Grant Letter to Study at UC Berkeley - 1951

Description:

The Foreign Service of the United States of America - June 15, 1951. Address official communication to United States Information Service - Djalan Segara - Djakarta. D. Lauriston Sharp, Director, Southeast Asia Program, Morrill Hall, Ithaca, New York. Dear Dr. Sharp: Mr. Oey Giok Po, of Djalan Tjendara 35, Djakarta, has shown me your recent letter offering him a fellowship of $2,000. He is a most worthy boy so the news was good. I wanted to report that he has been awarded a full Smith-Mundt grant by our Embassy for a period of twelve months to study at the University of California at Berkeley. This grant includes travel, tuition and a living allowance. We have discussed the matter in our office and feel it would be wiser for him to accept the Smith-Mundt grant for 1951-1952 and then apply for your fellowship for the following year. By that time he will be more completely at home with the English language. Ex-tensions of time are only granted when exceptional records are made - but I feel confident that Oey will make such a record. As a candidate for this fall I would suggest Dr. Moh. Wahban Hilal. He has recently sent you a rather complete statement of his background, his training and his interest in the field of human geo-graphy. He is being considered for an important appointment in the Ministry of Education. The Indonesian Government would very likely pay his travel expense. There would be a number of details to work out. I wanted in this letter to state my opinion that he is a strong candidate for a fellowship. His knowledge of English is far above average as a result of five years in Holland. Yours sincerely, Alvin C. Bro, Cultural Officer. Photostatic copy sent to Institute of International Education - 1 E. 67th St. - New York 21, N.Y. 9/19/51 - ACB:drz

Attribution:

The John M. Echols Collection

Date:

June 15, 1951