World Food Prize Ambassador Quinn
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THE ARCHIVE OF AMBASSADOR KENNETH M. QUINN
FROM THE MISSISSIPPI TO THE MEKONG
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The Worst Job in the Foreign Service

274/10/82

After completing his four-year stint on the staff of Iowa Governor Robert Ray, Amb. Quinn is forced to choose his next assignment from the small list of available jobs on the State Department personnel list. Arriving in Vienna, Austria in the fall of 1982, Amb. Quinn is informed by the officer he is to replace that the position of Counselor at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations is “the worst job in the Foreign Service.” The departing officer states that “no one in Washington knows that it exists or cares about what you do.” Sitting in his office in a non-descript building in a remote part of Vienna, Amb. Quinn believes he has once again “taken a wrong turn.” 

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