The Foreign Service Journal, November 2022

76 NOVEMBER 2022 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL from Delaware, Joe Biden. In Tokyo, Mr. Hamolsky escorted evangelist Billy Graham on a tour of the American embassy. Mr. Hamolsky also enjoyed meeting new colleagues. He formed lasting friend- ships with many, and maintained interest in their careers and travels throughout his life. After retiring from the Foreign Service in 1986, Mr. Hamolsky and his wife con- tinued to travel and explore the world. They eventually settled in San Diego, Calif., where Mr. Hamolsky returned to his first passion: teaching. Reprising his role as an English instructor to non-native speakers, he taught at the University of California–San Diego, San Diego State University, and MiraCosta Community College north of San Diego. His classes, along with his advocacy for the Mexican and Latin American agricultural workers who tended and harvested area crops by day and studied at MiraCosta by night, were highly lauded, receiving mention more than once in The Los Angeles Times . Mr. Hamolsky was preceded in death by his wife, Esperanza, in December 2021. He is survived by their children and grandchildren: daughter Monica Hamol- sky and grandsons Alex Hamolsky Hilvert and Andres Alberto Hamolsky Hilvert of Zurich, Switzerland; son George Ham- olsky of Portland, Ore.; and daughter Sharon Hamolsky of Solana Beach, Calif. n David Ingersoll Hitchcock Jr., 94, a retired Foreign Service officer, died peacefully at Ingleside at King Farm in Rockville, Md., on Sept. 4, 2022. Born in Salem, Mass., to David I. Hitch- cock and Margaret (Ballou) Hitchcock, Mr. Hitchcock grew up in New Haven, Conn., attended the Foote School, Choate Rosemary Hall, and Pomfret School, and graduated fromDartmouth College in 1950. His lifelong love of hiking, sing- ing, and joyful fraternizing was honed at these institutions among other boys who became and remained his dearest friends. After a two-year stint in the U.S. Army, during which he was commissioned as a second lieutenant, Mr. Hitchcock went to work in the mailroom of CBS News, where he occasionally glimpsed his hero, journalist Edward R. Murrow, giving nightly broadcasts in the tense days of McCarthyism. In 1956 he married Rachel Lee Wil- liamson of Chestertown, Md., and landed a job as legislative assistant to Senator H. Alexander Smith (R-N.J.). In 1957, at Senator Smith’s urging, Mr. Hitchcock joined the newly formed United States Information Agency (later directed by Murrow) and began his 35-year career as a public affairs officer (PAO). Though USIA was established during the Cold War to promote U.S. interests overseas, Mr. Hitchcock believed his job was to embody what he considered the best American values: optimism, gener- osity, open-mindedness, and intellectual curiosity. His first assignment took him to Hue, Vietnam. In 1960 USIA sent Mr. Hitchcock to language training in Tokyo. He immedi- ately fell in love with Japan, mastering the language well enough to make friends and dazzle restaurant owners and coun- try inn proprietors with his idiomatic command of Japanese. In what became a two-decade-long association with Japan, Mr. Hitchcock helped build American studies and Fulbright programs at Japanese univer- sities, championed U.S.-Japan cultural exchange, built ties to journalists and intellectuals, and, with Lee as his gifted partner, enlivened countless evenings with dancing, songs, and merriment for their ever-larger circle of friends. From 1977 to 1981, Mr. Hitchcock served as PAO in Tel Aviv, arriving just in time to get a front-row seat to the Egyp- tian-Israeli peace process that resulted in the 1978 Camp David Accords. Concluding his USIA career in Wash- ington as deputy director for manage- ment and then director of East Asian and Pacific affairs, he retired in 1992 with the rank of Career Minister. Mr. Hitchcock then threw himself into fundraising for Neve Shalom/Wahat-Al- Salam, or “Oasis of Peace,” a cooperative village in Israel dedicated to peaceful coexistence between Arabs and Jews. He spent long summers in New Lon- don, N.H., swimming and sailing on Lake Sunapee, as well as wielding chainsaws and loppers to tame the verdant fields of his beloved Red House on Burpee Hill. Every evening at sundown he gathered with friends and family, made icy mar- tinis, talked and talked a little more, and laughed. A passionate student of music with regular tickets to the symphony, he also delighted in bellowing out the humor- ous songs of Gilbert and Sullivan, Cole Porter, and Pete Seeger. Even as dementia began to cloud his memory, his love of his family and dear wife never faded, and photo albums jammed with happy faces of those he knew and loved piled up by his bedside. In addition to his wife of 66 years, Lee, Mr. Hitchcock is survived by his children: Charles Wellman Hitchcock, Evelyn Tay- lor Hitchcock (and husband Nick Black), Lucinda Lee Hitchcock (and husband Thomas Brendler), and William I. Hitch- cock (and wife Elizabeth Varon); and grandchildren: Rachel Lee Black, John Phillip Black, Benjamin Lee Hitchcock, Emma Taylor Hitchcock, Phoebe Lee