crony nodded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“My\npoor little insides are all shaken from the crash,” I tried, writhing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“You\ninsult me,” he growled.  Crony\npuffed ominously.  My guide pleaded with\nhis eyes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\nI put the flask to my lips and pretended to drink, swallowing loudly and\nsmacking my lips.  The sham didn’t\nwork.  So I swilled a large swill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When\nI gasped for breath, my throat and stomach seared and my eyes gushing tears,\nMr. Big was satisfied.  I read in his\nmocking eyes his freshly-formed generality–that all Americans are too\nsoft to appreciate green rice wine.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Late\nthat afternoon my fatigue vanished instantly as we rounded a bend in the hilly\ntrail.  A lump came to my throat.  Below us was the unmistakable symbol of the\nUS Air Corps–a C-47 plane, workhorse of the Air Transport Command–refueling\nat the Tengchung emergency field!  I\nraced the last half mile, now guiding my guide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nwas greeted in mad confusion.  The\nAmericans there knew I was down because a wide search for me had been on,\nfinally abandoned that afternoon.  I was\nfound!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After\narranging for proper rewards, I took my hero to the medics to sew up his foot,\nand bid farewell to this close friend with whom I’d exchanged not one intelligible\nword.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\ngulped my first square meal in 56 hours, and gratefully endured the bumpy\nflight to Mytikniya in the ancient C-47.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Hello,\nMajor?  This is Findley.  Can you send someone to get me?  I’m over at—,”  I got out just this much on the scratchy\nfield phone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Findley?”  bellowed the amiable CO of the 9th Photo\nSquadron, “Findley!  Where in the\nhell have you been?  Where are you?  Damn it son, speak up!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nspoke up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Minutes\nlater he himself came to a careening halt in his command car, leaped out,\nembraced me like my mother used to, and I was “home”.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’m\noften asked whether it was this experience that compelled me to become a\nminister.  Yes, partly.  Because God saved me from death?  Or because, even though I consciously avoided\ntrying to make a deal with God, I really had promised Him something?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No,\nit was something else.  I realized that\nday, for the first time in my gay young life, how startlingly puny we humans\nare.  Wasn’t I a nearly perfect physical\nand mental specimen, one of the finest trained pilots in the world?  Wasn’t my P-38 one of the sleekest,\nbest-equipped aircraft men had yet produced? \nAnd yet I was absolutely helpless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Penetrating\ninsights come with such helplessness, and afterward one burning question\nhounded me constantly.  It harassed me as\nI walked out of China.  It haunted me as\nI returned to duty, completed my tour, returned to the States.  “What, after all, is ultimately\nimportant?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nknew the answer shortly after VJ Day: \nNeither plane nor pilot training, nor wars, and rumors of wars, nor\nlanguage and cultural barriers, but God’s love for us and our love for\nGod.  And because of this, our love for\neach other, no matter the color of skin, the angle of eyes, or the syllables of\nspeech.  Apart from such love, we are all\nhelpless together, and such togetherness is havoc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To\nthis truth and the articulation of it I have dedicated my life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Findley, Lisa. E-mail to Daniel Jackson. 28 February 2016.<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Dear\nDaniel:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How\nnice to hear from you. Your thesis sounds fascinating…..and is the kind of\nthing that could certainly expand become a life’s work–or, at the very least,\na PhD!  I also enjoyed perusing your\nwebsite. Its great! The video of Tengchong fighting is quite amazing to see.\nAnd how I wish that beautiful city wall had not been destroyed. I am happy to\ncontribute whatever I can to your efforts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My\nfather, William Findley, flew a P-38 (configured as an F5) doing photo recon\nover the CBI late in the war (’44-’45). He was in the 9th Photo Squadron, 10th\nAir Force. The son of one of his squadron mates maintains a website about the\nsquadron at http:\/\/www.9thprs.org\/<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dad\nwas moved forward from India to Myitkniya, Burma and his adventure began\nValentines Day, 1945. After a series of mechanical difficulties, he had an\nemergency belly landing of BEVERLY in a dry rice paddy about 60 km north\nnortheast of Tengchong in a place called Jeitou. He was unhurt, and walked\naway, but was completely lost. The locals took care of him, and guided him a two-day\nwalk south the allied emergency airbase in Tengchong. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nam attaching a recreated digital version of his debriefing when he got back to\nbase so you can have the story in his own words…..at least how he experienced\nit then–when he was your age. Also attached is a version of the story he wrote\nwhen he was in his 40s. Also including a few photos you might enjoy. As you\nmention, my father would never have made it out without the help of the local\npeasants. It was not as dire a circumstance as many pilots and their rescuers\nfaced because the Japanese had been pushed out of the area a few months prior. