00:00:01.200 - 00:00:16.450

This is Nicole Cox from the Samuel Procter Oral History Program. I'm here today, June 16th, 2000 and 10 at the University of Florida with Mr Richard Morgan, who currently lives in Sarasota. First of all, Mr Morgan, I'd like to thank you for taking the time to talk with me today.

00:00:16.460 - 00:00:37.070

Thank you very much. Before we discuss your Panama Canal Zone experiences, maybe you could begin by telling me a little bit about your early life before the Panama Canal. Maybe about your parents, Your background where you're from. Sure. I was born in Minneapolis, grew up in the Midwest and in the New York area both way.

00:00:37.070 - 00:00:57.800

Moved around quite a bit while I was a child. I graduated from high school in Scarsdale, New York, and went on to Northwestern University for my undergraduate degree in business administration when they had an undergraduate business school when they had a E and then joined the army for four years, served in U.

00:00:57.800 - 00:01:23.730

S. Army counterintelligence, and two of those years were in Germany. Um, while I was in Germany, I stayed on as a civilian, working for the U. S. Government and medical, who was a Panamanian by coincidence, and a few months later, we were married in Germany and in Switzerland, both because of the separation of church and state.

00:01:23.740 - 00:01:45.910

In Europe, you have to have two separate ceremonies. And that was how I came to learn about Panama. Okay. Do you mind if I ask where you met where? In Frankfurt? At a foreign service party. She was staying. She She had come over from Panama as a tourist and was staying with her sister in Frankfurt and went to work for the U.

00:01:45.910 - 00:02:02.570

S. Army to stay on for a year or two. And I met her at a foreign service party in Frankfurt. Okay. And what year were you married? We were married in 1963 1963. I think we knew each other all of four months. And that was a lot of years ago.

00:02:03.140 - 00:02:20.650

So that started. I guess your education about Panama started my education about Panama. She had been she had gone to college in the United States in Los Angeles, so she was bilingual. But I hardly knew where Panama was in 1963. Like like many Americans, I knew all about Europe and I knew about the Far East.

00:02:20.650 - 00:02:47.250

I didn't know much about Central America or South America. Um, but I began to learn with her. Okay? And maybe you could, um if you don't mind, go ahead and maybe talk about how you ended up in the canal zone and in Panama. Okay. In 1965 we took what the US government calls home leave from a foreign assignment.

00:02:47.380 - 00:03:06.470

That is a trip to the United States, the two of us. And at the time, our firstborn child was about a year old or a little less so we had a baby. We traveled to the United States to the Midwest to visit my parents, and she said, Let's take a side trip to Panama while we're on home life.

00:03:07.040 - 00:03:21.870

Um, we were young and had almost no money at all. But we could scrape together enough to fly to Panama and and stay with her family who lived in Panama City, which is the capital of Panama, and at one end, the southern end of the Panama Canal.

00:03:21.880 - 00:03:36.880

So, not knowing what to expect, we got on the red eye plane and they were all red eyes them they left Miami at midnight, got into Panama on 3. 30 in the morning and soon as they opened the door to the plane, the humidity and the temperature hits you.

00:03:36.970 - 00:03:52.730

Both of them were about 95 degrees. Before you got off the plane, you wondered, what in the world am I doing here? This is a Turkish bath. And actually, within a week I came to love it. We spent about a week and a half there and saw all of Panama.

00:03:52.730 - 00:04:14.430

Stayed with her mother on DSHEA. Has she still has family in Panama and we still visit. And I grew to really like the place and the people. So I knew things were gonna be closing down in Europe in the mid sixties. By that time 65 66 the plans around the drawing board to close down and pull out Ah, lot of units.

00:04:14.440 - 00:04:33.400

We lived in Verona, Italy, at that time, which was a beautiful, beautiful place to live. After Germany, we moved to Barona. And so I decided Thio, look for a job with the government in Panama since I already had four years of Army service and two years, three years of civilian service in Europe by that time.

00:04:34.010 - 00:04:56.610

So I met the, introduced myself to the personnel director of the Panama Canal Company. That was called at the time, and he interviewed May all of one afternoon about that. I remember about the civilian personnel practices in Europe and where I would fit into the organization into his organization.

00:04:56.610 - 00:05:14.590

And at the end of the afternoon he said, Well, do you wanna work for me? I said, I sure do. Do you remember how you answered those questions? Yes, Ideo. It was an impressive thing. First of all, very few job applicants us or Panamanian were interviewed by the personnel director.

00:05:14.600 - 00:05:29.950

Hey, just like the fact that I worked for the Army in Europe and he wanted to pick my brain about how civilian personnel things were handled in Europe and it wasn't a one hour job interview, it was a three hour all afternoon pick, my brain interview.

00:05:29.960 - 00:05:55.360

And so at the end, we never really talked about, um, position title grade money until the very end, when he said, Well, do you wanna work for May? And I said, I sure did. And so he hired me on the spot and my wife and baby stayed in Panama with her family and I flew back to Italy, put together what few household goods we had and got on the plane and came back to Panama.

00:05:55.370 - 00:06:23.310

So the government handled it as an interagency transfer. I officially transferred from the Army in Europe to the Panama Canal Company in Panama, both of which were United States government agencies. And that was in August of 1965. That's when I went to Panama. Didn't really know what I was getting into, except I knew that her family was there, which was a good thing.

00:06:23.650 - 00:06:42.420

And I knew that I liked the lifestyle there and the people I had met. Do you remember any, like your first impressions, I guess, of the actual canal itself. Just you know, obviously you've heard founded everything My first impression of the canal itself. Not the canal going through the jungle as a waterway.

00:06:42.420 - 00:07:02.750

But the locks in particular, were just astounding. I'm not an engineer, but I had some engineering background on guy. Just I was in awe Onda more. I learned about it the more I worked there. The Maurin, all I Waas and I still transit the canal about three times a year as a as a lecturer on cruise ships.

00:07:02.760 - 00:07:26.230

And every time I dio, I'm just like a kid again. It's awesome to think that this this was the Panama Canal designed by ah bunch of geniuses in the early 19 hundreds and built in less than 10 years after after the French had failed after the Spanish had failed after some of the greatest helped achievements, medical achievements in the world.

00:07:26.240 - 00:07:43.230

Toe actually see and work at the canal was was a wonderful thing. It was an honor, actually. But I was an outsider. And here here are where some of the differences is. I was coming from the outside in my mid twenties. Um, I was not born and raised there.

00:07:43.450 - 00:08:01.750

My major impression was not so much the canal as life in the canal zone. The canal zone was 500 square miles of land and water set down right smack in the middle of the isthmus of Panama and actually cut the country in half. Right down the middle.

00:08:02.240 - 00:08:29.280

It was five miles. I'm sorry. 10 miles to each five miles, which is a total of 10 to each side of the canal and 50 miles long, 500 square miles. And when you were in the canal zone, you were under United States police jurisdiction. United States courts, United States schools, United States, everything, um, to the complete exclusion of any Panamanian law or legalities at all.

00:08:29.290 - 00:08:45.910

And so we're Panamanians. When they passed through the Canal Zone, if if they broke the law in the canal Zone they went to US Jail Canal Zone Jail, where they better know how to speak English because nobody else learned, knew how to speak Spanish. They went before us judges, Magistrates.

00:08:45.920 - 00:09:16.130

And if they went to penitentiary, they went Thio Canal Zone Penitentiary. And I just, uh, nobody could have ever prepared me for that. And I don't think any student in the United States then or now could imagine, um, it's kind of like somebody compared. It wants to me like drawing 100 mile wide swath down the Mississippi River from Canada to the Gulf, and when you're in that swath of land you're under French jurisdiction.

00:09:16.160 - 00:09:36.840

You better speak French at a French driver's license in a French court system, which is completely different than American as his American from Panamanian. It's a foreign country inside of another country, and that's exactly what the canal zone waas. Uh, even my wife could not have prepared me for that, although she told me stories about it stories.

00:09:36.840 - 00:09:53.430

For example, when she was growing up in Panama City, she had to carry two driver's licenses. She had to actually pass tests in both nations, if you will. Ah, Panamanian license and a Canal Zone license. Ah, few years before that, you had to have to license plates if you wanted.

00:09:53.430 - 00:10:13.280

If you were Panamanian and you wanted to drive from Panama City up to the beaches and the interior of Panama on the way to Costa Rica, which actually is driving west from Panama City, you had to have a Canal Zone license plate on your car. Or you would be arrested crossing, crossing the 10 mile wide canals, um, by Canal Zone police.

