The letter which follows was written in Paris in December of 1950 by Yvonne Bazin - the translator for the Utleys. It was apparently sent in reply to an October letter to Yvonne and her husband Leon "Jean" Bazin from F�ves schoolmaster Henri Torlotting and his wife Mathilde. By this time, Trans World Airlines had already moved the Utleys from France back to the United States. How the letter came to be in the Clay County Museum materials is not known.

The letter is interesting because if gives a perspective of someone not directly in the middle of the sister-cities situation. But it also provides a glimpse into some things that are interesting in their own right.

The letter was in French and some of the references may need some explaining. To help in this regard, in some places in the text words have been inserted. These appear between brackets - [ ] - and should be read as if they were part of the original letter. Braces - { } - are used in two different ways. When they surround a word or words, they provide an explanation. When they surround a number, they are a link to additional information below the body of the letter.

14 Rue Angelique Verien
Neuilly, Seine

December 11, 1950

Dear friends,

See, I did not wait for Christmas to reply to your letter of October. I even intended to answer much sooner, but I have been very occupied since the beginning of the quarter. I ask you to forgive me as I have a very good reason: on foot you go more slowly than something motorized, do you not? With my scooter, I tell you it is much longer.

Please find attached photos and enlargements for you and for your friendly family. (Give the cash to the Cur� {priest} for a family alone.) We think that because Utley especially took color film, they will not be able to send you proofs. These {the ones she is sending} will remind you of our good times with you and we are waiting for those we will spend together here when you come to Paris. Needless to say, the negatives are at your disposal if you need them. For photos of the school children, of course it was not possible to make as many pictures as there are students, but if there is a need to make some more proofs, tell us, and it will be a pleasure.

Henri, you are a rascal waiting to return a reply to our letter of June. What are you doing this summer? Were you dancing, singing, or what? You probably have to visit the sister of Mr. Roenigk.{1} I hope she was friendly and you will give us a report �soon.�{2}

We also had a long letter from the Utleys in October with details on their long holiday. They covered 14,000 miles. (about 20,000 km) and traveled through twenty states (of the 48) into Alberta and Canada. They were delighted with their long well-deserved vacation. They also took on the way their respective parents on a rotating basis and went visiting with them the families. They were very pleased to see their great country. [They wrote] it seems that a day does not go by without their speaking the names of Torlotting, Bazin, etc. We sent an enlargement of Mr. Utley on the roof of the barn with a long pole inconveniently placed.{3} They found it entertaining and will frame it. They plan to settle in their personal and final American home in January. For now, they are in a furnished house of a colleague who moved to Kansas, but was sent elsewhere.

By the way, you'll have to learn what happened to that brave Roy Davis if you have not read [it] in the newspaper. In October, a plane from Bombay had in its engines a hidden packages containing millions of rupees (about 30 or 40 million francs, I think). The two mechanics who cleaned the engines shared the secret package with Roy. Everything has been discovered: prison, etc., etc. What a pity. That boy is so nice and a good worker. His career has certainly been destroyed at TWA. He had to go back to America with his wife in November said Mrs. Utley. {4}

It seems that the photo of the church of Feves could be enlarged by a specialist and I understand they will send it to you when they see their family in Morganville.

Morganville's children have celebrated July 14 singing �Sur le Pont d�Avignon.�{5} The Utleys made a speech on their Feves visits. They viewed color photos, and everything was finished with ice cream, cakes, coffee, etc. The money [raised] will go to the Fund for Feves, they say in their letter. I took the opportunity in my response to remind them of the needs of the school in Feves and �their� idea of a projector or other useful and pleasant object. I guess they are not alone in deciding though, but they will be a good influence, because you know how much they are attached to you and your village now.

They spoke to me of the terrible air accident TWA had in Cairo on August 29 in which they had four very good friends die that leave women and children.{6}

They also fret about you with these rumors of war and tremble for �poor little Feves.�

Finally, they ask me to relay to you anything in their letter that might interest you, which I did. They renew their hope to return to visit us all in a few years if all goes well. She thinks her husband will not be mobilized, other than on the ground, because of his work, even if he is called up for military service.

The events {Korean War} are in fact not pleasing and the poor Americans are having it hard in Korea. They were so sure of their strength and their superiority, but the enemy also has links to guerillas who are against them.

Finally, everyone is working to not think too much about these terrible things that hopefully will not come.

