Sheldon Baird Vance was born in Crookston, Minnesota, on January 18, 1917, the son of Erskine Ward and Helen (Baird) Vance. He graduated from Austin High School, Austin, Minn., in 1935. He earned a bachelor's degree from Carleton College, Northfield, Minn., in 1939, and a law degree from Harvard University in 1942. He joined the Ropes, Gray, Best, Coolidge & Rugg law firm, Boston, in 1942.
Vance joined the Foreign Service in 1942, and served as an economic analyst at the American embassy in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (1942-1946); U.S. vice consul in Nice, France and in Monaco (1946-1949); U.S. consul at the U.S. embassy in Martinique, West Indies (1949-1951); Swiss Desk Officer (1951-1952); Belgium-Luxembourg desk officer with the State Department in Washington, D.C. (1952-1954); first secretary at the American embassy in Brussels, Belgium (1954-1958); chief of personnel placement in the Bureau of Africa, Middle East, and South Asia (1958-1960); student Senior Seminar in Foreign Relations (1960-1961); director of the Office of Central African Affairs (1961-1962); deputy chief of mission at the American embassy in Ethiopia (1962-1966); and senior foreign service inspector (1966-1967). He served as American ambassador to Chad (1967-1969) and to Zaire (1969-1974). He was promoted to the rank of career minister in 1971. Vance served as senior adviser to the secretary of state, coordinator for international narcotics matters, and executive director of the President's Cabinet Committee on International Narcotics Control (1974-1977). After retiring from the Foreign Service in 1977, he practiced international law in the Washington, D.C. law firm of Vance, Joyce, Carbaugh and Fields (1977-1989).
Vance married Jean Chambers on December 28, 1939. They had two children: Robert Clarke and Stephen Baird Vance. In later years they made their home in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Sheldon Vance died at Bethesda, Maryland, on November 12, 1995.
The collection includes correspondence, newspaper clippings, photographs, dinner menus and programs, and other papers. There is a literary manuscript written by Vance and his wife discussing American foreign policy since World War II; letters from Sheldon and Jean to his mother Helen in Austin, Minnesota; an essay by Vance about problems faced by Zaire in the 1990s; and the transcript of a television news program interview (1984) wherein Vance is questioned about events in Zaire. There is information about American foreign policy; Vance's career in the diplomatic service; the family's life and experiences in the various countries in which they served; and commentary about a variety of world leaders and political conditions in countries around the world.
There is also information about Vance's work with the State Department in its efforts to control international narcotics trade.
Correspondents include Sheldon and Jean Vance; Sheldon's mother Helen; State Department officials; Henry Kissinger, George H. W. Bush, and other government officials.
Some of the material is in French.
Two collections of Chambers family papers are in the Minnesota Historical Society manuscript collections.
Records of American diplomatic and consular posts are in the Records of the Foreign Service Posts of the Department of State (Record Group 84) at the National Archives.
Records of offices responsible for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African affairs are in the General Records of the Department of State (Record Group 59) at the National Archives.
This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the Minnesota Historical Society. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons or places should
Accession number: 15,440; 16,056
Processed by: David B. Peterson, August 1999; Kit Smemo, June 2005
Catalog ID number: 1735812
Typescript manuscript written by Sheldon and Jean Vance describing their experiences in the foreign service. In this manuscript Sheldon Vance argues that "the great promise of American world leadership through an effective foreign policy" was lost in the decades following World War II. 378 pages.
Transcripts of three interviews, one with Sheldon (1989) and two with Jean (1990, 1991), carried out by the Association for Diplomatic Studies, an independent scholarly organization working through Georgetown University. The interviews summarize the Vances' ambassadorial career.
Most of the letters are from Sheldon and Jean to family in the U.S., especially parents and children. They relate family matters and the Vances' day-to-day lives at the embassy.
As in the Chad series, most of the letters are to family in the U.S., and relate family matters and the Vances' day-to-day lives at the embassy.
Essay by Sheldon Vance discussing the history of Zaire since gaining its independence from Belgium in 1960, and the metamorphosis of its leader, president Mobutu Sese Seko, from a friend of the United States to an absolute dictator blamed for the "disastrous and often bloody" chaotic mess in which the country found itself by the 1990s.
Includes a transcript of a January 24, 1984 interview with Mike Wallace of CBS News.
A Zairian children's story re-told by Jean Vance, for which she sought U.S. publication.