00:10:13.390 - 00:10:34.020

And so I began to understand why there was an animosity that had grown over the years. The canal zone had to exist in the early 19 hundreds because Panama itself was a backwater, a jungle pestilent backwater of a place where people there was no sanitation at all.

00:10:34.030 - 00:11:05.540

There was no help. There was no hospital. There were no sewers. There were no potable water facilities. All of those were brought in by the Americans, who not only constructed the canal. They constructed the two terminal cities in Panama, Panama City and Cologne. They, the Americans, built the sewer system, built the potable water system, built the hospitals, the clinics, everything and my wife's mother, uh, thank the Americans in her prayers every day because they cleaned up that pestilent piece of jungle down there.

00:11:05.540 - 00:11:24.660

But as the years went by and Panamanians became more self sufficient, which they did by the 19 forties and fifties and economically well off, ah, banking center on a financial center, they grew to resent the canal zone and everything it stood for and the fact that it still was under U.

00:11:24.660 - 00:11:45.040

S. Jurisdiction flying the American flag, cutting their own country in half. And there began to be a Siris of, um, serious problems, some of which resulted in killing in deaths in 1964. The flag incident. Um, so that would have happened. That will happen just before I got before I got there.

00:11:45.050 - 00:12:08.800

My wife had lived there during some of that, but it was it was building up to a high pressure situation. Uh, the students in Panama were the most active anti American. There was a very small Communist Party which was always fomenting problems with America. But the existence of the canal zone by 1965 was a serious thorn in Panama's side.

00:12:08.810 - 00:12:36.770

And any leader of Panama, um, would have done anything he could to get rid of the canal zone and turned it into Panamanian property. That's that's how I landed in Panama. And here I was trying to find my way a new around a new agency, a new organization trying to find which jobs were the right ones to get into, to rise in the organization, living a home hometown, American existence.

00:12:36.780 - 00:12:57.870

Let me just tell you about the canal zone. The folks the old timers won't tell you, because again you see this. Maura's an outsider. If you were born there, you were born in an American hospital, as was John McCain. As a matter of fact, you went to school an American grade school, middle school, high school and junior college.

00:12:57.880 - 00:13:14.190

If you want to go to college, you had to go off to the States and many did and came back toe work from the canal. Um, if you went through the Apprentice program, you worked for the company. It was the last company town on earth. As I say, except for the Falkland Islands, which still does things that way Pretty much.

00:13:14.200 - 00:13:36.440

You worked for the canal your entire career. If you died there, you were buried in the company cemetery. I'm very serious. But the American flag flying over you in perpetuity, supposedly in perpetuity Because that treaty between the United States and Panama was in perpetuity, which meant forever, We thought way found out how long perpetuity really WAAS.

00:13:36.450 - 00:13:56.220

Jimmy Carter had a different idea. Perpetuity and that all change. But the attitude waas that I sat down in 1965 was very much like a small state in the Midwest or the south of the United States. It was all American, and it was more American than America was in the sixties.

00:13:56.700 - 00:14:16.110

More churches per capita than any small town in America. Boy Scouts, girl Scouts, boys clubs, boys and girls clubs. A little league. Just everything you could imagine and all of our kids did. All these things together grew up together, and it was like like they weren't even in another country.

00:14:16.120 - 00:14:39.540

It was like they were in Des Moines, Iowa, in miniature, and even the number one American leader there was called the governor. He was the governor of the Canal Zone, as if the governor, as if the Canal Zone were another state of the United States. And in fact, he went to the governor's conferences and was treated as a governor of a mini state.

00:14:39.550 - 00:14:56.820

Yeah, and he was a major general in the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers. That was always the governor, since since the construction of the canal. Since Goebbels, who had been a major general in the core, the core kind of held onto that job for years and years.

00:14:56.830 - 00:15:12.150

But he did not work in uniform. He worked in a white suit in those days. When I got there in a Panama hat and we called him governor and that's he was he had to two positions governor of the Canal Zone and president of the Panama Canal Company.

00:15:13.140 - 00:15:35.600

But it was not part of Department of the Army. That was just happened that it happened, that he was an army officer, career army officer. And it was a plush position. E Not only was he governor, he had a household staff of his own. He had a mansion that was that had been moved to its present location That was originally the home of George Goethals during canal construction.

00:15:36.240 - 00:15:53.760

I think the only thing holding it up with the termites by the time I got there, he had a lifestyle, as we all did. Um, I remember how surprised I waas to learn that you could live like a millionaire without being one. Uh, by being is only, um, by living in the zone.

00:15:54.610 - 00:16:16.460

Many of these 3rd and 4th generation friends of mine are called Zone Ian's. They don't call themselves that very much. It's a derogatory term. Um, that was thrown at them mainly by Panamanians and other Americans who did not live there. Zone Ian, simply to me meant meant that you were born and raised in the canal zone.

00:16:16.640 - 00:16:36.560

But it became a term that you didn't want had to have used about you. I never waas Azzoni um, because I had gone there from the outside, but my kids were two out of three were born there, went through the school system there and consider themselves own Ian's and are proud of it.

00:16:37.040 - 00:16:54.880

And they are. Two of the three are part of this mob of three and 4000 that is in the Panama Canal. Society participated in this society, and they love it. They love it. It's the only time they get together with their kids. They went to high school with, and and then they're just that takes him back years.

00:16:54.880 - 00:17:11.680

And it's just fun to watch them for three or four days a year. Just relive this whole thing, which they do at the Panama Canal Society Re Union once a year in Orlando. Well, you kind of touched on what family life was like, um, and living like a millionaire.

00:17:11.680 - 00:17:33.680

Could you elaborate a little more? Um, What? It was like you had a choice on where you live. You could live in the canal zone. And if you chose to do that, you had to live in government provided housing. There was rent. It was not expensive, but the housing itself waas.

00:17:33.690 - 00:17:53.500

Barely adequate. It was government housing like you would find on any old army base. Um, that dates back many, many years. It wasn't large square footage wise. By the time I got there, it was there. Conditioned. Thank goodness. Miss Panama. Yeah, Panama's a hot place. Just a few years before I got there.

00:17:53.500 - 00:18:13.730

It wasn't even air conditioned, so there were very few nice houses. The way you got a better house was but was to be a heavy senior in service and a few positions. Um, executive positions in the canal got special housing by virtue of being in designated positions.

00:18:13.810 - 00:18:29.020

I later rose to that level, but even then, the housing wasn't great. Um, but it didn't matter because everybody was in the same boat. You weren't looking at somebody who was living in a better house unless he had a lot more service than you did. And that was fair.

00:18:29.030 - 00:18:50.900

I mean, that was the way things were. Almost everybody had a servant or two or three. A live in maid. Who was your cook? Your baby center. Your house cleaner? Um, that kind of labor was super cheap in Panama. And it wasn't just zone Ian's that had these.

00:18:50.900 - 00:19:14.630

It was every every family that could afford it in the Republic of Panama had live in maids. And and that was that something you don't hear of much in the United States other than for super rich people here. These were people making median level government salaries off in the area of 30 to 40 $50,000 a year was a huge salary.

00:19:14.630 - 00:19:34.970

50 was in the 19 sixties, but most of these folks for making 25 30,000 year with a live inmate 24 hours a day that did their cooking took care of their kids. Their baby sitting was built in. They had a yard boy that would come or a yard man that would come once or twice a week and take care of the grounds.

00:19:35.140 - 00:19:49.060

Um, the government agency itself mowed the grass and cut the trees and did all of that for you. So you didn't even have toe. You didn't even have to have a screwdriver, a hammer in the house, which was a good thing, because my I was never very good with those.

00:19:49.070 - 00:20:10.710

If there was any maintenance of a government house. It had to be done by government people in their employment as mechanics for the Panama Canal, so people didn't have to maintain much themselves. On day were just so many outstanding activities to participate in every interest in the world.

00:20:10.880 - 00:20:29.570

And, for example, our kids all played in Little League while who were the coaches of Little League? Primarily the police, law enforcement people and the and the lower the younger managers of the canal who all knew each other. Everybody knew everybody else's kids and kept him from getting into trouble.

00:20:29.580 - 00:20:48.680

It was a fish bowl, you know, you could. You could tell exactly what time your neighbors had their argument last night and what they were arguing about on. Of course, the place was always full of gossip, and the word was spread as it would in any small town.

