Keeping Posted
We Visit Pearl Buck
Song session in Pearl Buck's study. In the foreground are Welcome House youngsters Paul, Jack and Sumi Yoder.
It has been twenty years since the work of Nobel Prize winner Pearl Buck appeared on our pages, and THE SILVER BUTTERFLY (page 26) seemed a good reason to get reacquainted with this busy lady. When we visited her 400-acre farm near the village of Dublin in Pennsylvania's Bucks County, she had in progress a play, a novel, a speech and a film she plans to produce in Japan. She invited KP to chat with her in the study where she does this creative work. (An adjoining study, she explained, is for "the dull work.")
Much of Pearl Buck's sprawling, Revolutionary home is filled with handsome furnishings collected during her many years in the Far East. It is a comfortable home with a view of rolling farm land, and it has been mellowed by the many children who have lived there. Miss Buck-she's Mrs. Richard J. Walsh in private life-has adopted seven children. Eleven years ago her interest in children led her and her neighbors to establish Welcome House, which arranges for the care and adoption of children of Asian ancestry. Some are war orphans, but most are mixed-blood children born in this country.
We were introduced to Sumi, Jack and Paul Yoder, three of the nine buoyant youngsters adopted by the married couple who live at Welcome House and help superintend it. "I tell the children," says Miss Buck, "that they each have another country, just as I do. My other country is China, where my parents served as missionaries. Paul's other country is India. Jack's other country is Korea. Sumi's other country is Japan."
How did the welfare of these "world children" come to be such a vital part of Pearl Buck's life? "I suppose Welcome House was started in indignation as much as anything. The first child brought to me was the grandchild of a Christian missionary who went to India to preach-Christian love, supposedly-but when his daughter fell in love with one of the people in that country, he wouldn't allow her to marry him. Her baby was born in America, and. the missionary wouldn't accept the child. This, to me, seemed such an outrageous thing-going to a country with what's supposed to be a message of brotherhood, and when it comes to the reality of love, which is inevitable when people meet, you don't recognize it."
Welcome House thrives on the same love of the Orient and of children which inspired THE SILVER BUTTERFLY. Speaking of this story of Red China, author Buck says, "It is difficult for us, here in the United States, to realize the feelings of isolated young people who are ashamed of their old country and determined to create a new one. Such shame and determination result, inevitably, I suppose, in tragedy-and also a sort of progress perhaps. Much cruelty to the individual is apparent, but bridges do get built over great rivers, and dams are made. The question is-will it be worth while? Nobody knows. Anyways my story is an attempt to present the picture in cameo."
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Formula for a Sweet Disposition
Edwardian-era Standish and Eisenhower-era Standish.
In response to our plea for an up-to-date photograph, Robert Standish submitted the portrait at left above. It was taken in London on Edward VII's coronation day in 1902- "when I was far better looking than I am today." Standish uncovered this likeness when burglars ransacked his home in southern France and hurled a drawerful of photos and letters all over his office. After poring over this memorabilia, he wrote us, "The outstanding memory of my childhood, which accounts for my sweet and equable disposition, is being left to play on the lawn in the sunshine with a saucer of honey and some duck feathers."
Since his duck-feather days Standish has lived in Ceylon (where he was a tea and rubber planter), Japan, China, Java, Australia, New Zealand and Canada-to say nothing of spells in Morocco, Indonesia, New Guinea, Mexico, East and South Africa and most parts of the Caribbean. He even comes to Philadelphia occasionally, and on a recent visit we photographed him (see result) for the benefit of readers who might imagine that he still sports an Edward VII-era wardrobe. Oddly enough he doesn't, although he seems to have retained his affection for bow ties.
Anyone in the mood for a Standish-conducted romp in merry England is invited to read THAT FICKLE FEELING, page 40.
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NEXT WEEK'S POST:
"I Call on Sammy Davis Jr."
By PETE MARTIN
A talented Negro entertainer talks candidly about his conversion to Judaism.
Printed in U.S.A.
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