The Foreign Service Journal, January-February 2016

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2016 89 IN MEMORY n Arija Bianka Ozolins Hutson, 74, the wife of retired FSOThomas R. Hutson, died on Nov. 4 in Nebraska City, Neb., after a courageous battle with pan- creatic cancer. Arija Hutson was born Sept. 7, 1941, on the eve of World War II, in the Latvian countryside. Her family fled the country in 1944, following the Soviet invasion and occupation of Free Latvia, spend- ing six years as refugees and in camps in Germany. The family finally found safety and hope in the American sector of divided Berlin, where they remained as “displaced persons” until 1950, when a Lutheran church in Hanover, Kan., sponsored them to live in an unoccupied farmhouse (with the handsome income of $1/day plus all the food they could raise). With this move, the family was finally able to begin a new life. This arrangement was followed by a similarly impover- ished one near Mead, Neb., before they settled more permanently in Lincoln, Neb., where two Latvian churches and a strong Latvian community thrived. Mrs. Hutson’s father supported the family as a laborer in a flour mill, and longed to return to his home country until his death in 1979. She attended the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, where she studied architecture, and where she met her future husband, Thomas Raymond Hutson. They were married for more than 52 years. Mrs. Hutson joined her husband in postings to Tehran, Belgrade, Winnipeg, Moscow, Lagos, Taipei and Bridgetown, particularly enjoying the close, lifelong friendships and associations she devel- oped overseas. She was an avid collector, bowler, biker, hiker, animal lover and gardener. Family members recall that she was a magnificent mother, ensuring that her children had no choice but to succeed, and was stalwart in living her own way as a Foreign Service wife. Indeed, like many FS spouses, she was the anchor of the family in any and all strange ports of call and in both memorable and challenging times. Mrs. Hutson also was a PIT (Part-Time Intermittent, Temporary) accountant in Moscow, where she worked to resolve retirement accounts for FSOs. The tragic murder of the Hutsons’ oldest child, Elizabeth Maren “Bessie” Hutson (1964-1993), in Washington, D.C., changed the family forever. Mrs. Hutson honored her daughter’s memory by devoting much of her time thereafter to saving animals on a small acreage near Thurman, Iowa. There she tended boun- teous flower gardens and meticulously manicured lawns until the very end with her large riding mower! Mrs. Hutson’s triumphant battle against ovarian cancer 30 years before her passing, as well as her inner strength and courage, continue to serve as a source of inspiration for her family and close friends. She is survived by her daughter, Amy Marie Hutson; her son, Peter Martin Hutson; husband, Thomas Raymond Hutson; two sisters, Edite Biruta Ozolins Evans and Elizabete Gundega Ozolins; one brother, John (Janis) Vikskonts Ozo- lins; and six grandchildren (Julia Averill Hutson, James Matthew Dayton Hutson, Karoline Arija Anderssen Hutson, Esmija Laima Hutson, Sasha Rovinsky and Max Rovinsky). Her oldest daughter (Elizabeth Maren Hutson) and oldest grandchild (Benja- minThomas Hutson) predeceased her. In Arija Hutson’s memory, contribu- tions may be sent to Hearts United for Animals, Box 286, Auburn NE 68305 (www.hua.org) . n Douglas Ralph Keene, 71, a retired Foreign Service officer, died on Oct. 7, at the Pine Point Center in Scarborough, Maine. Born in Malden, Mass., in 1944, Mr. Keene graduated from Reading High School in 1962, and went on to earn a B.A. degree from Colby College in Waterville, Maine in 1966. A civil rights advocate from a young age, he spent a semester of his junior year as an exchange student at Fisk University in Nashville, Tenn. Mr. Keene worked briefly for the IRS before joining the Foreign Service in 1967 for a 35-year diplomatic career spent mostly in the Middle East. His first posting was Vietnam, in 1968, where he served as district senior adviser for the Civil Operations and Revolution- ary Development Support program in Go Cong Province. Next he was posted to Warsaw (1971- 1973) and Karachi (1973-1975). After five years in Washington in the Bureau of Political Military Affairs, he served as the first political-military officer at Embassy Cairo (1980-1983). There he was pres- ent at the military parade during which Anwar Sadat was assassinated. Mr. Keene served as deputy principal officer at the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem from 1983 to 1986, and then deputy chief of mission (DCM) in Muscat from 1986 to 1989. He came back to Washington to attend the Foreign Service Senior Seminar, and was then named director of Arabian Peninsula affairs during the first Gulf War. He returned to the Middle East as DCM in Amman (1991-1994) and attended the Middle East Peace Confer- ence in Madrid as liaison to the Jorda- nian and Palestinian delegation. Mr. Keene spent the next year at the Center for National Security Studies at Los Alamos National Laboratory and