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TI: So going back to your career, when you think about the long career with the foreign service, what are some highlights, when you think back to those years?

LH: Yes, well, I think back to... after Japan, I mentioned that -- well, I didn't mention -- we went back to Washington for a couple of years, and then we had a son who was born in 1962, who's a screenwriter and producer/director in Hollywood right now. We went to the Philippines, he was three until age five, and that is another aspect of it, that my wife's father helped me a lot there because he was commander of the 7th Fleet, which also included the Philippines. This is '45-'47, somewhere around there. '46, '48.

TI: '50, '55?

LH: No, well, no, I was there in '65.

TI: Oh, got it.

LH: But I'm saying when Admiral Cooke was head of the 7th Fleet. So they all knew my wife's father. But it helped a lot because I got access to the foreign minister, and especially to President Diosdado Macapagal, who was president of the Philippines then. And you know, it's the same old business in your own personal life. If you happen to be a friend of the mayor of Seattle and the governor of the state of Washington, you get involved in circles that may help you in your own career, and it helped me a lot in the Philippines. And then we'd gone back to Washington, and then I was sent to Vietnam during the worst time, '68, '70. It really was the worst time of the war, and in fact, I had unnamed ambassadors that said, "I want you to serve in the country I'm in because I know you don't want to go to Vietnam." And I would answer back, "I don't want to go to Vietnam," but as Maynard's background and mine mesh, if you're asked to go, you go. And it unfortunately, my son claims it was the worst time of his life, that I was gone, I think he was something like five to seven in age.

TI: 'Cause your wife and son were...

LH: Remained in Washington because they both, at this time, had medical holds on them for tropical climates, they both had severe asthma. In fact, my wife was under house arrest, medical arrest, the second year in the Philippines. And after Vietnam, then I returned and...

TI: Tell me a little bit about those Vietnam years that you were there.

LH: Well, I served in the embassy as, let's see... by then I was first secretary, and assigned to the embassy in Saigon. But my assignments as a political officer took me to various provinces of South Vietnam. And was not literally involved in firing weapons, but we always carried weapons on these trips, and we had weapons in our cars, in our offices. And though I was not, I was involved in a couple of firefights in these provinces, I was not actually involved in the battle itself. And then we had, you know, rockets falling into Saigon all the time, and it was literally a very dangerous assignment, personally, to your, to all of us that went. And it's like right now, they're forcing foreign service officers from various elements within the foreign service to go to Iraq because there aren't enough officers to go, or not enough volunteering to go, and they're being drafted to go. It's just like the army is so small, the military is so small, they're going back for second and third tours, or they're being, their periods of time are being extended in Iraq, because there aren't enough bodies to fill the positions.

I'd like to tell one story. In Japan... I first met President Carter in Japan, and his wife. And the time that I met their daughter, it was soon after he had lost the elections, I had never seen a man so down in all his life. He was really so discouraged, and the children, they had been in China for about ten days, and they came to Osaka. I was the senior consul there, I later became consul-general in Osaka-Kobe. And I had a, a bet with the president and his wife that I would beat his daughter, Amy, who was, I think, thirteen at the time, running up the down escalator, and I won. [Laughs] And I was well over fifty then. I...

TI: And so this was, I'm sorry, this was after Carter had lost the election but he was still president at this point?

LH: Oh, no, no.

TI: This was, he was...

LH: This was now, I think, '82. Reagan was already in office.

TI: Okay. So he was, he was just visiting Japan as a former president.

LH: Yes. Oh, but I tell you, when former presidents visit a foreign country, the embassy goes whole hog. I mean, the Secret Service comes first, everything almost shuts down, so to speak. And so we have to work with the, like in Japan, with the national police agency and all other elements of the government security services, about where they're gonna visit, who they're going to see. It's really quite a horrendous effort. And then, of course, the social aspects of it later are a lot of fun and extremely interesting. And a lot of publicity for both countries and for myself personally. It's always nice to, when people come, I don't like to have pictures of myself with presidents in the public rooms, but in one of the bathrooms I have pictures of myself with various presidents.

TI: Oh, that's good.

LH: And I won't say here on camera which president has come to the house, it shows him in my house.

TI: Okay, I'll ask you later.

<End Segment 18> - Copyright © 2007 Densho. All Rights Reserved.