A Note About the Author: Colleen Wilson
Oran and Colleen Wilson live in Richardson, Texas, a suburb of Dallas. They have two children who were born in Saudi Arabia, Olan Keith, who passed away in 1996 from Melanoma cancer, and Victoria Gayle. Colleen spends her spare time writing about their lives in Saudi. Oran spends his time volunteering for the local hospital and police department.
Email Coleen and Oran: Oranandcolleen@msn.com
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter XVII - Another Scheduled Home Leave
On November 11, 1955, we left Arabia again to go on our scheduled home leave after two more years with Aramco. We flew to Amsterdam, Holland, spent one night there, and then flew on to New York City. We spent another night there, then flew to Dallas, Texas, the next day and checked into the Adolphis Hotel. It was good to be home again.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter XVI - Back Home in Ras Tanura
It was good to be back “home”. Oran found out at work that he was going to be on straight days for two months while he helped train the other operators for the Hydroformer. That meant fixing two big meals everyday, but at least, there were no graveyards. I spent a lot of time cooking and trying to think what to cook, but I got in the groove, and we were soon completely settled and back in the old routine.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter XV - Refinery Hydroformer Training Program
By the first of the new year, 1955, the company had decided on the schedule for the Refinery Hydroformer Training Program in the United States. So, for the next two weeks, we were finalizing plans for that. On January 16, we left Saudi Arabia on the Aramco plane with some of the others, spent one night in Amsterdam, Holland, and flew on to New York City the next day.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter XIII - Happy New Year, 1954
1954 came in with a roar. It would be very active, not only with the kids, but with parties, sports activities, and friends. A number of new people would arrive in Arabia with whom we would become very social. However, for the first week, everyone kinda kicked back and relaxed and recuperated from the Holidays. The next weekend, on Thursday night, the Company had a Las Vegas Party in the Recreation Building, which was different and fun, and everybody in camp turned out for it.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter XIV - To Kick Off The Summer
June was the month Oran had been back in Arabia for a year since his home leave, so it was time to go on his short leave. I really didn’t want to go anywhere as the kids were so young, and I sure didn’t want to leave them, but Oran felt he would really like to get away from the pressures of work for awhile, so we decided that he would go to Asmara, Eritrea for a week.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter X - First Home Leave
Before we knew it, it was March 21, 1953, and we were arriving at the Dhahran Airport. To say we were excited would be an understatement. We visited with other Aramcons as we waited to board the TWA plane, including another young couple with a new baby. We told them about making arrangements with the airlines to be seated at the front of the plane with just a wall in front of us. So, you can imagine our surprise and upset when the other young couple was given that seat instead of us.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter IX - Happy New Year 1953
During this month we had been making our final plans for our home leave, Keith and my first. Oran had been there exactly 2 years, so his contract was up. So, on March 6, we decided to make one more little excursion outside camp. We checked out an Aramco car, hired a baby sitter for Keith, and with two other couples, drove down toward Dhahran to the oasis town of Qatif.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter VIII - And The Beat Goes On
Oran finally took me on a tour through the Refinery on September 13th. It was a bit scary being around all that big machinery, but interesting. I enjoyed meeting more of the guys Oran worked with (the ones I didn’t already know), Roy White, Frank Gates, Frances (Hondo) Schmidt (Joe Schmidt’s brother), Burl York, Bob Wolf, Bill Gallivan, and Gene Johnson, the boss.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter VI - Being Pregnant
I received a letter from my mother saying that she had had a dream that I was pregnant, but was deliberately keeping it from her. So, I decided it was time to tell everyone. I wrote my mother first, on March 24, 1952, and told her she was certainly having some mighty fancy dreams lately, but I must confess that it was true. I wasn’t doing it to punish her though, honest. I just didn’t want her to worry about me for nine whole months. I was going to tell her soon, anyway, because the baby was due in about two and a half months.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter V - Happy New Year, 1952
All the celebrating wasn’t over yet. To start the New Year off right, we went to a dinner party for only “people from Texas” on January 1. The host & hostess were one of Oran’s bosses and his wife from Bandera, Texas, Walt & Daisy Mayfield. They had invited 10 of their Texas friends in for black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter IV - Beirut, Lebanon
Oran had been back in Arabia long enough to warrant his short leave or vacation, which every employee could go on once a year. We had decided to go to Beirut, Lebanon, so at 1:30 a.m. on November 14, 1951, we flew out of the Dhahran Airport aboard a KLM airplane for a two week local vacation.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter III - Trips Outside Ras Tanura
We celebrated our first birthdays together in Arabia on July 26th. We have the same one. Oran was 24 and I was 23. We had managed to wait until then to open my parent’s gift to us that I had brought from the States and were very pleased with a record of our favorite songs. We didn’t do much, but I did bake a cake-my first, which was ‘fair to middlin”.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter II - Settling In
After three and one-half days in Saudi Arabia, I started writing my first, long letter to my parents describing my trip over, our camp, and what life was going to be like over there. I knew they would be anxious to hear details, and I had plenty to tell them already.
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First Trip to the K.S.A.: Chapter I - Trip Over and Arrival
This book contains the highlights of my first trip to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia where I lived with my husband and children for five and a half years in the early 1950’s. I loved living in Saudi Arabia and having the privilege of meeting and associating with all the people of all nationalities I encountered. For this unequivocal opportunity, I give praise to Allah.