Woman Career Diplomat Reaches Top In U.S.

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30055, 13 February 1963, Page 2

Woman Career Diplomat Reaches Top In U.S.

Many distinctions have graced the long career of Frances E .Willis, a tall, slender woman with iron grey hair who has been United States Ambassador to Ceylon since 1961. One of the most highly-regarded officers in the American Foreign Service, Miss Willis has, for more than three decades, been blazing a trail for the career advancement of women in diplomacy.

Skilled in every aspect of her profession, Miss Willis has established a number of important precedents in the United States Foreign Service. She was the first woman to serve as acting-minister to a foreign country (Sweden, in 1932); the first woman to be appointed to Class One of the Foreign Service; and the first woman to achieve the rank of career minister. Last year the Senate confirmed her nomination to the highest rank and she became America’s first woman career ambassador.

"Career Minister’* and “Career Ambassador” are fairly recently established diplomatic grades. The Foreign Service Act of 1946 created the rank of career minister to be hdld by occupants of certain key positions in posts abroad and positions of top responsibility in the State Department The new class of career ambassador was created in 1955. Persons appointed to this rank must have served at least 15 years in a Government agency, including at least three years as a career minister, and have rendered exceptionally distinguished service to the Government. The National Civil Service League, a non-partisan citizens* organisation devoted to improving Federal government service, honoured Miss Willis, presenting her with one of its 1962 career service awards. These awards are given annually to the outstanding men and women in the Federal service. Misgivings Overcome In nominating Miss Willis for the award, the State Department said in its summary of her accomplishments: "Perhaps the greatest confirmation of Miss Willis’s outstanding performance in these important capacities is that, although the appointment of a woman as the United States ambassador initially had caused some misgivings in the countries of her assignment, her professional and personal qualities have quickly won the respect and admiration of both officials and public alike.” Frances Elizabeth Willis was born in Metropolis. Illinois, on May 20, 1899 After her graduation in 1920 from Stanford University in California, she did postgraduate work at the Universite Libre de Bruxelles in Belgium for a year. On her return to Stanford, where she received her doctorate in political science in 1923, she became a teacher and taught in two well-known women’s colleges—Goucher and Vassar —before entering the Foreign Service. Tact and Sincerity “It takes certain qualities to make a fair success in diplomacy,” Miss Willis says. "A diplomat's sex has nothing to do with it Mostly, I think, it takes adjustability. M intelligence and stability.” She believes that “the basis F of diplomacy is to be tactful and sincere at the same time.” In her 35 years with the State Department serving in different countries, she says she has never met resistance on the grounds of her sex—“or if there was any, it was concealed diplomatically.” Miss Willis joined the Foreign Service in 1927 with the idea that some actual ex-

perience in Government operations would be useful in her career as a college professor teaching political science.

“The more I taught, the more I realised how little I actually knew about gwemmenit,” she recalls. “Everything I taught was something I had read in a book. I decided to find out first-hand what it was like.” She has not—as yet~-re-turned to her original profession, for although she admits diplomatic life is neither glamorous nor easy, she believes it is “as interesting a life as it is humanly possible to have.” Also immensely rewarding is the feeling of being able to contribute toward the solution of some of the world’s problems, however small that contribution may be. Miss Willis says. Her first assignment was as vice-consul at Valparaiso, Chile in 1928. followed three years later by a transfer to the capital city of Santiago From there she was sent to Europe, where She served in increasingly responsible positions at Stockholm, Brussels, Madrid, London and Helsinki.

She also had a tour of duty in the State Department in Washington from 1944 to 1947, serving first as an assistant to the Under Secretary of State and then as assistant chief of the Division of Western European Affairs.

Miss Willis’s outstanding performance of political duties as a first secretary of the United States Embassy and Consulate at London, and the fact that she had shown executive talents, led the State Department to break tradition. In 1951, it promoted her to Class One of the career corps of the foreign service. With this promotion came her first executive appointment as deputy chief of the mission at Helsinki. First Ambassador

In 1953, President Eisenhower appointed Miss Willis to be United States Ambassador to Switzerland—the first time a woman in the Foreign Service had ever been appointed to an ambassadorship. Two other women had served as ambassadors and three as Ministers, but all were appointed from outside .the service. Miss Willis travelled through every canton of Switzerland, getting to know the people of the country Her friendliness, straightforward manner and dedication to her job soon earned her the liking and respect of the Swiss nation. She was promoted to the rank of career Minister in 1955. Two years later Miss Willis was appointed Ambassador to Norway. Her career has included two tours of duty at the United Nations. In 1955 she was consultant on European affairs to the United States

delegation to the tenth General Assembly. Jn 1960 she was a® alternate delegate to the fifteenth General Assembly. In 1961, President Kennedy selected her for nomination as ambassador to Ceylon. To Miss Willis, whose service had been mostly in Western Europe, Ceylon came as “a whole new world.” “I wouldn’t have missed it for anything,” she says.

Speaking of United States foreign policy, she says that one of its basic tenets is “the voluntary co-operation of other free nations which believe as we do, in liberty and the dignity of the individual.” The American Women's Association, a private organisation of business and professional women, gave her its 1955 award for eminent achievement. In her speech accepting the award, Miss Willis said: “One of the primary tasks which faces us in the middle of the twentieth century is to keep the free world united and strong so that Ihe liberties which we inherited may be passed on to future generations.'’— United States Information Service.