The last member of our branch of the Van Valkenburg family to speak any Dutch, or any language but English, was Peter Van Valkenburg (?556,A1), born in Schagticoke, New York, on April 12, 1818, died February 18,1874, at Union Fort in the Utah Territory. For a century, none of the Vans in my line budged from the unincorporated settlement that Peter helped to pioneer in 1847.

The next to travel was my father, MacElwyn Van Valkenburg, born in 1921, who set off for graduate studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1943. He died March 19, 1997 at the age of 75, but in the course of his career as a Professor of Engineering he took the family to the University of Utah, Princeton, the University of Hawaii and the University of Illinois. Besides the minimum reading knowledge of French required for his PhD degree, he left achievement in foreign languages to his children. Among us, we speak German, Italian, French, Spanish, Chinese and Russian.

In my early twenties, I began looking for an employer who would pay me to pursue my hobbies: travel, foreign languages, analysis of current events, and descriptive writing. That employer turned out to be the Foreign Service of the United States, the career diplomatic service that staffs our Embassies and Consulates abroad.

I was commissioned in 1979 and have since served at the American Embassy in Managua as Vice Consul and Third Secretary; the American Embassy in Kingston, Jamaica, as Second Secretary; the American Embassy in Beijing, China as Second Secretary; the American Consulate General in Tijuana, Mexico as Consul; the American Embassy in New Delhi, India, as First Secretary; as well as in the Department of State in Washington, D.C. At the time this article was written, I was the Consul and Principal Officer of the American Consulate in Merida, Yucatan, Mexico.

I've tried my hand at all four Foreign Service specialties: Political, Administrative, Economic and Consular, but spend most of my time on Consular work: passports, visas, notaries services, assistance for Americans in distress abroad and so on. I've never forgotten that this career was meant to support my hobbies, and so have traveled extensively, to some of the remotest corners of the countries to which I have been accredited and to thirty other countries. I think of these experiences as a form of continuing education, as a form of wealth that cannot be stolen,

Unlike my father and some of my siblings, I am not a published author. I have, however, written hundreds of diplomatic dispatches, mostly descriptive of political, economic and social conditions and events, and these dispatches will eventually be added to the National Archives.

I have also obtained freedom for dozens of Americans held in foreign jails, helped dozens of destitute Americans return home, visited dozens of Americans in hospitals, and provided lesser services to the thousands of Americans fortunate enough to be able to come on their own power to my offices. I have met three of the four American Presidents I have served, and a variety of foreign leaders.

As to the foreign leaders, they're not so hard to approach when you have the prestige of the United States behind you. I've found that the key to success is getting to know the cabinet minister, the chief of police, or whomever socially, before the first time I need a favor, consideration of a certain vote to be cast at the United Nations, for example, or the release of a fellow citizen.

I received the Department of State's bronze medal (the Meritorious Honor Award) in 1982 and again in 1993, and received its silver medal (the Superior Honor Award) in 1995.