The Foreign Service Journal, September 2011

64 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 1 Salvador Allende (Cornell University Press, 1985). Ambassador Davis returned to the State Department in 1973, where he was director general and then assistant secretary for African affairs. He re- signed from the latter post over a policy difference with Secretary of State Henry Kissinger regarding covert ac- tion in Angola. Davis was subsequently appointed ambassador to Switzerland in 1976. In 1977 he moved with his family, which by then included four children, to Newport, R.I., where he taught at the Naval War College for six years as diplomat-in-residence. In 1983, he re- signed from the Foreign Service and accepted a position as the Alexander and Adelaide Hixon Professor of Hu- manities at Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, Calif. He taught there until retiring in 2002, at age 77. During his tenure at Harvey Mudd College, he wrote a book, using re- search he had been compiling since 1947, called A Long Walk to Church: A Contemporary History of Russian Orthodoxy (Westview Press). A second edition of the book came out in 2003. A skier, Davis was also skilled at white-water canoeing and mountain climbing, for which he won several awards. His most notable accomplish- ment was a “first ascent” of Mount Abanico in the Venezuelan Andes with George Band, a member of the team that had first successfully climbed Mt. Everest. He also was a political activist, starting in the 1960s in the civil rights movement. He held positions through- out his life in the Democratic Party, both in California and nationally. Amb. Davis leaves his wife, Eliza- beth of Claremont; four children, Mar- garet Davis Mainardi of Boonton Township, N.J., Helen Miller Davis of Los Angeles, Calif., James Creese Davis of Barrington, R.I., and Thomas Rohde Davis of Boston, Mass.; eight grandchildren; two great-granddaugh- ters; and two sisters. WilliamB. “Bill” Dozier , 85, a re- tired Foreign Service officer, died on April 29 from complications of Alz- heimer’s disease in Marion, S.C. Mr. Dozier was born on Aug. 24, 1925, in Marion County, S.C. He re- ceived a B.S. in engineering from the University of South Carolina and an M.A. in economics from Yale Univer- sity. He was a World War II veteran with the 58th Seabee Battalion. In 1947 Mr. Dozier joined the For- eign Service. His overseas posts in- cluded Jordan, France, Aruba, Italy, Sweden and Israel. His last position in Washington, D.C., was as director for regional affairs in the Bureau of Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs. Prior to that he served as counselor for eco- nomic and commercial affairs at his posts in Europe and the Middle East. While in Jordan, he met his future wife, Nancy Dimmig, who was then on assignment to the consulate general in Jerusalem. They were married on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem in 1950. Mr. Dozier retired from the Foreign Service in 1979, and the couple settled in NorthMyrtle Beach, where he own- ed and operated ERA Dozier Realty. In 1992, they moved to his childhood farm in nearby Marion, S.C. There he dusted off the farming skills he had learned as a young man and raised cat- tle and horses. Bill Dozie enjoyed gardening, golf- ing and being close to family members. He loved nature and the outdoors, and his family has happy memories of trips to the beach, nature walks around the farm and fishing together. Mr. Dozier is survived by his wife of 61 years, Nancy, of Marion; a son, Billy Dozier of Marion; daughters, Carolyn Dozier of Annandale, Va., and Eliza- beth McCollom of Matthews, N.C.; and three grandchildren. Patricia Gordon Erickson , 84, a former Foreign Service specialist and widow of the late FSOElden Erickson, died at her home in Solomons, Md., on March 29. Mrs. Erickson was born on Sept. 7, 1926, in Vallejo, Calif. She grew up there and, later, in France, where she was sent to live with her grandmother. During that sojourn, she fell in love with all things French. She attended college at the University of California in Berkeley, where she graduated with a major in political science. During WorldWar II, she worked inHonolulu, with a security clearance that would protect her underground in the event of a nuclear attack. Following the war, she joined the Foreign Service as a secretary. While on assignment in Tokyo in 1956, she called Elden Erickson, an economic of- ficer, long distance to tell him he would not be able to get out of his assignment in Laos. It was the beginning of what would be a 50-year marriage and a long joint diplomatic career. In 1961, before Mr. Erickson’s as- signment to Kobe-Osaka, the couple adopted a son, Mark, whom they whisked across the country to Kansas to meet the extended family before de- parting overseas. After braving a bliz- zard in Kansas, they arrived in Cali- fornia, where they set off by ship, stop- ping in Hawaii on the way to Japan. I N M E M O R Y