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nam writing my own account of my Dad’s adventure, and my follow-up to it. My\nfirst trip out to Tengchong was in 2000. That first trip we found the Jeitou,\npeople who remembered my father, a pieces of his plane turned into useful\nhousehold items. I have now been there nine times. My family supports college\nscholarships for poor students in Jeitou village (about 60 KMs north northeast\nof Tengchong) through a fund administered by friends there. I have also gotten\ninvolved in the area as an architect (I am a professor of Architecture),\nencouraging the preservation of old buildings and, with some of my students,\nworking with a local village on how to design for the coming influx of\ntourists. Here’s the story told by China Daily in 2013. http:\/\/usa.chinadaily.com.cn\/life\/2013-08\/20\/content_16906942.htm<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over\nthe 15 years I have been involved there, I have gotten to know several Chinese\nhistorians and journalists working on this huge piece of history. In\nparticular, I am friends with Ge Shuya, a prolific historian of the CBI. He is\nbased in Kunming. If you haven’t met him, I am happy to help with the contact.\nHe has done a lot of work on the Hump pilots and hump plane crash sites. I also\nhave good contacts at the new Museum of the Anti-Japanese War in Tengchong.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\nmuch to say. If you would like, I would be happy to have a phone conversation\nwith you about our family’s little piece of this very large, but somewhat\nforgotten, piece of history. Though you will find that in China, it is not at\nall forgotten. Let me know if you want to set up at time to talk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Best\nwishes for your pursuits,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lisa<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Findley, Lisa. Interview by Daniel Jackson. 4 March 2016.<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s\na very unique situation. I think I mentioned in the e-mail that when I finished\nthis database, it became clear how unique the war in China was. Comparing it to\nEurope for example, statistics-wise, about fifty-four percent of\nreported-missing aircraft, the crew either died in the bailout or the crash.\nAnd that\u2019s about the same for Europe. They lost about half. But in Europe, only\ntwenty-five percent of the ones that survived made it back to friendly\nterritory with the help of the French Underground or the Belgian Underground or\nwhoever, whereas in China, ninety percent made it back to friendly territory if\nthey survived the crash or bailout. Which is amazing. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\nis amazing. Well, and I\u2019d have to say meeting the Chinese peasants\u2014I found some\npeople that remembered my dad\u2014they\u2019re pretty amazing people, you know? They\u2019re\nuneducated, they work hard in the fields every day. But they truly hated the\nJapanese and knew their own territory much better\u2014especially in the mountains\nin Yunnan. I think it was less likely that people survived because the terrain\nwas so difficult, but when they did, they were able to sneak around the\nJapanese at the time where it was occupied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nactually missed your father\u2019s missing aircrew report initially because the\nTenth Air Force had him going down in Burma, which is outside of my\nself-selected area of study here.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m\nan academic and I know you have to\u2014even then it sounds like a huge project to\nme. As I said in my e-mail, sounds like a PhD. Just out of curiosity, what do\nyou fly?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nfly U-28s, which is actually a reconnaissance aircraft. So from the beginning\nof my research in this theater I\u2019ve been interested in that aspect and I\u2019ve\ninterviewed quite a few guys that were in the photo reconnaissance squadrons in\nChina and Burma.\u2026 At any rate, this study made me have to redefine what was\nenemy territory. You know, you look on the maps and there\u2019s a neat line\nseparating Japanese occupation from supposedly Free China. And you find out\nthat some guy crash-lands in downtown Shanghai in his P-51 and still manages to\nbe rescued by Chinese civilians there. There is no enemy territory per se\nbesides the ground those guys were standing on.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well\nin that way, I suppose, it has some overlaps with Burma: the difference between\nBurmese who were sympathetic, Burmese who weren\u2019t, Kachin, Shan. And so even\nthough Burma was technically Japanese territory, there were certainly places\nthe Japanese didn\u2019t go and places where they just would have welcomed American\nflyers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\nI\u2019m seeing the cluster there in western Yunnan that would have been the Hump\nlosses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m\nnot even including the airlift. So I feel like the Hump Airlift\u2014the Air\nTransport Command Effort\u2014has been studied a little more than the combat air\nforces. So what\u2019s interesting is you see what looks like a tail going into\neastern India there are just the combat aircraft losses. Those don\u2019t include\nthe Air Transport Command.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of\ncourse that would just be impossible. Weren\u2019t there hundreds of those planes?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\nwere six hundred reported lost over flying the Hump. Which, because they\nweren\u2019t on combat missions per se, would have skewed the stats as to what was\nkilling American aircraft in combat in China. So I was also trying to get at\nwhy these airplanes went down.   <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nis really interesting, I have to say Dan, I had no idea that it was this kind\nof number. I actually first got to know this Chinese historian of the war, Gu\nShiya, when he invited me to this thing in D.C. This was probably at least ten\nyears ago, maybe more. They brought Chinese peasants and I think they were from\njust south of Beijing\u2014I don\u2019t know exactly where they were from\u2014anyway, they\nhad rescued at risk to themselves and their villages a couple of downed airmen.\nSo these completely typical Chinese farmers showing up in D.C. for this awards\nceremony and I flew out and met him for the first time there and then went to\nthis ceremony which was pretty interesting. Where you picked up my name, the\nevent, those guys were in L.A. just last month. It was a very funny event but\nthere were a number of flyers\u2014mostly guys that were navigators, a guy who was a\ngunner, in the CBI. It was a ceremony from this Chinese-American guy who wasn\u2019t\nin the war but is an avid collector of memorabilia. It was a huge gift to the\nmuseum\u2014the new museum in Tengchong\u2014and so there was a delegation from Tengchong.