00:20:48.680 - 00:21:19.570

But it was a great place to raise kids. It was an outdoor life. They rode Chiyoko boats. They raced, they were scouting. It was just a It was a life that became unreal. By the 19 seventies, nobody in the States lived like that in the 19 seventies, but the people in the canal zone thought they did, because the Canal Zone life was had been plucked out of time, almost like a time capsule from Des Moines, Iowa, 1958.

00:21:19.640 - 00:21:55.480

And here it was still going on just the same way in 1978. And when people would come from Washington unofficial business and see what life in the Canal zone was like, um, they couldn't believe it. They thought it was a time capsule, and in many ways it waas many of the zone IANs who were born and raised in that did not realize what an anachronism that WAAS and why people in Washington resented that because they no longer had it because I was an outsider and traveled a lot, too.

00:21:55.480 - 00:22:23.420

In my in my job, I was traveling back and forth to the States constantly, constantly. Well, I was several different positions in the organization. But, um, for many years I was in charge of contracting and procurement, which might I was the chief contracting officer for the agency, and I had to travel to the states and other countries, um, to do contracting and I could see coming and going what a lot of the zone.

00:22:23.420 - 00:22:39.560

Ian's couldn't see because they hardly ever left the something. But once every two years they'd go visit Aunt Mary in Iowa or in South Carolina, but they wouldn't travel is much as we did. Um, from your experience, if you had visitors say from Washington, D. C.

00:22:39.560 - 00:22:56.760

Coming in and they saw this life, were they interested in seeing if maybe they could transfer to the Canal Zone? Did you have a lot of transplants? People that wanted to be part of that? People loved to see this because it waas it was storybook America.

00:22:56.840 - 00:23:19.170

It was the American flag waving everywhere. It was churches and just everything that life had once been in the States. We think it's small town Midwest and small time so And of course they envied that. And many of them didn't like it, just plain didn't think it was right for that to be going on on.

00:23:19.180 - 00:23:36.470

We're a little bit jealous of it. The ones who lived it, for the most part, didn't even realize how good they had it. I still get together with some of the old time zone. Ian's like it the once a year thing. When I do go and I'm just shocked that some of them still don't realize.

00:23:36.480 - 00:23:55.230

And there's seventies and into their eighties how good a life they had in the canal zone. Some do. Many don't. Well, I know that you had said when when you arrived, you were kind of in the middle of this sort of the rising tensions with native Panamanians and things like that.

00:23:55.240 - 00:24:14.770

You sort of had a unique perspective with your wife being, um, from Panama, Everything. What sort of interaction did you have with people outside of the Canal Zone? We had the best of three worlds as time went by, because she's Panamanian and her family lived in Panama City and had their own bookstore, okay.

00:24:14.850 - 00:24:35.570

And, well, Liberia and we're a successful business family in Panama. We had that side of the street and the social life and the close family life. The Panamanians have a very close family life. Um, and they do things with their kids. Even when the kids were growing up all the time and we had that going and so are kids.

00:24:35.580 - 00:24:51.580

Had that bond, their grandmother, who was a Panamanian, and their cousins, who were Panamanian and my kids all grew up completely bilingual, which was just a wonderful thing for them with no accent at all. The only way you could do that is to learn it when you're growing up.

00:24:51.580 - 00:25:10.520

Really. We had to connect the best of the Canal zone life as time went by and I grew higher in the organization. Um, life got pretty good and I got better housing and the best of the Canal Zone life. But I could get up and go across into Panama anytime I wanted to, which is something a lot of zone Ian's didn't dio.

00:25:10.530 - 00:25:27.840

Ah, lot of them didn't go into Panama. Uh, much like some military stuck on American bases overseas and don't mix with locals. And I think they lose a lot when they don't do that. And then toward the last six or seven years of my career, there I was.

00:25:27.840 - 00:25:49.670

In addition to those two pieces of the perspective, I was also, um, assigned diplomatic immunity. I carried a diplomatic passport, so I had the protection that that carried, and so did my Panama did wife. Now she was a US citizen by that time, but also Panamanian citizens.

00:25:49.640 - 00:26:08.740

So she was a U S diplomat in her own country, which meant we could do things like shop at the military commissaries and the military PXs, which were not all that great. But it gave us access to things that some others didn't have. So she she still remembers it as the best of three lives.

00:26:08.750 - 00:26:26.340

It was just a wonderful thing for us and and for our kids to grow up that way. Well, I was listening to the interview with Mr Crazy, which I had mentioned earlier, and I thought it was really interesting because he described his time in the canal zone, Um, as a 32 year vacation with pay.

00:26:26.530 - 00:26:50.410

Yes, he did to me, too, when I interviewed the same words. I think that's his. That's his his standard phrase, But I wondered how you would compare your experience for me. It was a 26 year vacation. I'm not a vacation because I valued my work too much, and I put a lot of effort in time into my work and into my jobs.

00:26:50.420 - 00:27:08.250

It was a 26 year peace, or almost 26 years, for May 25 a half piece of paradise I could not imagine a better place to live or raise my kids. Uh, and I have been a lot of places in the world and there was no better place.

00:27:08.250 - 00:27:35.630

And of course, that's all gone and you can't go back. And there's no hasn't been a canal zone since 1979 and that's when things changed completely. It all became integrated into Panama, but I would. I agreed with Leo crazies a completely It was paradise. Okay, maybe before I definitely like to talk more with you about what happened after 1979.

00:27:35.640 - 00:27:59.210

But maybe before we do that, I'd like to hear more about what kind of work you were doing in Panama. I was reviewing your resume, and I noticed that you held a number of different positions. So maybe you could kind of explain how you where you started in 1965 and then sort of this thing is an area where some of the older Zonen's will differ from me.

00:27:59.210 - 00:28:24.030

And with May, I learned when I went there that the Panama Canal Organization was a relatively small agency. As US government agencies go, it numbered about 15,000 people and that's small. When you're looking at a General Services Administration that was 40,000 people at that time or any of the large agencies in the United States.

00:28:24.030 - 00:28:42.070

They were all bigger than the Panama Canal. But the Panama Canal did everything from a to Z from birth to death, ran all the government activities, ran all the same activities that any government agency in the United States runs and in addition, paid its own way.

00:28:42.340 - 00:28:59.170

I don't know if Leo brought that out, but that was an important point for many of us. It was the only government agency at the time that paid 100% of its own, built with the revenues that we brought in from the shipping and and other things that we did.

00:28:59.170 - 00:29:21.320

We were the water company. We were the electric company, uh, in many cases for part of Panama to and we were required by law, United States law to pay our own way. So there was a pride there that we had to run it like a business even though it was a government agency and we were all government employees in the government civil service system.

00:29:21.330 - 00:29:41.790

Uh, we had to pay our own way completely, and therefore in a small organization that had to pay its own way. I didn't want to get into a slot and get so far into a corner that there was nowhere for me to move job wise. And I saw that happened to a lot of people.

00:29:41.800 - 00:30:05.550

They would get into a particular professional type job, um, or engineering type job, whatever. It was their career field waas because they liked that that niche, and then all of a sudden, within three or four years, there was nowhere for them to go. They couldn't go any higher because they had reached the pinnacle of that little niche, and they were to hire, to go sideways, to go laterally into some other field.

00:30:05.540 - 00:30:21.880

So I decided from the start, um, that I would move around from the first time I joined the organization. I went up a couple grades and I moved to another job and I went up a couple grades and I moved to another job and so on, which is why I got to the very top.

00:30:21.890 - 00:30:38.570

It really is. Plus, I had some good people along the way that helped me and mentored me. But I did not want to end up, um at the mid level in that organization and then not be able to go any higher because I had put blinders on myself.

00:30:38.740 - 00:31:01.050

I kept moving around, unfortunately with my education, and I picked up a master's degree along the way from Florida State University in public administration and that combination, Um, Andi, I think the foresight of being of moving around within a small organization and not getting stuck somewhere going up the line got me Thio.

00:31:01.040 - 00:31:24.600

What was what they called a bureau director general services director of the Panama Canal, which meant I reported to the agency head, um, my last. I think it was 3.5 years I was the general services director and procurement. Exactly. I never would have gotten there, had I not and flexible and moved from job to job, and you'll notice probably in my in my resume.

00:31:24.600 - 00:31:43.800

I worked in different fields, and I like to joke and say I couldn't hold a job long in any field. Well, I didn't wanna hold a job long in any field was what it waas. So when you when you started. I know you were explained to me about the three hour long interview and things like that.

