Roots of the Peace Corps: Youth Volunteer Service in the 1950s

Abstract

The creation of the Peace Corps is usually associated with President John F. Kennedy. However, before Kennedy articulated his vision of a “peace corps,” Senator Hubert Humphrey and Congressman Henry Reuss sought the establishment of such an organization. Humphrey and Reuss grew interested in the idea as they observed the work of voluntary organizations, created by religious groups, that sent young people into the world to carry out humanitarian projects. Working on a people‐to‐people basis, often in isolated locations in developing nations, these groups, to many observers, had a greater positive impact than the larger development projects carried out by the U.S. government. In particular, this article focuses on two of those organizations: the Brethren Volunteer Service (BVS) and International Voluntary Service (IVS). Most of the IVS projects were financed by the U.S. government under contract with the International Cooperation Administration. Little historical work has been done on either of the two organizations and this study is an in‐depth look at how the work of BVS and the IVS in the 1950s set the stage for the creation of the Peace Corps in the early 1960s.