\nPart of the reason (this was in L.A.), I went down because a couple of the\npeople I\u2019ve known for a very long time who were there and I just wanted to see\nthem because I don\u2019t get to very often. But there were some guys who were\nsurvivors\u2014I don\u2019t know of any crashes per se, but there aren\u2019t many of those\nguys as you have learned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s\nfunny because I have a lot of material, actually, and I\u2019m trying to develop\nmore of the Chinese material working on building some research partnerships\nthere. But what became apparent to me was that the repercussions of this\nconflict and this two-way partnership between the United States and China obviously\nechoed well beyond the end of the war. It\u2019s still echoing today. You\u2019ve been to\nJietou there, what, eight or nine times?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nine,\nyeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\nobviously your father\u2019s experience there is continuing to the next generation.\nSo that\u2019s part of what I want to capture in this project as well, because I\ndon\u2019t want to just cover what happened during the war and all of the sudden end\nit. There were people who were captured by the Japanese who had pretty\nsignificant issues after the war. There are people that were rescued by the\nChinese and had trouble reconciling how to feel about that in the wake of China\nbecoming a communist country.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s\nto me, a really interesting part of the story. Because in western Yunnan,\npeople love Americans there. When we were tracking down pieces of the plane,\none man said: \u201cWell, I had this whole bag of parts from the plane, but when the\ncrackdown came,\u201d when it was illegal to have anything Western, he said \u201cI\nburied it someplace near the river and I haven\u2019t been able to find it again.\u201d\nBut when you talk to people there they say, \u201cthe Flying Tigers, your father,\nthey were heroes.\u201d For a long time, I spent a lot of time trying to say, \u201cWell,\nmy dad wasn\u2019t technically a Flying Tiger, blah blah blah.\u201d But then I just\nheard this thing in L.A. that actually Chennault encouraged the Chinese to\nrefer to all the airmen as Flying Tigers. So that helped me understand this\nconstant reference. But the other thing that\u2019s happened in the fifteen years\nI\u2019ve been going to Yunnan, to Tengchong, is the first time I was there, I had\nmy dad\u2019s blood chit that has the Guomindang flag on it and I was showing it to\nthe local officials. And my Chinese friend who was with me who was raised in\nSan Francisco, fluent in Chinese, he went to help translate. He said, \u201cLisa,\ndon\u2019t wave the Guomindang flag around!\u201d Now, it\u2019s flying over the museum. In\nsome little tourist trap this past summer, there was this whole stall set up\nwith a big Guomindang flag and Chinese tourists were dressing up in that era\nclothing and uniforms and stuff and standing next to the Guomindang flag. I was\njust like, \u201cWow!\u201d Nobody is explicitly saying in these museums that it was\nGuomindang in that part of China. Because there was very little Communist\naction in that part. It was almost entirely Chiang Kai-shek\u2019s troops. So nobody\nis saying it, but \u201cThey were all heroes.\u201d History is revising itself. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

How\ndid your father deal with his experience in China in the wake of China being\npainted as the boogey man of the Cold War?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s\ninteresting because we never had explicit conversations about this\u2014like many\nguys from World War II. It was something that he did and this whole experience\nin Tengchong was formative as you can tell from what I sent you. It was\nextremely formative. But at the same time, he didn\u2019t talk much about it. I\nthink\u2014like the Chinese do, like many of us do\u2014separated out what is a\ngovernmental policy and the stance of that versus what people do on a daily\nface-to-face conversation, or even helping strangers or whatever it is. And so\nI think what was important for him, like a lot of pilots\u2014sorry, it\u2019s true in my\nexperience\u2014you guys are the best and the brightest. You\u2019re physically fit, you\nsee really well, you have to be really good at what you do\u2014especially to fly\ncertain kinds of planes. So he was a \u201ctop gun.\u201d He\u2019s flying the P-38 Lightning.\nHe was good looking. He\u2019d never been helpless a day in his life. He played\nfootball in college, blah blah blah. And all of a sudden he find himself in the\nmiddle of nowhere having no idea where he is. I mean, you know, you sit in the\ncockpits of those planes, they were kind of tin cans with some controls. And\nwith his radio and his compass was freaking out\u2014I think it was probably weather\nor something\u2014but suddenly he\u2019s on the ground. He doesn\u2019t know if there are\nJapanese troops in the area or not. He has no idea where he is\u2014if he\u2019s in\nBurma, China, you know. And that moment of helplessness was this\u2014and this is\none thing he did talk about, that being helpless when he had never felt that\nway in his life before, completely changed his point of view. He\u2019s from Des\nMoine, Iowa. He grew up in a completely white\u2014I shouldn\u2019t say that. His best\nfriend all the way from kindergarten all the way through high school was\nactually African-American and remained a family friend his whole life. But I\nthink suddenly being with these Chinese peasants in this setting and realizing\nhe had to completely trust and rely on them because it was the only choice. And\nso that kind of human\u2014it sort of humanized all of those political dynamics. My\nfather became a left-wing Democrat, out of the sense of compassion, caring,\naction around his beliefs. And became a Presbyterian minister who was a civil\nrights activist, etcetera, etcetera. And the civil rights activism in part from\nhis life-long friendship with his friend Paul, but I think there was also this\nsort of sense\u2014for instance his objection with the Vietnam War had to do with\nhis knowledge of Southeast Asia and his understanding of the very dynamics\nyou\u2019re talking about and the just sort of craziness of thinking we could do\nanything. And then also young men in our church who came home expressing\nfrustration they felt when they were over there that there was not a real attempt\nat winning, that is was just skirmishing and that everything was confused. They\nwould take a hill and lose it, take a hill and lose it. Guys would die. So\nyeah, I think it was a profound thing. I grew up with these stories of what\nhappened in China. So at the same time that Maoism and all that craziness was\ngoing on, I think I perceived it more as the craziness of Mao. