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Arnold Zeitlin in Accra with his students, c. 1961-1963. American University Archives, Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n
Chapter 2: An Archival Puzzle<\/p>\n
In November 2022, I had three months under my belt at my fellowship, and I was ready to start processing another collection. I grabbed the box with Arnold Zeitlin\u2019s donations and opened it up to see a great deal of fascinating material. The donation included everything from newspapers, to photos, to correspondence, and much more. I prefer to start working on new collections by processing any correspondence. Letters written before or during a Volunteer\u2019s service usually give me valuable information about the Volunteer and their experiences. This context makes it easier to understand the significance of the rest of their donation. Archivists do their best to preserve the original organization of donations. Sometimes, such as in the case of Zeitlin\u2019s correspondence, the donor only organizes some of their letters. I therefore put the rest of his letters into chronological order.<\/p>\n
As I was doing this, I found an object that was not a letter at all: this napkin, which had no clear connection to any of the letters I sorted. It had a very strange collection of phrases on it in Zeitlin\u2019s handwriting, such as, \u201cI do not like to see women smoke,\u201d \u201cI wish I could be as happy as others seem to be,\u201d and \u201cI am more sensitive than most.\u201d [2]<\/p>\n
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What was the story behind this napkin? A full transcript of the letter’s phrases is at the end of the post. Arnold Zeitlin, napkin with list of phrases, 1961, American University Archives, Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n
Finds such as this napkin are fairly unusual. In my three years of experience, I have never seen anything quite like this. More delicate paper products such as napkins, especially a completely unfolded one, are not the easiest to write on. Nor are they easy to preserve for several decades. And then there were all the odd phrases, which made no sense and slightly concerned me. As I continued processing the collection, I became more and more confused: What was this object, and what did it mean? Since my position is only a few hours a week, it took me quite a while to process Zeitlin\u2019s collection, and the mystery grew deeper and deeper in my mind.<\/p>\n
Chapter 3: Mystery Solved!<\/p>\n
The very last set of items that I had to process in Arnold Zeitlin\u2019s collection were a few dozen newspaper articles about Ghana I\u2019s service. Zeitlin wrote about half of them. I began the delicate process of sorting and scanning them- newspaper ages poorly and easily tears. As I started to scan the newspaper articles that Zeitlin wrote during Ghana I\u2019s California training, a few bolded words suddenly leapt out at me. These were the phrases from the napkin!<\/p>\n
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Mystery solved! Arnold Zeitlin’s newspaper article that included information from the napkin. Arnold Zeitlin, “Peace Corps Quiz Probes Aspirant,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, date unknown. American University Archives, Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n
After a little more reading, I realized that Zeitlin was writing a humorous, slightly frustrated article about the battery of psychological tests he and fellow hopeful Volunteers had to take. Words on the napkin were quotes from what he considered the most ridiculous true\/false psychological questions on a test. [3] In\u00a0<\/span>To the Peace Corps With Love<\/em>, which I would read later, Zeitlin discussed enduring the wide range of psychological tests and interviews, alongside his equally humored and incredulous peers. His conclusion was that the Peace Corps was bending over backwards to make sure that this first group of Volunteers would carry out their work as smoothly as possible. [4] He also noted that one of the psychologists, Brewster Smith, had not taken kindly to his critical article on the matter. Even as he hurried to join the rest of Ghana I after their arrival, his send-off included a good-natured, exasperated warning to write no further articles about psychiatrists. [5]<\/span><\/p>\n To confirm my findings, I contacted Arnold Zeitlin himself, who graciously answered my list of questions about a small occurrence that had happened more than sixty years before. To supplement the memoir, Zeitlin noted that he thought that the Peace Corps\u2019 reliance on all of the odd tests to predict Volunteers\u2019 performance was \u201cabsurd.\u201d [6] He found the situation so ridiculous that he had to write an article. Zeitlin enjoyed the opportunity to share his experiences-whether fascinating or ridiculous- with his readers back in Pittsburgh. [7] Finally, Zeitlin wrote that he had been able to become friends with Brewster Smith years later over a lunch in Hong Kong, where Zeitlin was living at the time. [8] With all of this information, the ends of my napkin mystery tied themselves in a surprisingly neat bow. You can see the results in the finding aid<\/a> for Zeitlin\u2019s collection, which includes an entry just for the napkin. Zeitlin recently passed away, after a long, rich life. I am very grateful for the time he took to tell me about his experiences.<\/p>\n Arnold Zeitlin with his wife, celebrating his ninetieth birthday. Photo from Arnold Zeitlin.<\/p>\n Epilogue: The Mysteries Continue<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/blogs.library.american.edu\/pcca\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2023\/05\/PCCA_Zeitlin_2023photo_0001-225x300.jpg\")
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