Hare Visits U.S. Embassy in Paraguay
Amb. Paul Hare, Senior Lecturer at Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, recently traveled to Paraguay and Uruguay to complete research and gain background knowledge for his IR 410 Latin America Today course. During his trip, Hare visited with the United States Ambassador in Asunción, Paraguay, Leslie Bassett, who brought up an interesting connection between Boston University and the U.S. embassy in Asunción.
According to Bassett, the Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center at Boston University played a crucial role in recovering a time capsule deposited in the embassy garden when the building was inaugurated in 1956. There are plans underway to redevelop the site of the embassy in Asunción, and Bassett was hoping to recover the capsule before the project started.
When the capsule was buried in 1956, the U.S. Ambassador to Paraguay at the time, Arthur Ageton, conducted the ceremony with the then President of Paraguay, Alfredo Stroessner. While documentation at the embassy on the location of the capsule was lost, Ageton’s papers from the embassy were donated to the Gotlieb Center at Boston University.
Bassett reached out to the Gotlieb Center, hoping that among Ageton’s papers was some reference to where the time capsule was buried. She was in luck. Archivists at the Gotlieb Center found 18 photographs among Ageton’s papers depicting various scenes from the time capsule ceremony as well as a journal page with some details on the location of the time capsule that helped Bassett and her team locate it.
During his visit, Bassett told Hare to pass on her thanks to the Gotlieb Center and the Boston University community for their assistance that proved instrumental in locating the time capsule. Upon his return, Hare contacted the Gotlieb Center to pass on Bassett’s thanks.
Instituted in 1963 as Special Collections and renamed in 2003 to honor its founder, the Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center is the repository for individuals in the fields of literature, criticism, journalism, drama, music, film, civil rights, diplomacy and national affairs. Find out more about the Gotlieb Center here.