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nthink humanization is the key. Here we see Americans rescued by Nationalists,\nCommunists, by people who were ostensibly collaborating with the Japanese. And\nwhat astounds me is that in a country that was destitute, where inflation was\nout of control, where everybody was in poverty, more or less, you didn\u2019t really\nsee anybody being sold out to the Japanese\u2014in spite of pretty high bounties\nbeing offered. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nstories are amazing that you hear. My closest long-time friend in Tengchong was\na journalist for a long time and now has a company that does promotion videos,\nbut he continues his interest in the war. And he\u2019s been working with the\nTengchong museum. They\u2019ve just done a memorial to the civilian supply chain\nthat brought food over Gaoligong to the Chinese Army. Hundreds of people died,\nthese civilian porters\u2014who were eating grass, not eating rice\u2014in order to carry\nthis stuff back. And so they\u2019ve just done at the museum now in Tengchong a\nmemorial garden to this civilian supply chain. It\u2019s a pretty amazing story that\nI hadn\u2019t heard in quite that way before. Because the young men were all off\nfighting it was old people, women, kids and they\u2019re barefoot. Of course half\nthe Chinese Army was barefoot from what I\u2019ve read. It was pretty remarkable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Do\nyou know Ge Shuya? I went over in 2005. That was the first time I took my\nhusband with me. We decided to spend ten days out in Tengchong and so I\ncontacted Ge Shuya and asked \u201cCan you recommend someone as a translator.\u201d\nBecause when I\u2019d been there before, I\u2019d been there with my Chinese friend and\nhe couldn\u2019t come with us for ten days. So he recommended this young woman who\u2019s\nnow like our adopted Chinese daughter. And that same trip, our friend who\u2019s the\njournalist made a documentary of the whole story. But of course, his\ndocumentary makes it much more dramatic; my father was shot down\u2026 you know. But\nhe won a documentary prize. Anyway, I\u2019ve continued to know Ge very well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Did\nyour father ever express any interest in going back?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nthe mid-1980s, I lived and taught in Penang, Malaysia, and when I was living\nover there, we were writing letters\u2014way back before the internet. And I said,\n\u201cDad, this really is so close to where you were.\u201d This was 1988. So he died in\n\u201989. He had cancer. He had planned to at least come and visit and we were going\nto try to go to Burma. But even at that time in Burma you couldn\u2019t get north of\nMandalay. It was pretty hard to travel. I did go to Burma at that time, but I\nonly got as far north as Mandalay. Of course, with China closed, there was no\nway to go. I\u2019m sure he would have loved all of this. I did connect with a guy\nwho was my dad\u2019s tent mate and best friend. He also flew recon in the same\nsquadron. So they were tent mates in Burma. He has passed away now, but he was\nin Long Island and one time when I was in New York City, I just added an extra\nday on and I have a lot of audio tapes. A lot of it was talking about his friendship\nwith my dad and what life was like on the base. He also flew that day and he\nsaid it was the worst weather he had every flown in. And I think it was because\nessentially it was dimensionless. Once they took off, they were in rain and it\nwas a deep, deep cloud cover. His name was Hank Lenox and he said he was very\nlucky to have come out of it. He was flying much closer to the Irrawaddy, so he\nwasn\u2019t in such mountainous terrain, but when he came out of it, he was in a\nvalley. And he was able to go to the Irrawaddy and just follow it back. But he\nwas packing my dad\u2019s trunk to send it home when my dad showed up in the tent\nand said, \u201cHey asshole! What are you doing with my stuff!\u201d They had given up.\nThey had sent out a rescue. And then Hank and some of the other guys convinced\ntheir C.O. to let them try once their jungle rescue stopped. Because, Hank said\nthat he felt like they didn\u2019t at the time completely understand how the jet\nstream operated. But he was fighting his whole time\u2014he was being pushed east.\nBecause they were searching essentially in a line between Lashio and Myitkyina,\nand Hank was quite sure that dad had been pushed east, but of course that put\nhim in worse and worse and worse terrain. Which, he was very lucky to have\nended up in that valley where he ended up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When\nthe 11th Bomb Squadron first deployed to China in June 1942, three of their\nB-25s crashed into those mountains in terribly weather. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

My\nfirst trip to Tengchong, we took a bus from Kunming to Tengchong\u2014before any of\nthose highways were built. It was twenty-eight hours. And my friend is getting\nlower and lower in his seat. He\u2019s like, \u201cOh, Findley, you owe me!\u201d Then we\ndiscovered on the way back that we could actually fly from Baoshan. So on the\nway back that was six hours, Baoshan to Tengchong. The new road wasn\u2019t done\nyet. Off on the usual old road, no line in the middle, people walking their\nwater buffalo. And now of course you just fly Kunming to Tengchong, forty-five\nminutes\u2014if the airport\u2019s open, which it\u2019s not in the summer months because of\nthe rain. I mean, it is sometimes, but it\u2019s not good to count on it. But now,\nBaoshan-Tengchong, there\u2019s still one little piece that they\u2019re building a\nbridge that you have to get off for twenty minutes, but it\u2019s a couple hours\nnow. So all that time-distance shrank. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s\nfunny to think about back then too; the American effort in China was mostly\nwith airplanes. So somebody like your dad flies over this space\u2014this huge vast\ndistance\u2014and it passes like that. And all of the sudden, his world shrinks to\nthe size of a single rice paddy and now it takes two days to travel what was probably\nten minutes in an F-5.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yep.