THE CLEM SCOTT STORY

  This book started when I met Henrietta, “Retty” Scott Mueller in the winter of 1968 in Denver, Colorado. I was engaged to my now wife of forty-eight years, Carol Scott McClennen. We were headed up into the Colorado Rockies to ski, and since I was coming up from New Mexico and Carol was flying out from Boston, “Cousin Retty’s” seemed to be a good place to meet before we headed up to the mountains. Retty was actually Carol’s father’s cousin, not hers, but due to the closeness of the families, Retty always was like an aunt to Carol rather than the more distant “cousin of my father.” Retty always seemed like a close family member through the years.    In 2006, we were visiting Retty in Denver.  She was getting older and making efforts to “put her house in order” contemplating that at some point age would catch up to her. She mentioned that she had a number of letters from her deceased brother, Clement Scott, Jr., most of which were written during his years working with the Presbyterian Mission in Iran, 1948 to 1978. Knowing my interest and past work in organizing old family letters, and knowing that her brother led a most interesting life, Retty offered to give the letters to me. Not knowing what I was getting into, I accepted her offer, and the seeds of Remembering Clem – A Good American in Iran were planted.   I spent two years with the 108 letters that Retty gave to me. I started to understand Clement Scott, Jr., and his work in Iran. Two years later, in 2008, Clem’s other sister, Marjorie Scott Doty, living in nearby Connecticut with her husband Leete Doty, was interested in how I was progressing with what had become my “Clem project.” Hearing that I was attempting to put together a book based on Retty’s original source documents from Iran, she offered me her collection of letters from Clem – letters saved first by her mother and then by Marjorie herself after her mother’s death in 1958. I of course accepted this offer without hesitation. Within a month, Marjorie’s box of letters arrived at my house. I was excited, but when I opened the box, I discovered that Marjorie’s collection of letters numbered 524 in total! The family had saved 173 of Clem’s letters from his childhood to college and early adult years – these mostly sent to his parents. Then there were 351 letters to either his mother or Marjorie (or both) from September 1948 on - almost all of which were related to his life and work in Iran.   To know Clement Scott, Jr., one had to know of his college and graduate school years - and certainly of his infantry training from January to June of 1942. Also the accident that resulted in the loss of his right arm while at Camp Croft, South Carolina needed to be well understood. Moreover, his training for missionary service included what would be called today “active placement training” wherein, he was placed in poverty locations in the rural South in order to experience a life working with some of the neediest people in our country. This was not unlike Peace Corps training fifteen years later in which volunteers-in-training learned what it was like to live and work with a very different population than what they had grown up with. These letters reminded me of my own Peace Corps Training for service in Minas Gerais, Brazil in 1968-1970.   Retty and Marjorie both lived into their nineties, but with their passing in 2008 and 2010 respectively, I had to carry on without their strong memory base. Fortunately, their children continued to share information with me, and this encouraged me to pull together Clem’s life in some type of book based on his letters.   So Remembering Clem – A Good American in Iran, Thirty Years of Christian Service, developed, matured, and by 2016, had become a volume that told an interesting and well-formed American story. It is a story of Iran in the mid-twentieth century; it is also of story of Missionary Service – not so much about proselytizing the Christian faith, but more of living a Christian life in a foreign land. It is a story about an American living and working abroad - and a story based primarily on original source documents. In that sense, some interesting Iran history is presented in spite of it being very much a book of family letters.    This website complements and extends what is found in the book. Via numerous photos and quotes from his letters, Clem’s life can be more fully understood and appreciated.