00:31:43.800 - 00:32:02.540

But what did you I didn't realize that was unusual. Sometimes around your baby, baby. Yeah, well, you never know, because I didnt. Months later, some of the people said you spent. How long With Mr Dolan? Hey, never spends that law. He never interviews people himself anyway.

00:32:02.550 - 00:32:22.930

And he spent all afternoon with you, and I began to realize that he was He had done that to pick my brain to because of my background. Onda he liked toe hire an occasional outsider. He didn't like the inbred of the Panama Canal organization. He wanted outsiders coming in and new blood.

00:32:22.940 - 00:32:46.400

And that's what I represented to him. I didn't realize at the time, but on due to the 3rd and 4th generations onions who were already in place, some of whom I would go right on past. I represented a threat. And I could feel that too. When you're in a place like the canal zone in 1965 1970.

00:32:46.410 - 00:33:13.790

If the inbred group doesn't like you, they let you know it really fast. And I learned pretty fast that the only way around that or the only way to deal head on with that was to mix with them socially, do things with them, play baseball, play softball, get the kids involved with their kids, doing things socially, don't put myself off by the side so that give them a chance to pick me up.

00:33:13.800 - 00:33:38.360

Become, become almost one of them. Um, but without the what I consider the inborn prejudices of zone IANS, which waas an interesting change for May. Well, how did your if you're okay talking about this how your ideas experiencing, um, security and counterintelligence, Um, in the army.

00:33:38.360 - 00:33:58.400

How That sort of prepared you for what you ended up doing in the canal zone. The many different positions that you had because involved in counter intelligence and the army, Believe it or not, um was a lot of psychology learning how and why people do things.

00:33:58.940 - 00:34:22.190

Um, learning how they cover up for things, learning how to deal with people. I think that helped tremendously. No matter what field I would have gone into eventually, but particularly in the canal zone and in the Panama Canal. Um, I had dreams at one time of staying in the intelligence field as a career.

00:34:22.200 - 00:34:41.390

But my time in Germany and what was going on during the Cold War in the early sixties from 1960 to 65 changed my mind completely on that one. It was a pretty dirty business to be in in the early sixties, Um, when the wall went up in Berlin.

00:34:41.400 - 00:34:59.270

Um, I don't know if you've read the history of that. In all it was we almost went to war with the Russians at that moment. Um, I was attached to the battle group. The President Kennedy sent up the autobahn, uh, to keep the auto bomb through East Germany open.

00:34:59.940 - 00:35:15.110

And that battle group was strung out over about a 10 mile period with Russian tanks sitting on each side of the autobahn, pointing at it. That was that was a hairy moment. It was really tricky. It was interesting. And it was fun to look back on what?

00:35:15.110 - 00:35:41.630

It was one of the interesting things in my short lived career in Army counterintelligence. Well, when you what year did you say that you became the General Service Director General? Yeah. General Services Director was the highest job I held. It was a bureau director reporting to the agency had And when did I get Let's say I retired.

00:35:41.630 - 00:36:38.840

And 1990 89 18 eighties late 1986 or early 87? And before that I had been the deputy to that position four or five years. So I was in the same office you were well prepared by. Was their incision exactly? I see. Well, maybe we could talk about, um, the 1979 Treaty and maybe your involvement in that or just what was going on at that time, if that's all right in those last year's of my state and Panama 1987 88 89 up to 1990 was a growing period of serious tension between the military dictatorship that was running Panama.

00:36:38.850 - 00:37:07.660

Um, who originally was headed, which originally was headed by Omar Torrijos. And then when he was killed in an airplane crash mysteriously, uh, Manuel Noriega became the military dictator of Panama, and Manuel Noriega was a fascinating guy. Um, still is to this day, I would imagine, although I don't speak French and he's in a French prison, so I'll never know again.

00:37:08.270 - 00:37:33.680

Um, there was severe tension between Noriega and his thugs and the regime in Washington, which was President Bush, one Bush senior. And it was kind of interesting because Noriega had once been Bush's man in Panama when Bush was the head of CIA and Noriega was on everybody's payroll.

00:37:33.780 - 00:38:00.240

He was on the Soviet payroll, the Cuban payroll, Washington's payroll, France. And he s so he was a I used to think of him as an old fashioned telephone switchboard. I called him the switchboard. He was switched into people in all these countries, and what he did was he would pass information from one to the others and then from one to the others and get paid for it.

00:38:00.520 - 00:38:26.450

He was everybody switchboard, and all he was doing was passing intelligence around among all these people. This was long before the drug thing became what it eventually waas. And he was noted for this and he became very wealthy doing this, socked his money away in Spain on Dominican Republic and got more and more independent and gutsy as time went by, did not think he had to count out to anybody.

00:38:26.460 - 00:38:47.520

He was a killer, a street killer. Um, there. That's not I'm not making that went off. I mean, that is proven. And he scared the hell out of everybody, and he simply ran the country. And he took what he wanted and got rid of who he wanted to get rid off and was pushing, pushing, pushing.

00:38:47.530 - 00:39:09.560

Um, and we went through about a two year period there, uh, severe pressure, for example, as it as it reflected on me. When I became the general services director, I went immediately on his hit list, close to the top. I was number three on the list of 33 I was quite proud of that.

00:39:09.570 - 00:39:23.870

A zit turned out, and people wonder how we knew where we were on the list. He made sure we got the list. That was part of the way he psychologically that was part of the way. He didn't have any formal psychology courses. He didn't have to.

00:39:23.870 - 00:39:47.910

He was street smart. He grew up on the streets of Panama. Counterintelligence, Probably. Well, yeah, that's what he was. He was in charge of intelligence for all of all the Panama to before he became the the leader with self appointed general. Um, he made things harder and harder, particularly on the Panamanian civilians who worked for the Panama Canal.

00:39:47.920 - 00:40:11.650

He wouldn't renew their driver's licenses. He wouldn't allow them to cash their checks. He wouldn't he just push, push, push to make life tough for them, which in turn made it harder for the Americans to run the canal. But he stayed away from putting pressure on American civilians working for the canal on interesting psychological ploy.

00:40:12.110 - 00:40:32.940

Put all the pressure on. Of course, there were more Panamanians and there were us. By that time, there were, uh it dropped from 15,000 down to about 10,000 when the canal zone functions disappeared in 1979. So running the canal itself took about 10,000 people, and by that time 9000 of them were Panamanian.

00:40:32.910 - 00:40:50.680

And every day he made it tough for them to come to work. Tough for them. Thio buy a house tough for them to do anything, even even drive their own cars around Panama, and he would sit back and laugh about it, and he also kept the pressure up on the U.

00:40:50.680 - 00:41:15.690

S. Military, which George Bush didn't like and it was going to come to a head, there was no doubt about it. And there were a Siris of practice invasions, if you will exercises on a small scale over a one year period, and Noriega thought that that that was everyone was always going to be a practice, that the real thing would never come.

00:41:15.690 - 00:41:39.590

The Americans never had the guts to invade Panama, he thought, and any sense of publicly on gun. Of course, the big one came. The one that wasn't the practice came on the night of December 19 slash 2019 89 early in the morning on the 20th. It actually by Mistake's, started an hour or two early on that cost a few lives.

00:41:39.600 - 00:41:57.450

But that was a fascinating night. In the in. The history of Panama on git was like one of those things where if you were there, you will never forget that the wrist everybody remembers what they were doing when, nine when the when the planes flew into the buildings and on 9 11, same thing in Panama, but you were there the night of the invasion.

00:41:57.450 - 00:42:19.900

You know, you could picture in your mind know exactly what you were doing, Um, my wife and I were home. My daughter was home from college and attending a Christmas party of other college, um, young adults, but fortunately, it was close to a U. S military base in the former Canal Zone area.

00:42:19.910 - 00:42:37.840

It was not off in Panama City somewhere where it would have been difficult. Thio. No, she was all right. And most of them were there that night. I think there were close to 200 of the young college people who were home were at this same party, which meant that the U.

00:42:37.840 - 00:42:58.310

S. Army put a barricade around that little town site and kept them safe for the next three days of four days. Which was wonderful. Uh, unfortunately, the fella she went out there with that night wasn't so lucky. He was the young man who's had been the quarterback of the high school football team, and he picked her up to take her out to that party.

00:42:58.900 - 00:43:14.370

And I said I didn't know there was going to be an invasion. None of us did that night. We knew it was inevitable where we didn't know it was coming that night. But I had a bad feeling. And I said, Be careful tonight with your driving and don't go anywhere.