\nSo I\u2019ve been writing my own version of this story. It\u2019s very personal; a story\nabout my dad. I\u2019ve filled in by talking with different people bits and pieces,\nmore of his story\u2014talking with villagers and people who were teenagers at the\ntime who remembered what happened. This guy, Yang Yinting, who helped my\nfather, all of his backstory. He was, by the way, the local landlord. He had\nthese dictionaries because he was off at university. When the war broke out,\nhis father died. He wasn\u2019t killed by the Japanese. I think he died of illness\nor something. So Yang Yinting had to come back from university to this little\ntown with these landlord responsibilities and the first thing he did was start\na school. So at the time, if you got to have an education it was with private\ntutors. Well he started a school in Jietou. And, there was already a little\nrice warehouse, but he grew these warehouses so that during the Japanese\noccupation, for a while they actually had food for longer\u2014until the Japanese\ngot there and took everything over. But after the war, when the Red Army (it\ntook them a long time to get all the way to Jietou, you can imagine), but when\nthey got there, they\u2019re marching up the road and the people of the town had\nheard that the Red Army was killing landlords. So the villagers went out and\nmet the Red Army and said, \u201cOur landlord is not one of those guys. He\u2019s the\nhead of our school. He\u2019s made sure we had food to eat. He\u2019s helped everybody\nwho was sick. He lives modestly like the rest of us.\u201d It didn\u2019t do a thing.\nThey marched into town, dragged him out of his house, and shot him in the\nstreet. We got this story from his sister who we interviewed\u2014of course this is\nall with translators, as your work must be. Of course out in Tengchong County\npeople are not speaking standard Mandarin. I mean, people can, but that\u2019s not\nwhat the villagers are speaking. In the villages, with the old people, our\ntranslator, who\u2019s from Kunming and speaks Kunming dialect along with Mandarin,\nshe needed a translator. It would be like us going to some rural town in\nScotland and trying to talk to the old guys. So that was a pretty amusing\nthing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When\ndid you first go there?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\n2000. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Was\nthat prompted by anything other than your father\u2019s experience there?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yeah\nit was. I teach architecture at the California College of the Arts in San\nFrancisco and we have formal relationships with some schools in China and other\nplaces around the world. And some of them are specifically art schools. So at\nthe time, in Kunming, the Nationalities Institute\u2014which is about supporting and\nmaintaining the culture of these ethnic groups\u2014we had a relationship with them\nand there was an exchange going on in jewelry and metal arts. Because our\nschool grew out of the arts and crafts movement we have a lot of people that\nstill do traditional craft practices\u2014though with a very contemporary spin, I\nhave to say now. And we also do all the fine arts and whole range of design\ndisciplines too. So we had this relationship and we\u2019d been having this faculty\nexchange in the fine arts. I was, at the time, co-chairing an international\nconference in Hong Kong\u2014I\u2019ve been interested in Asia my whole life. Maybe\nbecause of dad\u2019s story\u2014I don\u2019t know. I\u2019m much more interested in Asia than in\nEurope. So my living there, I\u2019ve traveled there frequently. So because I was\ngoing to Hong Kong, the provost of my university said, \u201cWould you mind, while\nyou\u2019re there, going to Kunming, meeting with the people at the Nationalities\nInstitute, and seeing if there\u2019s something architecture and design\u2014if there\u2019s\nsome possibilities there.\u201d In some academic environments, architecture is the\nmessy one: we need studio space, the students stay up late all night, and all\nthat stuff. But in our art environment, we architects are the organized ones.\nSo he though, \u201cWell, you know, we\u2019ll send the architects, maybe they can\u2026\u201d So\nbeing the being the kind of person who you just wave a plane ticket and I\u2019m\ngone, I said, \u201cSure.\u201d So then when I got the maps out and started learning\nabout Yunnan, informing myself about Kunming and the whole nationalities issue\nthere with the ethnic minorities and history of that, I realized, \u201cWait a\nminute, this is really close to where this all happened to dad.\u201d I still have\nhis silk maps. There\u2019s one that actually has an ink arrow pointing to the\napproximate place of Jietou. And so I got that out and I\u2019m looking at everything\nand so that\u2019s when I cooked this up. It\u2019s like, \u201cWell, if I\u2019m going that far,\nI\u2019m going to be that close.\u201d You maybe saw my dad\u2019s debriefing. He probably\nheard \u201cJietou\u201d as \u201cGaitou\u201d which is how the local people pronounce it and it\ngets described as K-I-T-O in the debriefing. So we had that, we had its\napproximate compass bearing and distance from Tenchong, we had the name Yang\nYinting. So I had these clues. And my friend who I went with, his father flew\nP-38s for the Chinese Air Force. We looked at the timelines of our fathers\u2019\nlives in the war and his father was training in Myitkyina just at the time my\ndad was flying his missions. Because in Myitkyina there was the south field and\nthe north field\u2014I mean it was huge, I guess. But his father had been in the\nUnited States training here before he went back to China to finish his training\nat Myitkyina. And then you know, of course, it was right at the tail end of the\nwar, his father became Chiang Kai-shek\u2019s pilot and ended up being killed in a\nplane crash in Taiwan when my friend was like two years old. So my friend was\nteaching architecture in Hong Kong. We had gone to grad school together. So I\ncalled him up and said, \u201cAs one pilot\u2019s kid to another, would you come with me?\nI know I can\u2019t do this without language access.\u201d And he said, \u201cSure.