Massachusetts remembers its deep bond with Thailand

Sayre was the son-in-law of a US president, and a foreigner honoured by King Rama VII with the Grand Cross of the Crown of Siam and titled Phya Kalayanamitri, “Great Friend”.

Gleaned through history’s prism, Sayre’s words prove most prescient. In his letter he had advised the young King to “follow the pathway which your father always followed, the pathway of selfless service for his country and its people. Your ideals like his must be kept untarnished and shining; and your constant compass if you would avoid shipwreck must be utter goodness and integrity of character. Nothing else will surely win your people’s hearts and strengthen your reign.” 

Studded with gems of Thai history, letters such as these are preserved among Francis Bowes Sayre’s papers in the US Library of Congress.

In his book “Glad Adventure”, a testament to the great friendship he forged with Prince Mahidol, Sayre writes, “His second child, Prince Bhumibol, was born in a hospital in Cambridge close by our home so that they could be near Jessie and me.” 

In addition to the legacy of selflessness for which he is remembered as the “father of Thai medicine”, Prince Mahidol forged lasting relationships with Thais and Americans that would go on to have historical significance. On one occasion in 1918, when receiving a group of students at a train station in Boston, he would meet the woman he would marry and father three children with, two of whom would eventually become kings.

A century ago, Prince Mahidol arrived in Massachusetts to embark on his study of public medicine at Harvard Medical School. On Saturday, that milestone was commemorated with the event “Celebrating the Legacy of His Royal Highness Prince Mahidol of Songkla: A Century of Progress in Public Health and Medicine in Thailand”, organised by the King of Thailand Birthplace Foundation, a non-profit group helped refurbish Cambridge’s King Bhumibol Square 11 years ago.

As an adviser on international law at the Royal Court of Siam, Sayre worked to help free the Kingdom from restrictions that had held the country back. King Prajadhipok had appointed him to serve Siam in the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague. 

In the many letters in the Library of Congress collection, a sense of service prevails. In a letter to a Siamese prince, Sayre writes, “So often I have thought of you and wondered how you are. My mind often goes back to the happy days in 1924 when we were in Bangkok and when I used to have the pleasure of going around to your house to talk with you. I shall never forget my year in Bangkok – it was one of the happiest of my life. … I too regret many changes which have come. I can understand how you have suffered. Both of us loved the old Siam.”

A letter to him, imbued with history’s current, reads, “Everything is going on as usual here in Siam, not much excitement besides rumors and mild attempts at coups-d’etats and so on, but nobody is paying much attention now.”

Unveiled in last Saturday’s event was a plaque inscribed with the words, “Prince Mahidol of Thailand and Phya Chanindra, a government officer of Thailand, arrived in Gloucester on Sunday August 27, 1916 on the 5:42pm train from Boston. He occupied a suite at the Moorland before beginning public health studies at Harvard University in September. Prince Mahidol, the first Thai royal to study in the USA, was a son of King Chulalongkorn and Queen Savang Vadhana and was the father of the two kings, Rama VIII and Rama IX.” The explanation below reads, “A gift from KTBF 2016” and mentions the organisation’s mission: “Preserving Thai history”.

 

Carleton Cole is a former copy-editor with The Nation.