00:43:14.370 - 00:43:40.910

You shouldn't go. I have a bad feeling about tonight. Well, when he got out to this was about 10 miles from where we lived. He started pretty heavy with the beer. Andi, he got loaded. And when the invasion started, he turned into the macho hero, jumped in his Volkswagen his beetle, and drove out to the main highway, which by that time had roadblocks set up on it by U.

00:43:40.910 - 00:43:57.930

S army roadblocks. And he ran the first roadblock. They told him to stop there, standing there with machine guns, and he ran right on through it because he didn't know who they were. Good guys or bad guys. They radioed ahead to the next roadblock. He didn't make it through that one.

00:43:58.000 - 00:44:14.690

And his poor little beetle. Volkswagen was shot with 50 caliber, 50 caliber machine gun bullets. And so was he. And he was He was one of the first casualties at night. Uh, she didn't know that my daughter, because she was back at you know where the party had been held.

00:44:14.700 - 00:44:33.890

Um, but she found out a few days later, she spent three days out at that location safely. And we were in our house, Um, and about one in the morning came a soft knocked at the front door. Now, as I mentioned, I had been number three on the hit list.

00:44:34.080 - 00:44:51.810

Now Number three on the hit list in those days meant that one of his specially trained hit squads who worked directly for Noriega and there were eight or nine of them. And they were eight man hit squads trained by United States Special Forces to kidnap people in time of war.

00:44:52.190 - 00:45:09.730

And they were specially trained and given this hit list and said, This is the priority and they were assigned Who to go get should there ever be an invasion? Or should anybody ever come in to try and get Noriega? Their job was to go out and get us first and hold us against him.

00:45:10.090 - 00:45:28.930

Um, and so I was pretty sure that I was high enough on the list that I was going to get a hit squad that night. All about one o'clock, I got a squad from the 101st United States Airborne Division, Army Airborne Division a squad of about 12 guys and one gal.

00:45:29.590 - 00:45:49.790

It was never publicized. There were. There were females in the war there, too, in combat. And they said, We're going to go around on your back porch on. We're gonna wait because we understand there's ahead Squad coming for you. We want you and your wife to get down on the floor, Get under the bed.

00:45:49.800 - 00:46:05.410

Well, you can't get under a bed That's only this far off the floor. And put anything on you that you have for protection like a like a bullet resistant vast amounts safety, help anything, really, and just stay down on the floor because there's gonna be a firefight.

00:46:05.980 - 00:46:34.410

And sure enough, about 20 minutes and we were down on the floor and we were whispering through the windows to them. They were across my back porch, which was about 20 yards long overlooking the backyard, which was about 10 ft lower, and up through the backyard came the eighth man hit squad with automatic weapons dressed in US uniforms, US fatigues with US weapons, and fortunately, the good guys had night vision glasses.

00:46:34.420 - 00:46:55.230

The bad guys didn't and all the lights have been turned off or shot out during the invasion during the initial stages of the invasion. And there was a firefight in my backyard about 1 41 45 in the morning. Automatic fire in both directions. And of course, bullets sing enough.

00:46:55.240 - 00:47:10.910

All the windows in Panama have bars on them. And so the bullets were zinging enough. That was the problem. Ricochets. They couldn't fire directly into the windows because of the angle of attack from the lower long. But they were hitting the the bars and you never knew where the ricochets would go.

00:47:11.050 - 00:47:26.140

So bullets were flying everywhere and we just stayed down on the floor. And it seemed, of course, when you're in a fight like that, that it lasts forever. It was It was over in less than two minutes, I'm sure. And I went outside and I said, You get them all He said, Yes, sir.

00:47:26.150 - 00:47:48.280

We're all dead in your backyard. Any of any of you heard? Not at all. But the lady would like to come in and use your restroom. E blamer. I'm sure you were happy. Yeah, exactly. And I went out in the morning at six o'clock when the sun came up and watched him put all the bodies in the body bags, and they were all in us battle uniforms.

00:47:48.290 - 00:48:10.720

Now they made a serious mistake. When the U. S goes to war, they so the American flag on the right hand shoulder and you'll notice that from anybody anybody going or coming from Iraq or Afghanistan right now to this day has an American flag here. Anybody who doesn't have the American flag is not going to a battle zone or coming from a battle.

00:48:10.720 - 00:48:25.690

So you'll see that, like in the Atlanta airport, the bad guys didn't know they were supposed to have American flags. They had stolen us uniforms, but they didn't know and all the good guys did have it. So you could tell the bad guys from the good guys and they threw them all in body bags.

00:48:25.670 - 00:48:44.310

No, I d didn't have any idea who any of them or cardinal way and trucks. Um, that was my experience with the Meanwhile, of course, our troops were out hunting for Noriega for two days and night. Three days and nights in Panama finally found him, took him to the States.

00:48:44.330 - 00:49:10.910

Uh um And then there was after the United after the United States completely got rid of the Panamanian military force, which had been the military dictatorship of Panama for years. By that time, there was complete anarchy in Panama for several years after that on I don't know which was worse the military dictatorship or the anarchy.

00:49:11.170 - 00:49:32.070

But that's when I left. I didn't leave because of that. I had planned to leave at that time anyway, because in 1990 the administrator of the Panama Canal who had been a United States general who was my boss for 10 years the last 10 years that I was there and a wonderful boss he was leaving.

00:49:32.070 - 00:49:55.390

He had to leave, and he was gonna be replaced by a Panamanian administrator of the U. S. Agency, Panamanian non U. S. Citizen for its last 10 years. And so I decided by that time I had well over 30 years of government service, and I decided it was a good time for me to leave Thio and turn my job over to the Panamanian who had been in training for a walk.

00:49:55.870 - 00:50:21.790

So I left in January of 1991 just after the invasion. Did you know other people that had similar experiences that might have been on Noriega's hit list? Yes, one was Joe. Would somebody in your organization will be interviewing if you haven't already? Joe is the president of the Panama Canal Museum has been for years, and Joe was a compatriot of mine.

00:50:21.760 - 00:50:43.640

Um uh, University of Florida graduate. My goodness, couldn't pick the right school, would kid each other a lot about that. Joe was high on the hit list, too, As I recall, he was number four, number five, pretty high up. And he had a protective squad come to his house just like I did.

00:50:44.010 - 00:51:03.290

And I knew a few others who did, too. But I don't know anybody else who had a firefight, actually in his backyard. I know that the other hit squads were successful in capturing some of the people, but not Panama Canal people. Not everybody on the list was Panama Canal.

00:51:03.300 - 00:51:24.240

There were some businessmen, or at least they said they were businessmen in downtown Panama and there were some Smithsonian Institute people, of all things scientists. I don't know from what reason in the world they were on the hit list, but one of those was captured and one businessman and was captured downtown.

00:51:24.240 - 00:51:40.950

They lived in apartment buildings in Panama City. They had no protection. Nobody came to protect them. And they were. They were taken. They were kidnapped. Um, some very interesting stories there. One of them was killed that night by the hit squad that took him because he was fighting them all the time.

00:51:41.160 - 00:52:07.770

And they finally got tired of it and shot him. Another one who was fluent in Spanish or Smithsonian Scientist of all things who you wouldn't think would have this kind of street smart. Um, talk to the leader of the hit squad all night long in Spanish, almost like the like the Oslo effect and before the night was over had turned him around completely.

00:52:07.870 - 00:52:29.470

And when the sun rose the next morning, he marched the hit squad that had captured him in, and they turned themselves over to the U. S. Army unit in the area. That is unbelievable. That's one smart guy. Saved his own life. Um, but I don't know of anybody else in the canal who actually had a hit squad come for them.

00:52:31.250 - 00:52:56.850

Okay. E and I also did not know that we were going to be furnished protection by the United States Army. That was part of their invasion plan. I'm sure that was a pleasant surprise, though. I know. Well, yeah, I know that there was some involvement of people in Washington, and some people believe the word in advance that you ought to take care of these people that are on the head schooling.

00:52:56.860 - 00:53:16.770

But it was all done behind the scenes and back channel. And so when they came knocking on my door, I said, Thank god you're here. Yeah. Huh. Yeah. Well, would you like to take a break for a minute? A couple minutes. This is Nicole Cox. I am resuming my interview with Mr Morgan.

00:53:17.150 - 00:53:39.130

Okay, Mr Morgan, one of the things that we hadn't talked about, and I know that way sort of skipped around some. And I, um, kind of got you off topic onto the will of the 1980 stuff. But I wondered if you could talk more about what was happening in 1979 and some of the transition issues that occurred after that.