\u201d Of we\nwent. I think we had allowed four days. And of course a huge amount of it was\nspent with our butts in a bus. But it was beautiful. The people are all so\nlovely. And at that time, I think when I rolled into Tenchong, I don\u2019t know how\nmany European faces most people had seen out there. Not very many. And of\ncourse in Jietou, even fewer. It was quite the object of interest when we\nrolled in. And then it turned out the guy at the Nationalities Institute in\nKunming whom I met with\u2014my friend came along with me, which was good because\nthe person that they had to translate, his English was pretty horrible. You\nknow, \u201csomebody\u201d speaks English and poor people are put in positions that are\nembarrassing to everybody. Especially, I think, the poor translator. Anyway, my\nfriend went along and we told this whole story to the guy at the Nationalities\nInstitute, who said, \u201cWell, you know, one of my former students is a government\nofficial in Tengchong. I\u2019ll call him and he\u2019ll meet your bus.\u201d So we get off\nthe bus: \u201cThank God we\u2019re finally here!\u201d And there\u2019s this guy in his little\nKaharo SUV. And he takes us to the Tengchong guesthouse, which at the time was\nthe best hotel in town. Which is hilarious, because now there\u2019s every kind of\nfive-star hotel there. And they took us to dinner and everything. The next\nmorning, this entourage starts showing up. They had the Communist Party, this\njournalist who is now my very dear friend and his daughter is now out of\ncollege\u2014she speaks perfect English\u2014she translates now between her father and\nme. Anyway, so then rolls in this very dusty SUV and it\u2019s the mayor of Jietou.\nAnd as you know, there are administrative areas in China\u2014like Jietou actually\nencompasses several towns. They didn\u2019t know where in his area it would be. So,\nanyway, we all hop in these cars and take off up the dirt road that\u2019s now paved\nwith huge shoulders. And we had to stop in a couple other towns and talk to old\nmen who had stories about pilots. There\u2019s one\u2014I\u2019m going to have to look up my\nnotes\u2014there\u2019s one town where they had two different stories of pilots who were\nnot my dad. I think in the town of Yang\u2019an [Yangjiawan?], which is about\nfifteen to twenty kilometers south of Jietou, right at a big bend in the river.\nThese guys had stories of parachutes in trees. So we listened to their stories.\nAnd I was getting really frustrated, because clearly this wasn\u2019t the town of\nJietou and I didn\u2019t understand about this administrative regions at the time.\nAnyway, eventually we got to Jietou itself and it allowed us to meet these\npeople who remembered dad and see pieces of the plane as useful household\nitems, which was fun. I actually have a few pieces. We saw a lot of pieces, but\nI never felt right asking for any of them, though my brother, when I got home,\nhe\u2019s like, \u201cYou didn\u2019t ask? You didn\u2019t bring anything home?\u201d I said, \u201cNo, they\nbelong there.\u201d There\u2019s something about the ecosystem of the whole thing. If you\nlook carefully on those aerial photos I sent you of the plane in the rice\npaddy\u2014they went back to see if there was any chance to get it off the ground,\nbut it had been belly-landed, so there was nothing going to happen. And they\nhad already started cutting it up, which you can see on the actual photo with a\nloop: there\u2019s little pieces missing. Anyway, once we started our scholarship\nfund there, this one schoolteacher showed up one day with a couple pieces his\nfamily had. This is one piece; it\u2019s a piece of the skin. The original rivet\nholes are here, but they put all these other holes in it. What the family would\ndo\u2014they weren\u2019t using it anymore for this\u2014but at the time they would make dough\nfrom rice and push it through and extrude rice noodles using this piece of the\nskin. So that\u2019s one piece. This piece\u2014maybe you can help me figure out what it\nis. It\u2019s got three threaded rods coming out of it. It looks like some sort of\ncam or something. This was sitting on a chunk of wood in the family shrine and\nhad a candle in it. They turned it into a candle holder, which is what we use\nit for here. But I\u2019ve always wondered what it was. We were wondering too about\nthe propellers. The thing they did with the propellers\u2014and this is one of the\nstories in one version of the book I\u2019ve written, but I don\u2019t think I\u2019m going to\nuse it\u2014where these pieces become a story, right? So here\u2019s the piece, somebody\nhacks it off the plane and goes off and does something with it. Like we met\nthis guy\u2014he was 88 when we met him, now he\u2019s 98. Apparently each propeller\nwould yield two and a half aluminum basins. They took them to a guy who made\nthem into these aluminum washbasins. Of course they\u2019re ubiquitous now, but at\nthe time it would have been amazing. The person who got the propeller\u2014I\u2019m not\nsure who decided who got what part of the plane\u2014but the person who had the\npropeller would pay that half basin to the guy [who made them]. They exchanged\nthat for these other two basins. So he had a basin that had been made out of\nthe aluminum that was in the propeller. So we were tracking these pieces. And\nas I said, a lot of the pieces have been lost. I think anything that had any significant\namount of steel in the Great Leap Forward was probably melted down. People did\nhide thing. Then people need a little cash and had something lying around and\nsold it to the scrap metal dealer. The other thing, though, is one of the propeller\nmounts served as the school bell in Jietou for years. And we love that because Yan\nYingtin started the schools and my family\u2014my three siblings and myself, all\nfour of us\u2014are teachers in some way. We come from a long line of that. But I guess\nin the \u201860s some time, the principle or headmaster found this in a junk sale\nand he didn\u2019t have a bell and so he bought it and he must have been able to\nsave it from the Great Leap Forward because it was being used in the school or\nsomething. So that\u2019s still hanging in the school. Now it\u2019s got this memorial\nplaque, pictures of me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\na lot of this discovery of the places and I assume the reports you were able to\nuncover from your father\u2019s debriefing and stuff like that, a lot of this\nhappened after he passed away. Do you feel like you reclaimed a piece of him\u2014a\npiece you never really knew or felt connected to in the first place?