Religious piety. They grew up in a parsonage and were deeply influenced by the ideals of missionary calvinism, the idea that the world is divided between good and evil and that christians have to go out into the world and transform the evil into good. A very short step from that to take it into politics and believe that politically, the world is divided between good regimes and evil regimes. And that it is the duty of the good regimes, that is us to go , out into the world and destroy that evil. That is an important part of the dulles brothers formation. The other big influence on them was the decades that they spent as corporate lawyers working for this very important law firm, sullivan and cromwell in new york. That was not a law firm that you went to if you needed a contract drawn up or to be represented in court. Sullivan and cromwell had a specialty. That was pressuring small weak countries to accept the demands of big american corporations. That is what allen dulles and foster du
Recently died when that super airport in chantilly, virginia was being built. President eisenhower announced that the airport would be named Dulles Airport. When kennedy took over, he didnt want to name it after a crusty old cold war era. The was pushed back and finally the decision was made to name it after dulles. You can still see the film clip of kennedy opening the airport with eisenhower there and allen dulles there. He pulls back a curtain and behind the curtain is this giant bust of John Foster Dulles. That stands in the middle of this big airport. I went to see it while i was writing this book. I couldnt find it. I started asking security guards. Nobody had ever even heard of it. It was a long process and finally, thanks to the washington airport authority, i was able to discover that the bust had been taken away from its place in the middle of the airport and it is now in a closed Conference Room opposite baggage claim number three. I find this a wonderful metaphor for how th
The naming honors Ikeda's persistence in the face of adversity and stands as "a stark reminder of the complicated histories of this country and our University."
The archway in Lockhart Hall will be called Ikeda Arch effective Oct. 4. The naming is intended to memorialize Ikeda’s experience at Princeton and recognize his inspiring persistence during extremely challenging circumstances.