00:53:39.140 - 00:54:12.070

Sure, um, in 1977 President Jimmy Carter signed a treaty with the military dictator of Panama, Omar Torrijos. General Omar Torrijos. Self appointed Um, and the treaty was just barely ratified by the United States Senate by one vote and also ratified by the population of Panama, but not overwhelmingly and was to take effect in 1979.

00:54:12.140 - 00:54:35.980

Now that meant a lot of things had to happen in less than two years for that treaty to take effect in 79 because a lot of activities were going to disappear or be transferred to Panama or to the U. S military in that short period. Um, in fact, according to his treaty, the original transition period was one year.

00:54:35.980 - 00:54:56.420

But Senator DeConcini from Arizona or New Mexico, Arizona, New Mexico, I'm not sure Dennis DeConcini objected and said, The only way you're going to get my boat is if you extend that transition period to two years because it's impossible to do it all in one year.

00:54:56.430 - 00:55:27.420

And so that's how the two year period, That's how the one year period turned into a two year transition and he was absolutely right. There was it, barely all got done in two years, um, one of the things that was gonna happen was that the ports and the railroad, the Panama Railroad, which had run since 18 55 was the first transcontinental railroad in North America or anywhere in the Americas was going to transfer to Panama and all the ports port activities we're gonna transfer to Panama.

00:55:27.430 - 00:55:50.000

They had previously been operated by the Panama Canal Company. Um, this was a huge thing because they were the logistical backbone of the canal. All the goods that were brought into panel while were brought into the ports and everything that crossed the isthmus of Panama from one side to the other, went on the railroad, and these were to be turned over to Panama, which met in that two year period.

00:55:50.010 - 00:56:09.690

The Panamanian management had to be trained in how to run them. Um, some of this training fell to the activity that I was working at at the time. Um, logistical training supply system, how to run a railroad, how to supply it, how to run ports. They didn't have a clue.

00:56:09.700 - 00:56:28.750

And so a lot of the training had to be done, uh, to novice Panamanian managers, if you will. Who didn't have a clue on what they were gonna have to dio, um, it was complicated by the fact that Panama's political system at the time was 100% the spoils system.

00:56:29.430 - 00:56:54.810

So that way started out training one national port director and his staff, which was primarily his in laws and his friends. And we would get about three months into that and he would be fired and all of his in laws and friends would be fired and then would come an entirely new national ports director appointed by the by the military by the dictator.

00:56:55.170 - 00:57:12.500

And he would bring in all his relatives and staff because that's the way it is, or waas in Panama in those days, you stole a Muchas you could as fast as you could, because your time wasn't gonna last very long. And then we would retrain the next Bert for six months aan den.

00:57:12.510 - 00:57:31.960

He would be fired because he would get crosswise with the General and then somebody else would be appointed an all new people with the ports. This this change over a personnel happened three times with the railroad. I think it happened twice, maybe three times, and we finally just shrugged our shoulders and gave up.

00:57:32.130 - 00:57:54.580

It was impossible to train people to run a railroad and and the national ports of a of a nation if they were not going to be in the job more than two or three or four months and all their cronies would be would be fired along with, um, this was a major problem in trying to carry out our mission of training Panamanians to take over what they were going to take over.

00:57:55.060 - 00:58:23.460

And it was pretty much a disaster and did. And it set a mental tone stage for people like myself about Oh, my God, is this the way it's gonna be when the canal turns over? Why is it gonna be any different? It's just the way they operate, the things we that were turned over like garbage collection, a lot of grounds keeping a lot of buildings, maintenance and buildings that turned over just absolutely fell apart.

00:58:23.820 - 00:58:44.170

Things regressed to the jungle. It is the tropics. And if you don't have, if you don't maintain something, it'll fall apart in no time at all, or turned to mold. And this is what happened with activity after activity after activity that was turned over during the during that interim period transition period.

00:58:44.170 - 00:59:16.350

Right around 1979. Um, when the canals on ceased to exist on September 30th, 1979. Then all of a sudden there were no more Canal Zone police. There was a joint transition force where X Canal zone police still had jobs, still wore uniforms, and we're riding side by side with Panamanian soldiers who were learning how to be policemen for the first time in their lives.

00:59:16.440 - 00:59:41.580

They were Noriega's troops, and they called that a joint police activity. And that lasted for, as I recall, 18 months. And then the U. S. Was gone completely from the police force. After that, after 1980 and 81 our neighborhood police force in what used to be the Canal zone, was Noriega's thugs troops on.

00:59:41.580 - 01:00:02.400

I'll never forget that About the time the hitless came out, one of their major missions was to surveil me and Joe Wood and other managers of the canal. On an almost daily basis. They would sit in front of my house in their car, smile at me and wave or give me another up seeing sign.

01:00:02.410 - 01:00:18.790

Look at their watch to make sure that I knew that they were checking what time I was leaving for work. Film me on a camera. I'm actually a motion picture of moving camera walking to my house to the office or driving from my house to the office.

01:00:18.800 - 01:00:38.940

If I walked, it was 10 minutes to my office. If I drove, it was two minutes and then follow me to my office and fill me getting out and their hope. But they didn't have to tell me anything. Their whole point. Waas We know exactly where you live, what time you go to work, what route you take and when you get there and any time we want to grab you Weaken Grab you What?

01:00:38.950 - 01:00:59.470

It was all non verbal and they did this to several of the high ranking managers of the canal. Purposely by direction, I'm sure from Noriega to keep us on edge to keep us nervous, to keep us scared. And I remember when the hit list did come out and Noriega made sure we got a copy.

01:00:59.480 - 01:01:17.720

A couple of the managers of the Panama Canal who were whose names were on that list did exactly what he wanted. They quit. They retired early and got out of there, and they said I didn't I I didn't sign up for a career of the canal from being, ah, hostage of Noriega.

01:01:17.730 - 01:01:36.330

And so that was the kind of atmosphere we lived in. And meanwhile, things began to get tougher on the Panamanian employees of the canal, and we had to cope with that. In some cases, we had to find bus transportation for them. We had Thio provide food packages for them.

01:01:36.330 - 01:01:54.660

In some cases, Um, when Panama actually went off, there was no cash in the country for a period of about six months, except the cash brought in by the United States, the Panama Canal and the military and Panama's currency is the dollar. And so there had to be cash.

01:01:54.910 - 01:02:13.810

The entire country, including much of what the canal did and what the people who work for the canal did, went on the barter system. You provide a service to may I provide a service to you and we barter. And this is how it was just amazing how people coped with a no no money available system.

01:02:14.500 - 01:02:42.440

Um life was very difficult during those years, and it was difficult first, because the Noriega regime pain and difficulty. But secondly, because the Bush regime in response, uh, put sanctions on the Noriega regime and made life tough for everybody down there, um, the things that did turn over early in 1979 for the most part fell apart.

01:02:42.720 - 01:03:06.540

Um turned just just did not operate well at all. And the people who operated them stole in many cases, everything they could so that by the end of the 19 eighties, there was no Panama Railroad in existence any longer. Uh, the trains didn't run anymore, and many of the cars have burned.

01:03:06.550 - 01:03:23.980

They decided to burn the grass one day in the rail yard because they didn't have machinery to cut it anymore. Well, they didn't realize when they burn the grass that would burn the boxcars, and then the boxcars would burn the creosote in the in the ties and the entire railroad was out of out of business.

01:03:23.990 - 01:03:44.830

Within nine years of being turned over to Panama, the ports were so decrepit and falling apart that they were dangerous, and ships stopped stopping in Panama Cruise ships and cargo ships that previously had stopped there for refueling and for taking on provisions and for delivering cargo and would not stop in Panama.

01:03:44.830 - 01:04:05.840

It was just too dangerous, so everything was just falling apart as a result of this. And we looked back and said What we said about Jimmy Carter's treaty in the beginning is true in spades. And why are they ever going to run the canal any differently when they get it on the last day of 1999 than they have these other activities?

01:04:05.850 - 01:04:28.520

So it was pretty plain upfront that this did wasn't working at all. And in retrospect now, many years later, I think it was primarily because of the military dictatorship and the fact that they were all a bunch of thugs and thieves and killers, and all they wanted to do was toe robbed as fast as they could as much as they could.

01:04:28.530 - 01:04:49.300

Meanwhile, theme United States mission and those of us who the 1000 of us reducing by at least 100 every year who were left there, who decided to stay on to make it work. Our job was to keep the canal operating through the midst of all this and trained Panamanian managers to replace us.