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yeah,\nit is interesting that way and something that I\u2019ve been trying to write about\ntoo. My dad was 23 and so I didn\u2019t know him then. It\u2019s also\u2014I teach college, I\nalso teach graduate students, so from 18 to say, 27, 28, 29. Especially early\non, less so now, most of my students were men in architecture\u2014more women are\ncoming into it. I\u2019ve watched some of my students have that moment in their\nlife, (and I think it\u2019s more true of men), that this sense of your own\nmortality is something you don\u2019t recognize. Certain men don\u2019t recognize it. I\nthink it depends on one\u2019s life experiences, if you\u2019ve lost somebody or not and\nall of those things. But I remember the first time it happened; one of our\nstudents (this was years ago) who was a bicycle racer was out training one day\nand he was hit by a car and killed. The guy driving the car had a diabetic\nblackout and was Sean\u2019s parish priest. It was just this horrible, horrible\nthing. Anyway, watching his friends have that moment of mortality, and this\nwas\u2014I don\u2019t know, I\u2019ve been teaching thirty years, so this was like twenty or\ntwenty-five years ago. But I realized, that was the first time I had this\nthought that, \u201cHey, that\u2019s kind of what happened to dad.\u201d It was this pivot in\na moment of a view of the world that was very interesting to see. And of course\nhelping the students through that; it happened in the middle of the semester.\nHe was in my studio. His friends were too. So we had quite a time. But I think\nthat recognizing\u2014because I knew my dad as my dad, first of all, and you have\nthat moment when your parents become human. But also thinking about him as a\nyoung man. And by his own admission, he says he was cocky, a pilot, good looking,\ngirls falling down. I think he married my mom because, he came back from the\nwar, he went to Grinnell College. He showed up, he was in the president\u2019s\noffice (he was pretty early back). And my mom was the editor of the college\u2019s\nnewspaper. They were at Grinnell in Iowa. And so my mom comes to interview him\nfor the school paper. She\u2019s the editor. She\u2019s got a photographer with her. She\nwalks in. He\u2019s in his uniform. He\u2019s still being all cocky. And my mom just\nhated guys like that. He\u2019s like big man on campus and she\u2019s just like, \u201cMeh. Ok,\nget over yourself.\u201d It took my dad months of asking before she finally went out\nwith him. So yes, it has connected me in a different way, of course. He died in\n1989. He was only 68 years old. My grandmother\u2014his mother\u2014lived to by 94. His\nfather lived to be 89. We expected to have him for a long time. And so there\u2019s\nthis way of continuing that relationship, but also understanding it differently.\nBut now the whole thing in China is not about that anymore at all. Not it\u2019s\nthis kind of weird set of friendships halfway around the world in a place where\nI can\u2019t talk to anybody except with a translator. We started out supporting\nprimary school scholarships. We saw kids at the school writing with this teeny\ntiny skinny little pencils like you get at miniature golf courses or whatever\nto keep score. That\u2019s what they could afford as their pencil for school. And\nthen some essentially newsprint little tablet of paper. So we started out doing\nprimary school scholarships, but then Hu Jintao really did a lot of rural\ndevelopment, in terms of education, electricity, water. He understood he had to\nspread the wealth around better. So now the primary schools are fine. Primary\nschool students are well supported. Schools are much better. But there are\nstill kids in Jietou who pass that national exam, have the opportunity to go to\nuniversity, but\u2014one of our scholarship students, her father was in bed from a\nfarm accident\u2014I don\u2019t know what happened. Her mother was kind of loose in the\nhead. She did her schoolwork on a board across her lap. The family didn\u2019t even\nhave a table. She did well enough to go to Yunnan University. Even just going\nto Baoshan is a big deal, but to go all the way to Kunming, to the flagship\nuniversity of the province. It might as well have been millions of dollars for\nsomeone like us. The way that the government works with kids from extreme poverty\nin a rural environments is, they have to pay for their first year and then the government\nsteps in. So we\u2019ve been able to send about six students a year who are in that\nsituation that we give them that foothold year. And it\u2019s not very much. It\u2019s\nlike $500. Now these students, some have graduated and they live in Kunming and\nthey have apartments and they brought their parents to live there, or they\u2019ve\nmoved to Baoshan. And they always ask what they can do to thank us. And I\nalways say, \u201cTurn around, do it for one more, just one other person behind you.\u201d\nMy brother and our household, we contribute money to the scholarship fund every\nyear. And then I do a little consulting with the government in Tengchong County\nabout architecture preservation and dealing with tourism and those kinds of\nthings. They pay me\u2014I didn\u2019t know this\u2014but it turns out they pay me for this\nconsulting, the government does. But my friends there just put the money in the\nscholarship fund. They\u2019re very scrupulous. Every time I go we have this\naccounting meeting. I trust them completely, but we have this accounting\nmeeting and I\u2019m like, \u201cHow can there be so much money in this?\u201d Because we keep\ngiving it away. They said, \u201cBecause we just put your pay in there.\u201d And now I\u2019ve\nbeen taking architecture students out there. Because they all read about\nShanghai and the big Chinese cities, but they don\u2019t know\u2014we start in Kunming and\nthen go progressively more rural, out to Dali and that area and then Tengchong\nand finally we end up\u2014my journalist friend\u2019s family is from some valley partway\nto Jietou, and we end up in their little courtyard on their farm, eating a meal\nthat his mother has prepared. It\u2019s good for them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Have\nyou seen the old British consulate in Tengchong?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nhave and one of the things I did for them was track down the original drawing\nfrom the British archives. The British are such great record-keepers. So I was\nable to send them. Because they wanted to restore it, but I\u2019d gone to see it\nand I\u2019m like, \u201cAre you sure?