Imagine being a college graduate in history and then deciding to seek an education. That’s exactly what young John Kessell did in 1958 by ship, train, bus, airplane, Land Rovers, Morris Mini-Minors and Italian scooters in Rome. He cruised from San Francisco to Australia, went around the world for 231 days (but who was counting?) and came back by boat from Europe to Halifax and then to New York City for a flight to California.
In a post-World War II world, it was a different time. Americans had earned the peace. We had conquered Germany, forced Japan to surrender and global citizens wanted our trucks, tractors, music, agricultural products and those fabulously large American cars with their long tail fins, two-tone paint jobs, big V-8 engines and chrome bumpers. With two physician parents and his father from Australia, John Kessell set out to visit his raft of Aussie cousins but then, rather than returning to Fresno, CA, he kept on traveling. This is his story and he’ll tell it in person at the Durango Public Library at 6 p.m. on August 14.
Dr. Kessell represents what makes Durango and La Plata County unique. Yes, we have thousands of acres of public land and the Southern Ute Tribe is our largest employer, but we also have “intellectual capital,” or retirees who could live anywhere but have chosen Durango and its environs. Professor John Kessell exemplifies what I mean.
Kessell, originally a mediocre history student at Fresno State, would go on to work as a ranger for the National Park Service, earn a Ph.D. at the University of New Mexico, become an expert on the Spanish Colonial Southwest, and write award-winning books like “Mission of Sorrows”; “Kiva, Cross and Crown”; “Friars, Soldiers, and Reformers”, and the magisterial “Spain in the Southwest: A Narrative History of Colonial New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, and California.”
In six volumes, he edited with colleagues the journals and letters of don Diego de Vargas in a project that required two decades of research. Kessell’s numerous awards include the Orden de Isabel la Catolica, Cruz de Oficial from the King of Spain. I’ve seen the framed document and admired his medal. “It’s like a knighthood for research,” he laughed as we sat in his house with a view of the La Plata Mountains beyond his spacious deck.
But before he became a scholar, he set out to see the world. In 1958 Americans were welcome almost anywhere and ocean-going ships were a fraction of the size of the gigantic cruise ships which now ply the world’s waters.
At age 89, Kessell has now written an autobiographical memoir/travelogue based on his diaries, ticket stubs, American Express receipts, and his wonderful .35 mm. Kodachrome slides. “Around the World Not Counting Days” is a quick read with plenty of youthful beer, wine, gin and scotch drinking, and a variety of “vivacious” young women found across several countries. It is a delightful chronicle of colonial customs from frequent toasts to the Queen of England, to snatches of foreign phrases. Kessell came of age around the world. He lost his California girlfriend but met many a pretty female companion during his multi-month travels.
He writes of shipboard friendships, youth and optimism in the late-1950s, the Australian passion for sports, and that Yanks couldn’t spend a dollar in an Aussie bar. In his three months in Australia, including visiting a friend’s million-acre Kallara Station, he was met with genuine hospitality. Weeks later when he’s lonely, homesick and tired of looking at rain sliding down a train window in Italy, three girls, two Americans and a German, invited him “to share their first-class compartment for the rest of the way. Nearing Rome, a silvery gold full moon rose over the ocean, silhouetting the palm trees.”
Kessell partially dedicates his book, “To those fellow travelers and hosts—loving, laughing, and light-hearted—who made all those days I wasn’t counting among the most memorable of my life. The world seemed not so broken back then.” His memoir is filled with vignettes of all the classical tour stops, plus late night parties, deck tennis, ping pong and family stories. He begins on the 28,00-ton R.M.S. Orcades of the British Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company. It is a luxury liner, but he is in tourist class. In this boat and in other ships he was always sneaking into first class for the better bars and outdoor deck activities. The twenty-two-year-old meets plenty of friends also out to see the world.
On the Orcades his berth is an interior cabin without a porthole, but he smartly managed to locate it on a first-class deck. Instructions for dinner from the P&O Line included, “We do not insist on formal dress during meals, but we find that people prefer gentlemen to wear a suitable shirt with tie or scarf, and a jacket.” Astonished at the array of place settings with over twenty silver knives, spoons, and forks, Kessell looked puzzled at what to pick up. A well “attired gentlemen with impeccable white mustache, surely a veteran world traveler” states, “Young man,” in an audible whisper, “just pick up any one of them, but do it with authority!” Good advice, which young Kessell followed for the rest of his journey.
He writes about Honolulu and Waikiki beach parties at 3 a.m. The ship called on ports such as Suva in Fiji, and Auckland in New Zealand. In Australia he bodysurfed Sydney’s famous beaches, and visited his uncle in Tasmania. Later Kessell boards the S.S. Arcadia with ports of call at Melbourne, Adelaide, Freemantle, Singapore, Columbo, Aden, Suez, Port Said and Marseilles, but he sails on to Gibraltar.
In Singapore at the Raffles Hotel, Kessell reminisces, “I’d never tasted such spicy chicken and shrimp curry. I remember the huge ceiling fans and the rich mahogany of the bar, easily peopling the lounge with Brits in pith helmets, ironed khaki shorts, and white knee socks.” Here and there Kessell writes letters home, buys a few trinkets, meets more companions and explores cities at night with guides of questionable character.
In Port Said, Egypt, on the Mediterranean, he and a few buddies were “led by another shady impromptu guide (and) we engaged in a zombielike, dim-lit tour of the city’s cabarets.” Kessell writes, “I remember seeing countless belly dancers through the heavy smoke.” But other nights were spent lying back in deck chairs on various ships, counting the stars, identifying constellations and adding ice to melting gin and tonics.
He meets a young girl named Jenny who beats him at deck tennis. He buys her a necklace, gives it to her in his cabin, and then, “As Jenny and I took our final walk around the darkened decks, wispy white clouds played tag with a bright half-moon that lay a silver path across the glass-smooth sea. Together we studied the lights on the coast of Spain, and I wondered what I’d got myself into ... ”
In Spain, Kessell attends bullfights, feels the restrictions of Francisco Franco’s totalitarian regime, is in Madrid for Holy Week, and sees elaborate parades along with art museums and cathedrals. He begins to grow a beard, tours the Alhambra, drinks sangria, eats paella, and finally leaves for Rome where he throws coins in the Trevi Fountain, visits the Coliseum, and ascends the Spanish Steps. Finally homeward bound, he takes the Vulcania. Launched in 1926, it carried more passengers more places than any other Italian vessel. He’s on board with a thousand Italian immigrants headed to Halifax, Nova Scotia. They speak no English. His rudimentary Spanish helps.
Please join Distinguished Professor Emeritus Dr. John Kessell at the Durango Public Library at 6 p.m. on August 14 as he tells tales, shows photos, and talks about a world before the Internet, before cell phones, a world of handshakes, hugs, and honor to the American flag. Come and share your own cruise ship stories with maybe a little “fair Dinkum”--that’s Australian for good truth.
Andrew Gulliford is an award-winning author and editor and a professor of history at Fort Lewis College. He can be reached at gulliford_a@fortlewis.edu.
