For the Honorable Jean M. Wilkowski, a retired U.S. diplomat and the first woman to be appointed U.S. Ambassador to Africa, travel and learning have been a way of life. She has lived in eight different countries on four continents; she has broadened her horizons, and explored different languages, cultures and countries; and she has had many opportunities to enrich her global understanding.

On Sept. 18, she hopes to enrich the global understanding of others as she kicks off Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College’s 2008-2009 Four-Star Series with a talk entitled “From The Woods to the World, a 35-year Diplomatic Career in the US Foreign Service.” Wilkowski’s presentation, which is free and open to the public, will begin at 7 p.m. in the Cecilian Auditorium of the SMWC Conservatory of Music.

As a young girl, Wilkowski hardly imagined a lifetime overseas even though the family traveled twice a year between her birthplace of Rhinelander, Wisc., and her father’s place of business in Miami Beach, Fla.

She attended parochial grammar school then a public high school before seeking more advanced faith education as a student at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College (SMWC). At SMWC, she found a protective, yet academically challenging community, which nurtured self-discovery and finding a role in life.

“I made life-long friends at The Woods while strengthening my faith as a solid underpinning for life,” Wilkowski said. 

Born in an era when few women sought professional careers, much less overseas careers, Wilkowski graduated from SMWC in 1941 with a journalism major and a French minor. Planning to become a foreign correspondent, she went on to earn a master’s degree in journalism and political science from the University of Wisconsin, then changed career plans and entered the U.S. Department of State. There she rose in the ranks from Vice Consul at a very small post in the Caribbean to the top rank of U.S. Ambassador in charge of an overseas mission. After serving at several capitols in Latin America and Europe, she was assigned to head up the U.S. Embassy in Zambia from1972 to 1976 during the liberation wars in the region.

Once in the Foreign Service, Wilkowski simply “went with the diplomatic flow, accepting all assignments as was required,” only to find that it all added up to a very interesting career with significant accomplishments. She credits her success to commitment and hard work.

“While I lived at a time which happened to coincide with the feminist movement, it was neither my nature nor personal inclination to be involved as a leader in that movement, nor was it appropriate for me as a government official,” said Wilkowski. “Yet some insist that I benefitted from the movement. Perhaps this is so. But I believe that people succeed in whatever tasks are assigned them through commitment and hard work, rather than just talking the talk or demanding certain entitlements simply because they are women.”

During her distinguished pioneering career, Wilkowski specialized in protecting and promoting U.S. trade and investment interests overseas, including tariff and trade negotiations, before assuming diplomatic management and leadership roles. One of her most challenging assignments was when she headed the U.S. Embassy in Tegucigalpa during the El Salvador – Honduras war in the 1960s.  There she faced the urgent need for humanitarian assistance to more than 50,000 war-displaced persons. The Embassy requested U.S. material aid from the American military in Panama to meet the urgent need. Wilkowski was recognized and honored for her leadership in the emergency by the Order of Malta of which she is a member.

Before retiring from government service she was named U.S. coordinator of U.S. preparations over three years for the 1979 United Nations Conference on Science and Technology for Development (UNCSTD). Together with the Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh (then president of the University of Notre Dame), whom President Jimmy Carter named Ambassador, Wilkowski co-led the U.S. delegation at the world conference in Vienna.

Since retiring in 1980, Wilkowski has remained active with service on the boards of SMWC, Barry University and EPS, a religious lay education foundation at Trinity College. She was a director of DACOR (Diplomats and Consular Officers Retired), chairman of the board of VITA (Volunteers in Technical Assistance) and a director of CPC/Best Foods International, a multinational corporation with operations in more than 60 countries worldwide. She was also a consultant for the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, a lecturer at the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, and a lay member on the International Policy Committee of the U.S. Catholic Bishops Conference. She has represented the Order of Malta at international conferences in the Dominican Republic, Colombia and Cuba.

As to the future, Wilkowski prays for a “continuing happy life,” and hopes she can continue to urge others to expand their vision and interests so that they can enrich their global understanding.

“That returns me to my central messages which are to encourage travel, and through it, better understanding of and better communication with our fellow humans as we share our hopes for a better, safer and more sane world,” Wilkowski said. “We need to start by being better neighbors here at home so that we can be better neighbors abroad and thus collaborate more effectively on solving our many common problems which are making this world of ours an increasingly dangerous place.”

Wilkowski’s life is chronicled in her informative and entertaining memoir, “Abroad for her Country, Tales of a Pioneer Woman Ambassador in the US Foreign Service,” recently published by The University of Notre Dame Press and available at local bookstores or online at undpress.nd.edu or Amazon.com.

For more information about Wilkowski’s presentation at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College or upcoming events in the Four-Star Series, contact Jeff Malloy, director of campus life, at 812-535-5219 or jmalloy@smwc.edu.

Photos by Bill Petros/The Current, www.currentnewspapers.com