\u201d The standard of what restoring means. But it\u2019s a\nnice building. I one time brought a friend of mine from when I lived in Penang\nwho\u2019s an expert in historic preservation. He works for UNESCO and World\nHeritage and all that. And I invited him because I got invited to come out and\ngive them advice about historic preservation, which is not at all my field. So\nI asked Lawrence to come with me and he brought the head of World Heritage\nChina, who he knows, from Beijing. We got taken around and this was one of the\nbuildings they were shown. And they were really concerned about the standards\nthat were going on there. It was nice because for once, I wasn\u2019t the main\nperson at all the meals. I got to sit off to the side. They became the focus of\nall the attention, which was really good. A lot of success of Tengchong right\nnow, financially, of the county, is resting on tobacco, agriculturally. And when\nthe government decides that it\u2019s costing them more than it\u2019s earning them, I\nreally worry about our friends out there, because they\u2019re going to be stuck\nback growing just rice. They grow some of the best rice in China, but it\u2019s not\na cash crop in the same way. What is happening out there is some people are\nfinding other crops. Like they can grow mushrooms easily during the wet season.\nThere are some medicinal crops. This one valley where I worked with my students\nlast summer, they\u2019re growing a medicinal crop under shade cloth that is earning\nthem so much money that the young people aren\u2019t leaving the village. So it\u2019s\nthis whole real village ecosystem, not just old people and kids. It\u2019s people of\nall ages and families. They\u2019re also starting to grow tea. Way up in the valley\nthere are some really nice tea plantations\u2014above where it snows especially. So\nthere are other cash crops when the tobacco thing goes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\nthe one other poetic piece of all of this is my husband is third-generation\nJapanese-American. His grandparents were interned during the war. His uncle\nfought for the 442\u2014the Japanese battalion\u2014in Europe. His father was with the\nOSS in Germany after the war. So he was American, they were American, but he has\nthis kind of weird ethnic guilt around the Japanese behavior during World War\nII. It horrifies him. We\u2019ve spent a lot of time in Japan. When you\u2019re in Japan,\nthe Japanese are so kind and polite. What happened with the soldiers\u2014ok, with Nanjing\nis was top-down\u2014but random soldiers were also incredibly cruel. We\u2019ve heard\nstories of soldiers beating a little boy who\u2019s trying to keep them from taking\nhis water buffalo. So when we first went out there, my husband wasn\u2019t sure how\npeople would react to him because he sees himself as looking very Japanese. But\nin fact, he looks more like the Yi minority. On another trip\u2014a completely\ndifferent trip\u2014we were in a Yi village and everybody\u2014my husband has a little\nbit of an unusual look for a Japanese. He\u2019s got a very interesting nose. But\nthere are all these people that look like his relatives in this village. So I\ntake out a photograph of him and I show it to the local people and they go, \u201cOh!\nYou\u2019re married to a Yi guy!\u201d And I said, \u201cWell no, he\u2019s actually Japanese, but\nhe\u2019s been in the United States. His family\u2019s been there a hundred years, blah\nblah blah.\u201d And they said, \u201cWell that\u2019s right.\u201d They said, \u201cBack in the old\ntimes, when we were pushed out of central China by the Han, some of us went to\nthe coast and we ended up in Japan and some of us came here to the mountains.\u201d\nAnd I said, \u201cWhen was that?\u201d And they said, \u201cOh, two thousand years ago.\u201d So I\ntook Rod, my husband, back to this village when we visited another time and we\u2019re\nwalking down the street and people are just talking to him. Everybody just\nassumed. They thought it was hilarious. We check into a hotel together, you\nknow, same room, and they\u2019re trying to figure that out. People are talking to\nhim, he\u2019s like, \u201cI don\u2019t know what you\u2019re saying!\u201d He was very nervous at first\nabout how people might react to him in Tengchong but everyone of course was\ncompletely lovely. But it was this other little poetic twist on our whole\nengagement out there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nreally appreciate this. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s\nbeen great to meet you!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thank\nyou so much!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Findley, Lisa. E-mail to Daniel Jackson. 17 August 2016.<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Dear\nDan;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\ngreat to have your update and a summary of the intriguing outcome of all your\nresearch. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\nwas just in Yunnan again this summer with a group of my students. We spent a\ntwo weeks in the Tengchong area working on a project for a village north of\nthere. While we were there I (on behalf of my siblings) donated my father’s\nuniform hat to the Museum. There was one of those kind of awkward official\nceremonies, then one of those awkward official lunches. However, they were very\nhappy to have the donation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

All\nthis was done through Li Genzhi, of course. I took a copy of your last book to\nhim as a contribution to his library. He was so happy to have it–especially\nsince it contains photos he had never seen. I know he will also make his way\nthrough the content. He can read English, slowly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When\npassing through Kunming, I did not have a chance to see Ge Shuya. If you see\nhim anytime soon, please give him my warm regards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Please\nkeep me on the list! And let me know if you are ever in the Bay Area so we can\nmeet face-to-face. I am thinking of you, and others I know on active duty, as\nour leadership fritters away decades of carefully balanced foreign policy. I\nremember we spoke briefly about this over Skype that day…..months before the\nelection gave us this current administration. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stay\nsafe, be well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Warm\nRegards,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lisa<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Findley, William S. I Took the Long Way Home. Unpublished, 1962. I\u2019d set a new world\u2019s record–100 yards in nine flat across a rain-slick rice paddy.  I stopped fleeing and turned to look apprehensively at the smoking United State Air Corps P-38 plane I’d belly-landed.  Any moment now, the few drops of gasoline remaining would…<\/p>\n

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