[Maurice] Bazin, our son, is working like a mad [man]. He mentioned the Award of Excellence in July. {7}

Glad to know that the children have offered you a Kinax [camera] for your party. Give a lot of affection to the friendly families of Girard, Berne, Pierson, and your good friend, the young teacher of whom we often think, who was paralyzed.

My laurel {a small evergreen tree} is fine; it is put in the home when it is cold, but goes out on the balcony when it softly rains. When it is really cold, should I water a little or not if it stays in the heated house a long time? Your horticultural lights are precious to me because I care enormously. It had a few pink flowers bloom in September. I hope that it will hold on well until spring, despite the warmth of the apartment.

We kiss you both very affectionately and send you our best wishes for a good Christmas.

Please contact us if you find the time. We are always so happy to receive a letter from you.

I hope that the Girard family has received the pictures I have sent them directly.

Compliments for the Simca 8 {a small car}. I hope you will have it for your summer vacation.

Did I say we toured Austria (Tyrol) this summer - wonderful and economical!

Affectionately,

Jean and Yvonne [Bazin]

Additional Notes


1. ... sister of Mr. Roenigk. - Dan Roenigk's sister Anna Marie Roenigk, a school teacher, spent 6 months traveling in Europe.

2. ... "soon." - No doubt a reference to Torlotting's previous slow response.

3. ... a long pole inconveniently placed. - Uncertain as to what is being referenced, but with a little imagination ...


4. Roy Davis - Apparently things did not go so badly for Mr. Davis as Yvonne might have imagined. Two articles follow. The first is from the Dunkirk Observer - Todd's hometown newspaper - and it is a report of the incident leading to the arrest of the three TWA employees. The second is a short biography written after Mr. Davis' retirement to Arizona from TWA's O'Hare facility.


Westfield Man Is Arrested in Paris

Report Paris - One Westflield, N. Y., man was among three American aviation mechanics who were placed in custody here Monday on charges of the theft of a package containing 200,000 Indian rupees from a plane. Police and officers of the men's employer company, Trans World Airline, identified the men as Roy Davis, 34, of Fair Oaks, Pa.; Jerome Lasky, 27, of Brooklyn, N. Y., and Neal Bovec, 34, of Westfield, N. Y. They were arrested Saturday. Police said the men found the package in a motor cowling of a plane that arrived from Bombay, and that they learned about it when the men tried to market the rupees on the Paris black market. They said 139,000 rupees had been recovered. A rupee is worth about 21 cents. Westfield authorities here, however, indicated they knew of no one in the community by the name of Neal Bovec.

18 October 1950
Dunkirk Observer

When the war ended, Roy was back at TWA, starting at Laguardia Field in New York. He later spent several years in Europe before again returning to Laguardia. Roy went on to serve as TWA Director of Maintenance at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago. Roy became a legend in the world of airline maintenance. He was the TWA guy who flew company aircraft out of mud bogs and snow banks. Roy served as the model for the character of Joe Patroni in Arthur Hailey's "Airport."

Roy received a special Federal Aviation Association Certificate of Recognition honoring him for the many things he did for commercial aviation while he was TWA Director of Maintenance at O'Hare. Roy is only one of four persons to be given Honorary Lifetime Membership in the Airline Pilots Association. (The others were Jimmy Doolittle, Charles Augustus Lindbergh and Eddie Rickenbacker.) Roy is the only non-active pilot ever so honored by ALPA.

Pima Air and Space Museum

5. ... �Sur le Pont d�Avignon.� - This song had been sung by the children in F�ves on the occasion of the June 23, 1949 radio program. July 14 is celebrated in France as Americans celebrate July 4. So the people of Morganville thought it would be nice to sing a song on that day they had heard in the program.

6. ... terrible air accident ... - The details of this accident are related in the article below.


TWA Flight 903 was a regularly scheduled flight from Bombay International Airport, India to New York-Idlewild Airport, via Cairo-King Farouk Airport and Rome-Ciampino Airport.

The Star of Maryland, a Lockheed L-749A Constellation, flew the route on the night of 31 August 1950. It departed Cairo at 23:35 for Rome with 55 persons aboard, (48 passengers and seven crew members), in good weather.

As Flight 903 was climbing at 10,000 ft (3,000 m), the crew reported that its number three engine was on fire and that they needed a priority return to Cairo. As the plane was returning to Cairo, the engine separated from the aircraft, forcing the crew to attempt a forced landing in the desert about 65 miles NNW of Cairo. The airliner went down near the village of Ityai el Barud at the rim of the Western Desert, killing all 55 on board, including twenty-three Americans and an Egyptian film star.