01:04:50.190 - 01:05:16.500

So that was our major mission for that period 1979 to 1999 in the middle of which came the invasion of Panama and a complete change in government. So it was a ah period that really wasn't well understood in the United States. And there wasn't as much press coverage is, in my opinion as there should have been about how this whole thing it happened almost in 10 year increments.

01:05:16.500 - 01:05:37.580

In 79 the Canal Zone ceased to exist in 89. The invasion of Panama in 99 the canal, the entire thing transferred to Panama on and I expected disaster. And and so did just about every zone. And you will ever talk, Thio because the first few things were disaster.

01:05:37.590 - 01:05:56.710

Why would we expect any different? Um, one of the questions that I had on this is just kind of your perspective. E guess throughout the time that you were there, what role did the canal agency play with the government of Panama? Um but with the U.

01:05:56.710 - 01:06:20.430

S. Military with the U. S. Embassy, those sorts of things, it was the strangest relationship I have seen anywhere in the world, and I have lived in Europe, and I have traveled pretty much pretty widely throughout the world. It was almost like a ah four headed group.

01:06:20.450 - 01:06:46.660

Number one. The United States ambassador and the embassy supposedly are in charge of all American interests in every country in which they are located. And it's true everywhere in the world. Um, for example, if there's if there's a major difference between the ambassador and the commanding general of the Army unit in Germany, Thea Ambassador takes precedence.

01:06:46.670 - 01:07:08.740

He is the head of the United States interests in that country, and that's true throughout the world. And so every ambassador who came to Panama thought that that's the way it should be in Panama, because that's the way it is everywhere else. However, the governor of the Canal Zone when there was a canal zone was equal to the governor of a state, and he did not.

01:07:08.740 - 01:07:38.540

He he treated the ambassador politely. They treated each other politely, but one of them did not tell the other one want to dio and because that canal Zone situation was in place from 1903 until 1979. That attitude was very hard to change. And so even after 79 when there was no more Canal Zone and no more governor, the Panama Canal people acted toward the embassy and the ambassador the same way they always had, you know, were equal to you.

01:07:38.540 - 01:08:01.580

You don't tell us what to dio. All of a sudden. Overnight, he had the right to tell us what to dio for America to protect American interests in Panama. So that didn't work well at all. Then the third entity was the United States military. From my perspective, they acted 100% independently and on their own they did whatever they wanted.

01:08:01.970 - 01:08:21.890

Whatever the four star general said they did, it didn't matter if they lived on military basis or not. They followed their orders from their chain of command and many of the years I was there. The four star whoever he happened to be the general in charge had no time toe waste with the ambassador of the United States.

01:08:22.370 - 01:08:43.790

Hey, he he and the governor or he and the administrator of the Panama Canal always got along because they had a joint military background. Both of them came from a similar background. So they got along okay. Generally speaking, neither one of them got along very well with the United States Ambassador some of the time.

01:08:44.070 - 01:09:02.960

And then the fourth entity, of course, was the government of Panama, which for all of those years from 19 from the mid seventies on, was a military dictator who got along with anybody or nobody. Whoever he cared Thio and his. And when it was Noriega Andi, I understand.

01:09:02.960 - 01:09:24.010

One of his pet peeves was he had to drive along that beautiful Avenida Balboa by Panama Bay to get to his office every morning. And they had to look straight out the front of his car at a mountain standing up at the end of that Avenida Balboa, about two miles down at the end of the bay with the biggest American flag in the world flying from the top of it from Quarry Heights.

01:09:24.020 - 01:09:42.280

And it was a super large flag, and that that started his day every morning. You could imagine how he felt when he got the work and he was so anti American constantly, um, he hated the U. S. Military he hated the U. S. Ambassador. He put up with the canal.

01:09:42.870 - 01:10:02.430

I'm not sure why he was softer with us than he was with the others on Guy never really figured out what the reason could be, but he was never a pleasant fellow to begin with. So here are four different entities, no, two of whom are really friends with the others.

01:10:02.440 - 01:10:25.030

And it made life more difficult during this particular period of time during the 20 year transition, when we were supposed to be training Panamanians to run the canal and there were fewer and fewer US managers there because they would leave when they could. I've never seen the likes of that anywhere in the world.

01:10:25.160 - 01:10:39.300

Well, when you decided to leave, was it in 19 nineties that? Yeah, I I decided to leave in 1989. I stayed on a couple of extra months until my boss left, and then I was going. I was going to leave when he left the same day.

01:10:39.760 - 01:11:06.400

But we both got delayed because of the invasion on December 20th. Well, what was it like? Toe leave? Did you have mixed feelings about it? How did you how Did you feel, um, for me? Personally, um, it was a huge relief because of the pressures that have been that I've been living through, especially the previous three years.

01:11:06.410 - 01:11:25.570

Um, I felt very strongly that if I hadn't left, then they would have carried me out of there in a box. My wife, on the other hand, was devastated by leaving She, you know, living through these bad times and all. Didn't bother her at all. She was leaving her family and her country.

01:11:25.580 - 01:11:46.200

And we still differ on that to this day. Um, I had some recovery to do afterwards. Mental and physical. Several years, in other words, to straighten things out, get the blood pressure down, get y'all. And I still feel another year there would have killed May, but she wishes we hadn't left.

01:11:46.860 - 01:12:03.390

And now that a lot of North Americans have gone back to live there, she's exploring that idea with me from time to time. But not aggressively, because being a good Panamanian mama, she doesn't want to leave kids and grandkids, and most of them are around us in Florida.

01:12:03.350 - 01:12:22.410

Well, where did you Where did you go when you return? Well, We did some research for a year before we left. And a lot of research is a matter of fact in places, places to live in the United States. There are books on that, and we narrowed it down to three places and we visited the three places and the places where Austin, Texas.

01:12:23.650 - 01:12:49.500

Tallahassee, Florida and Sarasota, Florida. Um, by coincidence, all three college towns, two of them state capitals. Yep. And of the three, we liked Sarasota the best. It had the transportation toe, health facilities, the social life, the plays and, uh, and, uh, that kind of thing on.

01:12:49.500 - 01:13:09.200

It was a great location in a beautiful town. And and we selected Sarasota and moved there in January of 1990. And once again, we got lucky. It's still what it was then, and better at the other two places have gone downhill. Quite a bit, actually. They've overgrown their infrastructure.

01:13:09.210 - 01:13:30.180

How old were your Children when you returned at that time? Let me see. That's a tough question. I'm not sure how old they are now. E thebe boys, the older to, uh, we're living in the States with families of their own. By that time, and our daughter had just graduated from college.

01:13:30.190 - 01:13:51.550

Um and so she was 21 she was still living with us when we moved to Sarasota. What sort of work were you doing when you return from Sarasota? I noticed a few a few things on your resume. Their so Well, it's funny because I did not want to sit in first.

01:13:51.550 - 01:14:10.450

I was the county purchasing director for a year because they liked my background and purchasing, and they needed somebody right away to be the purchasing director. Uh, that was kind of interesting. Um ah. Huge difference from working at the federal level to working at a Florida County level.

01:14:10.440 - 01:14:31.410

Ah, lot more politics and a lot more local who, you know, type thing. And I didn't really enjoy it very much. So I quit after a year, and I was too young to sit and watch the grass grow like too many people in Florida dio I think I noticed in Sarasota a lot of retirees who sit and watch the grass grow and die.

01:14:31.420 - 01:14:48.570

I mean, the mind turns to mush, and it just doesn't work anymore. So I started to write a resume for the first time in how long was I with the government? 32 years counting. My military never had written a resume in 32 years. You had a lot to include.

01:14:48.580 - 01:15:11.510

So I started to write a resume and I got a phone call in the middle of the my resume. And it's from a It was from a gentleman who runs a training company in um in the Washington D. C area who had done a lot of training at the Panama Canal of our contracting people, including myself, and I had gotten to know him known him well.

01:15:11.510 - 01:15:26.570

But we have never spoken about work while I was still working for the government and on the phone, he said, How would you like to come up here and teach a class for me in government contracting? And I said, I've never taught a class and in anything he says That's all right, he says.

01:15:26.570 - 01:15:49.160

I know you'll be good at it and you know the subject. That's what I want. People who know the subject. Come on, give it a try, he says. I'll pay you and I'll watch you and we'll drop in on you Well Nobody watched me and nobody dropped in on May and he offered me a job after that one week up there being a con con government contracts trainer in about 10 different subject areas of government contracting.

