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Willard A. Hanna

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Willard Anderson Hanna
Born(1911-08-03)August 3, 1911
DiedOctober 5, 1993(1993-10-05) (aged 82)
SpouseMarybelle Bouchard

Willard Anderson Hanna (August 3, 1911 – October 5, 1993)[1] was an American writer of Southeast Asian history and works of fiction as well as a teacher. Hanna wrote politics, history, and historical fiction. He wrote Bali Chronicles with Adrian Vickers. Hanna co-authored Turbulent Times Past in Ternate and Tidore on the history of the Maluku Islands and Banda Neira with Des Alwi.

Biography

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He was from Cross Creek, Pennsylvania, and graduated from the College of Wooster in Wooster, Ohio, in 1932.[2] He traveled to China and taught English for four years in Shanghai and Hangzhou before returning to the United States and achieving a master's degree from Ohio State University in 1937 and a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1939.[2] He joined the Navy in early 1942 and served at the military's Japanese language school at the University of Colorado and then at a military program at Columbia University. He was part of the landings on Okinawa on April 1, 1945 (Battle of Okinawa) as a lieutenant commander, and remained in Okinawa for more than a year. His work there included helping establish schools.[2]

He continued his career at the U.S. State Department for seven years, working in Manila, Tokyo and Jakarta,[3] where he established the United States Information Services offices which he ran until 1952.[2] In Washington, D.C., he graduated from the National War College in 1953 and was deployed to the United States Embassy in Tokyo as an information officer.[2] He resigned from the State Department in 1954 and worked for the American Universities Field Staff in Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore and Hong Kong before he retired in 1976.[2]

He married Marybelle Bouchard. Hanna died in Hanover, New Hampshire, on October 5, 1993, at the age of 82.[2]

Bibliography

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  • Destiny Has Eight Eyes (1941) Harper & Brothers, a novel set in China at the outbreak of World War II
  • Bali Profile: People, Events, Circumstances 1001-1976 (Jun 1976)
  • The Formation of Malaysia
  • Eight Nation Makers
  • Indonesian Banda: Colonialism and its aftermath in the Nutmeg Islands (1978)
  • The Berkshire-Litchfield legacy: Litchfield, Ancram, Salisbury, Stockbridge, Lenox by (1984)
  • Hikayat Jakarta (1988)
  • Turbulent times past in Ternate and Tidore (1990)
  • Bali Chronicles: A Lively Account of the Island's History from Early Times to the 1970's (Periplus Classics Series) by Willard A. Hanna and Adrian Vickers (November 15, 2004)

References

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  1. ^ "Birth Indices: 1911 - H" (PDF). Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. p. 69. Retrieved 2021-08-01.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g "Willard A. Hanna, 82, an Author and an Expert on Southeast Asia", by Randy Kennedy, October 8, 1993, New York Times
  3. ^ "Obituary - Willard Hanna; Author, Southeast Asia Expert". Los Angeles Times. October 10, 1993. Retrieved 2021-08-01.