Searchers found the wreckage strewn over 500 yd (460 m) after trekking 15 mi (24 km) over hot sands to reach it, where the aircraft wreckage was found almost completely burnt out. The bodies of the victims were badly charred, delaying identification. A United Press International correspondent reported that the plane had smashed into a narrow-gauge railway in hitting the ground and had plowed up a considerable stretch of track.

A dozen nations were represented among the 48 passengers. Prominent among the Americans were Aubrey William Schofield, of Houston, Tex., and New York, an oil company executive; and Dr. Everett Moore Baker, dean of students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Mr. Schofield, a native of San Antonio, Texas., was manager of the Gulf Oil Company's eastern hemisphere foreign production division and had recently been filling in as manager of the Kuwait Oil Company. Dr. Baker had been in Bombay to preside over the International Student Service's annual conference there. Also killed was the architect Maciej Nowicki, who had been working on the design of the new city of Chandigarh.

After an intensive investigation, the probable cause of the crash was cited to be failure of the rear master rod bearing on the number three engine. The failure caused the rear crank-pin to overheat and fail, whereupon all the rear connecting rods failed, tearing through the cylinder walls and crankcase. In the process, oil lines were torn open, which caused the fire. Sludge buildup in the crank-pins, blocking oil flow was thought to be the root cause, which resulted in improved oil screens and the implementation of a crank-pin plug, as well as revised oil change intervals.

Wikipedia
�TWA Flight 903"

7. ... Award of Excellence in July. - Yvonne's son Maurice grew up to be a world-class atomic physist and educator who taught in many countries. Maurice would have been 16 at this time, so if this reference is to an award he was pursuing is unknown. He appears to have been a man of great energy who was greatly interested in social justice and helping the people of the world who were less well off than he was. He may have also been a man who was easier to admire at a distance.

Until 1975, he was professor in the Universities of Princeton and Rutgers, (USA), and he was also a member of the journal and collective, �Science for the People.�

He elected to live in Europe where he was teacher at the University of Evora, and he gave courses at the University of Lisbon during the epoch of the Carnation Revolution. He organized training workshops for science teachers in Africa (Angola, Guine Bissau) under the auspices of UNESCO.

During the government of Allende (1970-73) he gave courses in Chile for both teachers and factory workers, putting in practice his ideas about �science for the people.�

In the years 1970 and 1980, he was a correspondent for the journal Nature, in Portugal and Brazil. Beginning in 1979, he went to reside in Brazil where he was professor in the Physics Department of the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, collaborating intensely with Professor Pierre Lucie, dedicating himself to improving the system of teaching basic physics.

He was a pioneer in scientific publicity and in the development of teachers of science, having actively participated in the founding of the first interactive museum of Sciences in Rio de Janeiro�Living Scientific Space.

In the 1990s, he returned to the United States and begins to divide his time between the Exploratorium Teacher Institute in San Francisco and the Community Science Workshops of California and Brazil, where he organized training of teachers of the sciences and participated in the magazine, Today�s Science for Children.

He was also a member of the Scientific Commission of the Pavilion of Knowledge--Living Science Center of Lisbon, Portugal.

In 2000, he began a new life in Florianopolis where he collaborated with the newspaper, The News, in Santa Catarina and with the community paper of Campeche where he was also director of education and culture of the Residential Association (AMOCAM).

As consultant for the Socio-environmental Institute (ISA) he evaluated the indigenous peoples of the Upper Negro River in their re-encounter with their own traditional forms of mathematics.

He was a member of the Institute of Political Linguistics (IPOL) and evaluated the program of Education for Youth and Adults (EJA) of the municipality of Florianopolis.

In 2007, he returned to live in Rio de Janeiro and again takes up an active collaboration with Living Science Space and helped to develop the teachers of physics in the National Deaf Mute Institute.

Up to the end of his life, he always worked for a more just society and a world that would be viable for all. His friends and former students will forever remember Maurice, the friend, smiling, intense and active, whose multiple interests took him to interact and participate in so many successful socio-educational projects.

He died in Rio de Janeiro, from complications related to cardiac problems and leaves four children, two residents of the United States and two in Brazil.

Translated from Portuguese by Prof Angela Gilliam (Evergreen College).