01:15:49.330 - 01:16:15.940

And then I went off and got some training on how to be a trainer and that that was then a second career. I don't I never did that full time. I did it originally, maybe 15 times, 15 weeks a year, then 12 weeks a year. I still do that now, about 9 to 10 weeks a year, pretty much weeks of my choosing subjects of my choosing cities of my choosing anywhere in the country, because now I'm one of their senior instructors.

01:16:15.940 - 01:16:40.540

That's been 20 years now, and I enjoyed that immensely. And it's a wonderful company called Management Concepts, uh, incorporated one of the best known in the government training field, particularly in contracting. And to this day, uh, I've never had a written contract with him. It's always been verbal, and to this day I have not finished my resume.

01:16:40.550 - 01:17:05.560

E. I guess I never will. It must be getting pretty long. It not along the way at 19. I think this was in 1995 the Panama Canal Museum, of which I was a member of the board of directors at the time, Um, got a call looking for somebody who might be interested in lecturing on a cruise ship going through the Panama Canal.

01:17:06.030 - 01:17:29.650

And so we passed it around among the board members. Anybody interested? Anybody interested? And I said, What should visit? That they told me and I said, Yeah, I'm interested. So the museum past my name Thio this particular shipping line, which was called Crystal at the time Crystal Cruises and said Dick Morgan would be interested in doing this.

01:17:29.650 - 01:17:55.270

And here's his background at the canal. And so they took a chance on me with no tape, no rehearsal dough, Dothan just looking at my background and word from the museum, and I sailed on the crystal harmony and night. You know, it was 1993 or 94 for the first time through the Panama Canal.

01:17:55.380 - 01:18:12.660

As a lecturer. Now this is tough. You have you get a like a 12 day cruise or a 14 day cruise from one coast to the other through the Panama Canal and you have to give four lectures. Can you imagine that? 45 The 45 minute lectures?

01:18:12.720 - 01:18:33.630

A matter of fact, it isn't even 45 because they want you to leave 10 minutes for questions and answers on my favorite subject matter. Market out a lot of information to convince. Oh, yeah, four isn't nearly enough. I did. I did. I asked for two extra lectures on one ship, did six and still couldn't get enough in there and still packed.

01:18:33.780 - 01:18:57.840

Everybody. People who go on Canal cruises, they want to hear about the canal. So I have now done 25 lecture cruises, mostly crystal. But I've done a few other ships to Crystal now has two ships. The Crystal Symphony and the Crystal Serenity. There are six star ships, the best in the world, and they have outstanding lectures.

01:18:57.840 - 01:19:20.930

And I've met some of the most interesting people as fellow lectures on Crystal that I've been doing this. I do this three times a year. Um, I don't get paid. On the other hand, they don't either, so it's a wonderful thing to Dio and I generally give four lectures per cruise and, of course, answer questions throughout the ship from anybody at any time and talk about the canal in general.

01:19:21.320 - 01:19:39.690

It za neat thing to this, and that's probably my third career. If I'm working out of fourth, I don't know what the fourth back there. I know. We were talking earlier about some of the organized re unions for workers and families that lived in the Canal Zone.

01:19:39.700 - 01:20:09.380

Do you participate, Um, in these, or do you keep in touch with other with other people from the Canal Zone? Every year? The Panama Canal Society in the month of July in Orlando has a Panama Canal Re union. It lasts about four days and is just chock a block full of social activities and things to do and get togethers and lots of class reunions on I have been four times.

01:20:09.380 - 01:20:31.020

I think I never go two years in a row because there's an awful lot of Class re union bone home Marie type thing, and I didn't go to school there, and I'm not a zone in, and I'm like my kids are they go more often than I do, as a matter of fact, because I didn't grow up in the Canal zone, but I had them a Zeiss a four times.

01:20:31.030 - 01:20:53.950

I enjoyed them immensely when I do go, but I have to be selective about what activities I go because I wasn't part of the original click. Thanks, but they get between three and 4000 people at one of those reunions. That's amazing. It is amazing, and they have big dances, and it's just it's a fun thing.

01:20:55.310 - 01:21:25.850

There's no serious discussion, that serious business that is done at those those things. They're just fun. Um, I guess maybe my, maybe my final question, Um, how would you describe or evaluate Panama's management of the canal after 2000? Well, I guess I'm going to shock you now, after all that experience after all those failures.

01:21:25.860 - 01:21:48.630

But I watched from 1979 on, after all of my expectations that they would fail miserably once it became their responsibility. Um, I am happy to say that that was not true. That didn't happen. They've done an outstanding job of managing the canal since they took it over on December 31st, 1999.

01:21:48.640 - 01:22:06.400

I think there are some important reasons for that. Um, I talk I do talk about this in my lectures on cruise ships because it is evident to just about everybody going through the canal today that they are doing a good job. Um, canal waters. Time is down.

01:22:06.400 - 01:22:28.050

That's one of the metrics they use to measure. Uh, ship accident rate is down. Transit time is down. Um, they're putting through more cargo and more ships than ever in the history of the canal. It's something like between 14 and 15 0 ships a year now, which is much, much more than we ever did.

01:22:28.050 - 01:22:51.670

Even into the 19 nineties. Just about every measurement metric. There is shows an improvement since it was taken over 100% by Panamanians. There are no us left in the management of the canal. It all there are a few senior U. S pilots still working there on a individual contract basis for the agency that runs a canal.

01:22:51.670 - 01:23:25.030

But, um, that's because they're still training some of the younger pilots on most of the old timers. Air gone. There are no other us working for the canal. It all now there are some reasons for the canal organization, which is called the Panama Canal authority a C P out towards the Canal de Panama, Um is set up as an autonomous agency of Panama with no oversight from the politicians.

01:23:25.040 - 01:23:52.190

Neither the president or the Legislature can direct them what to do or interfere in their operation at all. And that's absolutely critical Thio to keep the canal a success in Panama because it's such a political country. It's an unbelievable place. One of the first things I learned in Panama, an old saying in Panama was, If you have four Panamanian politicians in the room, you have six parties represented.

01:23:52.250 - 01:24:11.700

At least they switch and move the bait and switch all the time. And everything is politics in Panama. Well, there are no politics that the Panama Canal it says politics free as it possibly can be. And that's by by organic law, supported by the Constitution of Panama.

01:24:11.710 - 01:24:37.480

Number two. The managers today are the same ones that that we trained in the 19 eighties and 1919 nineties on how to run the canal, and we trained them well and they are very serious and committed to continue doing a good job, and if it fails, it's not going to fail on their watch and that that's exactly how they have explained it to me now.

01:24:37.490 - 01:24:54.760

My problem with that is some of them are getting old now older, and they're going to be retiring soon, and I hope the spirit carries on with the next generation. But this generation says it's not going to fail on our watch. We're going to do everything is better than than the gringos did.

01:24:55.200 - 01:25:26.830

Not as good as but better. And I think number three, um, and I think this is evident every time I go there again on a cruise. It's still the best place to work in the country of Panama, and people are proud. Um, if anything else struck me, um, in the old Canal zone and even after the canal zone ceased to exist, right between the eyes, who was how proud the people were toe work for that organization on that same pride exist today.

01:25:26.830 - 01:25:40.410

Even though they're all Panamanians, it's the best place to work in Panama. Um, you can't get anybody to quit a job but the Panama Canal. If they get it, they hold on to it and it passes on to their son or their daughter. It's just a great place to work.

01:25:40.390 - 01:26:04.260

So there's There's some things working in its favor. It's not a typical government agency. Um, it's not just a job. It's really a way of life. Even though there's no longer a zone. And even though it's all Panamanian now, there's still that feeling. Well, Mr or I know we've taken up a lot of your time.

01:26:04.260 - 01:26:26.710

Were there? This is a pleasure for me to Were there any things, Um, you think that we've made me haven't addressed or for gotten or anything you'd like to add? I would just kind of end as I as I began by reminding you or other listeners of this that my perspective is somewhat different than that of a true zone.

01:26:26.710 - 01:26:46.010

Ian, you won't get some of the same observations from people who were born and raised there. You won't get some of the same observations from my own Children who were born and raised there because I Caymus an outsider on. Then I left, Um, but it was a wonderful 30.

01:26:46.020 - 01:27:03.860

Well, let's see 26 years, almost 26 year period of my life. And I am privileged to have lived and worked in Panama and for the Panama Canal Organization. All that time. Great people to work for and with great experience. Thank you again for sharing your experiences.

01:27:03.860 - 01:27:04.410

Thank you.