The Foreign Service Journal, May 2006

Mrs. Newhall’s family. Mrs. Newhall was an active volunteer at London- derry’s Flood Brook School and at the town library, while continuing to main- tain an avid interest in reading, writ- ing, gardening and caring devotedly for a succession of pet cats and Labrador retrievers. As she had wished, Mrs. Newhall died in that old Vermont farmhouse; her daughter-in-law, Sally, and friend, Alice, were at her side. Mrs. Newhall was married to the late Robert M. Newhall from 1944 until his death in 1991. She is survived by a son, the Rev. Jeffrey Newhall of Worchester, Mass., two grandchildren, Sarah Newhall Amorin and Jeremiah Newhall; and two siblings, Milton Raw of Winter Park, Fla., and Sheila Rivers of Pittsford, Vt. Contributions in her memory may be made to the Second Congregational Church of London- derry, Vt. n — Rev. Dr. Jeffrey R. Newhall 58 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / M A Y 2 0 0 6 A Love Letter from the Editor “This is my love letter to the Foreign Service and I can’t complain that it never wrote to me. I am sorry that I cannot write personally to all of those in the Service who helped me, guided me, extended the hand of friendship to me or offered the rare compliment that made this job worth doing. “The almost 20 years I have spent with the association have been rich ones, with many changes. I have seen the association change from a professional association to a combination employee-management group and professional association. The young Turks took over during that period and, as one said, ‘We have now become old Ottomans.’ Some of those I knew as junior-officer members of the Governing Board and Editorial Board have become ambassadors and I have proudly attended their swearings-in. “There have been changes in the Journal , too. Members of the Editorial Boards I have worked with over the years and I are proud of them. It has been a pleasure to fea- ture the work of our talented Foreign Service artists on the cover and inside the maga- zine. Early on, we decided on a professional layout firm to do justice to the magazine. From time to time, the Journal publishes fiction and poetry under its mandate to act as a showcase for the talents of members of the Foreign Service community. “It has been a challenge but it has also been very rewarding. The greatest reward has been getting to know the men and women of the Foreign Service, and I carry my appreciation of them into retirement. I shall do as my good friend Bob Rinden has done in Iowa and try to spread the word in my home country, Vermont, about the Foreign Service and its practitioners. Perhaps I can help to build a constituency for you...” — Shirley Newhall, Letters, FSJ , May 1981.