Operation Crossroads Africa (OCA)

Judy Rogers Returns to Dickinson, Speaks About Sierra Leone Trip

Date
September 26, 1963

Dickinson junior Judy Rogers, after spending the summer in Sierra Leone as part of the Operation Crossroads Africa (OCA) program, shared her experiences with her classmates and local communities.

Rogers remarked on the similarities between African cities and American cities, and her own intimate participation in Sierra Leonean culture: students were expected to live as the local people did, eating their food and donning traditional dress when appropriate.

Judith Rogers Receives Two Distinctions

Date
May 28, 1963

At the close of her sophomore year, Judith Rogers, one of the first African Americans to receive campus housing at Dickinson, had received two distinctions.

Cole, Harley and Peters Return from Africa to Share Their Experiences

Date
October 14, 1969

The Dickinson College Chaplain Paul Kaylor wrote a letter in October of 1969 to offer the presentational services of the most-recently returned Project Africa participants. 

Dorothy "Dottie" Cole worked with twenty other students in Sierra Leone "building a hospital in the village of Mabai which will, when completed, serve persons from a 50 mile area in that country." 

Kaylor endorses Dorothy Lynne Cole and Barry Eugene Taylor for Project Africa '68 Trip.

Date
December 27, 1967

Paul E. Kaylor, Dickinson College's Chaplain at the time, wrote this letter to the Operation Crossroads Africa headquarters in New York City in December of 1967 to endorse Dickinson's two applicants for the year, Dorothy Lynne Cole and Barry Eugene Taylor. Kaylor recommends both students enthusiastically, writing "they are, as the reference forms indicate, young people of the highest order and will [...] prove to be excellent Crossroaders."

Prioject Africa Participant Writes to Carlisle Area Churches for Support

Date
November 13, 1967

Barbara E. Hancock spent about six weeks during the summer of 1967 in Upper Volta, West Africa (present day Burkina Faso) where she lived with African students and helped to build a school.

Upon her return to Carlisle, Hancock became Co-Chairman of Project Africa and wrote a letter to the "clergymen of Carlisle Area Churches" in an effort to "refresh [their] memories about Project Africa" and to offer them a presentation where she would show her slides and give a brief talk about her experiences.

Project Africa Takes Off at Dickinson

Date
1966

OCA (Operation Crossroads Africa) was founded at Dickinson by Judy Rogers, '65. Rogers was the College's first representative in Africa in the summer of 1963. The following summer ('64) three other Dickinson students followed her lead.