Peace Corps volunteers' 15-year mission in Korea revisited

Suzanna Samstag Oh, front row, right, dances to the beat of the changgu at a traditional market in Sacheon-gun, South Gyeongsang Province in this photo taken in 1980. Oh came to Korea in 1980 as a Peace Corps volunteer and worked as a health worker in a clinc in the southeastern rustic county. Courtesy of Suzanna Samstag Oh

US aid workers' humanitarian works leave lasting impact on Korea and the personal lives of volunteers

By Kang Hyun-kyung

In 1966 when the nation was desperate to cut the vicious circle of poverty under a state-led campaign to achieve economic growth, Korea saw a unique group of foreign visitors: U.S. Peace Corps volunteers.

The first batch of Peace Corps volunteers to Korea, designated as K-1, arrived that year and most of them worked as English teachers. The group also included 24 science and eight physical education teachers, as well. Back then, Korea was a largely rural-based, impoverished country with a gross domestic product per capita of $133.

Since then, nearly 2,000 young American college graduates had worked in the nation's rural areas as English teachers, health workers or volunteers in other sectors until returning home after their two-year assignments.

The final group, K-51, arrived in Korea in 1980 and the Peace Corps program in Korea ended the next year.

During their 15 years of service, Peace Corps volunteers helped and motivated Koreans to overcome the hardships they faced. The U.S. volunteers had a lifelong impact on older Koreans who met them, as they endured adversities together when the country was in dire need of help from the outside world.

Kathleen Stephens, a former U.S. ambassador to Korea (2008-2011), is one of the former Peace Corps volunteers. Stephens taught English at a middle school in Yesan, South Chungcheong Province, in the mid-1970s and had a positive impact on her students.

In an interview with The Korea Times, Lee Chul-son, who was one of her students, said that he was motivated him to work harder to learn English and seek a career that could help him give back to society the same way he benefitted from the Peace Corps volunteer.

"Stephens was the first Westerner that I, and probably all my classmates, had met in our lives back then. Because of this, everything about her became big news and spread rapidly throughout the entire town back then," he said.

Lee joined the military after graduating from the Korea Military Academy and served in several foreign posts.

The Peace Corps' presence in Korea during the period when the nation was undergoing a seismic transition, from one of the world's poorest countries to one of its fastest-growing economies, left a lasting impact both on the nation and on the personal lives of the American volunteers.

Back in the 1960s and 1970s, Westerners were rarely seen in Korea's rural areas. So, locals' interactions with the young Americans in schools or clinics and their direct exposure to Western ways of life through the volunteers were full of wonder.

Ma Sang-yoon, a professor of political science at the Catholic University of Korea, said the American volunteers played a key role in improving their country's image among Koreans as a powerful country that is also willing to give a helping hand to others in need.

"Back in those days, few Koreans traveled outside of their country, so people here really didn't know much about the West. Through the Peace Corps volunteers, Koreans were able to get experience with people from the West, and their humanitarian work helped the locals build a positive image of the sending country," he told The Korea Times.

"The volunteer corps also served as a vehicle through which young American college students or graduates came to Korea and learned about the nation, and later on they played the role of a bridge between the two very different cultures."

Peace Corps volunteers enjoy a bit of relaxation during their training in Chuncheon in 1980. Courtesy of Suzanna Samstag Oh

For their part, the Peace Corps volunteers' brief stints in rural Korea were much more than the U.S. government's development assistance to Asia or their own exposure to an East Asian nation that is very different from their home country.

Their two-year assignments in Korea became the experiences of their lifetimes shaping their careers. Former U.S. Ambassador Stephens and Bruce Cumings, a history professor at the University of Chicago, are two prime examples showing the impact of their Peace Corps experiences on their careers.

These Americans' ties with Korea expanded further as they shared their experiences with their friends and neighbors after returning to the U.S.

For some Peace Corps volunteers who returned home, their lives couldn't be separated from Korea. They chose Korea as the academic focus of their graduate programs, leading to the creation of new areas of study. Several U.S. universities have established Korean Studies departments.

Trinity University history professor Donald Clark, Harvard University history professor Carter Eckert and Harvard professor of Korean literature David McCann are some of the seminal figures in Korean Studies who had worked in Korea as Peace Corps volunteers at different times.

Many other Peace Corps volunteers who returned to the U.S. took on the role of "self-appointed civilian ambassadors" and promoted Korea and Korean culture in their home country.

"The majority of former volunteers shared their experiences in Korea on a personal level with average Americans," Suzanna Samstag Oh said. "This changed the image of Korea from that of a poor, war-torn country to that of a country with unlimited potential."

Oh, a senior adviser to the chairman of Daesung Group, was one of the last Peace Corps members to arrive in Korea on July 31, 1980. She joined the K-51 group of volunteers after graduating from Georgetown University and worked as a tuberculosis (TB) control worker at a rural health clinic in the southeastern county of Sacheon until mid-1981 when the Peace Corps formally ended its mission in Korea.

Then U.S. Ambassador to Korea Kathleen Stephens, front, smiles during an event in Seoul in this 2008 file photo. Stephens severed as a Peace Corps volunteer in Korea before her diplomatic career. Korea Times photo by Shim Hyun-chul

Her life as a Peace Corps volunteer was full of culture shock.

"At that time, I had a room in a hanok with a traditional toilet…. Instead of toilet paper, we used the pages from old schoolbooks," Oh said. "There was no washing machine, so I had to do my laundry by hand. There were no phones or TVs in my hanok, so if I wanted to make a phone call, I had to go to the local post office."

After her service, Oh chose to remain in Korea as she was fascinated by traditional Korean culture. Like her, some other Peace Corps volunteers have stayed in Korea after their assignment ended. They also played a role in helping the world learn about Korea and its culture.

"The volunteers who stayed here worked as expert translators or advocates for introducing less familiar aspects of Korean culture to Americans. The Peace Corps' main successes were on these grassroots levels, I believe," she said.

During their 15 years of service in Korea, the Peace Corps contributed to the improvement of English education here. David Lassiter, who was part of the K-1 group and taught English in middle and high school in Uijeongbu, Gyeonggi Province, recalled that English education in Korea had been focused largely on grammar and reading classes, which made it difficult for them to use the language in real conversation.

"It did not take long for me to recognize that students were not remembering the conversational phrases, sentences and interactions they had been taught the previous week. It seemed evident that this approach wasn't working and was a waste of effort," he was quoted as saying in an article titled "Peace Corps Korea: A Story of Personal, Professional and National Transformation" written by Gerard A. Krzic.

Peace Corps volunteer Daniel Holt, who was part of the K-12 group, was involved in the creation of the textbook series "Middle School English," which was used in all Korean public schools.

Initially, health volunteers worked in rural clinics to treat respiratory illnesses, TB and other communicable diseases. Later on, they began to focus on TB control and health education.

"At that time, TB was a rather common disease. We had to make sure that the patients took their medicine and shots as required so that they could be completely cured," Oh recalled. "Since there was no internet, we did public health presentations on the local market days when many people gathered."

The Peace Corps volunteers have become a key part of Korea-U.S. relations and their indispensable role in bilateral ties is revisited as this year marks the 70th anniversary of the Korea-U.S. alliance.

Former Peace Corps volunteers have fun an event at an elementary school in Seoul in this 2010 file photo. Korea Times file