Syrian Yankee by Salom Rizk
Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1943

Syrian Yankee
Salom Rizk, author
DeWitt Wallace, Foreword
Garden City NY: Doubleday and Company, Inc., 1943
1946 printing
xii, 317 pages

This blog post created by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com.

Dustjacket Endflap Text

Front Endflap: Salom Rizk was born in 1909 in a tiny poverty stricken town in Syria.  Although he grew up as a Syrian, when Rizk was twelve years old he discovered that his mother had been an American citizen and that he could claim American citizenship.  Two brothers in Iowa paid his passage to the United States, but he arrived in this country penniless, homeless, and with no knowledge of our language.  The story of his incredible experience in self education and his rise to one of the most sought after and inspirational speakers on American lecture platforms is contained in Syrian Yankee.

There is an almost Biblical simplicity about the opening chapters of Mr. Rizk’s story.  These deal with the little Syrian town where he lived in a tiny hut with his grandmother and their sheep and chickens.  Eventually he becomes a swineherd and attends a little Arabic school, where he discovers his American citizenship.  The schoolmaster writes to his brothers in Iowa, who forward the passage money, but he waits five weary years in Beirut until his identity is finally established.  After his arrival in America, Rizk enjoys a variety of employments.  In an amazingly short time he begins his career of lecturing under the auspices of the Reader’s Digest.  His story is of a true American who made his way by courage and perseverance.

Back Endflap: My Chinese Wife by Karl Eskelund 

 An explosive combination of three things has kept Karl Eskelund in a perpetual swirl of adventure: travel, writing, and a Chinese wife. Here’s the start of each:

Aged seventeen, one spring day Karl is rowing around Copenhagen harbor looking at ships.  Sudden inspiration, and he sees at last how he can get East.  Next morning he’s signed up as a cabin boy on the motor ship Annam bound for Shanghai.

A check for twenty dollars for his description of a Chinese funeral, sold on the sly by his father to a Danish newspaper, determines his future.  He will be a foreign correspondent.

One night in the library of Yenching University he looks up and into the eyes of the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen.  Four nights later he’s proposed and got his “Yes” from little Fei Chi-yun (Beautiful Cloud).  P.S.: Parental opposition makes courtship long and turbulent.

Karl was thus dedicated to the unexpected.  He has traveled the world: Europe, Asia, Africa, U.S.A., in and out of one international situation after another.  He’s reported present day history for the Associated Press, United Press, New York Times, Danish and Chinese newspapers.  And always the biggest, most exciting part of his life has been his love for Fei Chi-yun.

Here’s global adventure staccato fashion with an international romance for background.