Chip Beck:
CLASS OF 1963
Ventura Senior High SchoolClass of 1963
Ventura, CA
South Hagerstown High SchoolClass of 1963
Hagerstown, MD
Chip's Story
Life
In September 2019 we sold our house in Arlington and moved to our farm in Hillsboro, Virginia (where Susan Koerner, the Mother of the Wright Brothers was born in 1831). “Goose Island Farm” is a tranquil 11-acre setting with a two acre pond. During the 2020 Pandemic we literally tore the farmhouse apart down to the studs (including the floors and ceilings) and put it back together the way we wanted it. We added a two level porch facing the pond (east) and a solarium and patio on the backside (west) for great viewing of sunrises and sunsets.
I also studied KiSwahili for 420 days during the Pandemic to exercise my mind and get ready for the next African adventure. After that I started refreshing my French and Spanish, both of which I’ve used in past careers and travel.
Later in 2020 I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. After radiation and hormone therapy the doctors were happy with the outcome. All-in-all I feel pretty good!
Kathy and I are getting back into our artist activities and turning our barn into an collection of studios for our artist friends. In June 2021 I donated a portrait (24 x 36 inches) of Susan Koerner Wright to the town of Hillsboro for its historic renovation and reopening as a landmark town dating back to 1745 when it was on the frontier of westward migration. The town council even used the painting to make a banner for the ceremony. Nice honor.
In September 2021, the Mayor of Hillsboro commissioned me to create 16-32 watercolor paintings for the upcoming “Fall Campaign” and invited me to be a guest speaker on Veteran’s Day.
Kathy and I spent a month from NOV-DEC 2017 as artist in residence at Gettysburg National Military Park, living and working out of a 200 year old farmhouse (restored) right on Pickett’s Charge! What a great experience. Uncovered a lot of data about my own ancestors who lived just down the road from the battlefield, some of whom fought elsewhere during the Civil War.
(See Instagram account chipbeckcombatartist for photos. ) in 2018 we were artists at Chaco Canyon National Park for 30 days, then at Manassas Battlefield in 2019.
In mid 2017 i returned from a 3-week safari in Botswana with my friend of 40 years who was Ambassador there before retiring. We used his Land Rover and camping gear on a 1300 kms trip through the northern wildlife areas and the Kalahari. Magnicent animal sightings and encounters on a daily basis.
In 2013, after a year in Haiti with their National Police, I traveled to Madagascar to visit my daughter (then in the Peace Corps). Following that, I was invited to Southern Africa to draw editorial cartoons against Zimbabwe's dictator (Mugabe) for opposition leader (Tsvangirai). Fun but futile. After that I went to Pretoria for a month to finish writing a book on the collapse of Cambodia in 1975. Hope to publish later this year.
Since returning from Haiti and Africa, Kathy and I have traveled to the Mediterranean countries, Baltic Sea states, and the West Indies, bringing my country total to 150--42 of which are in Africa.
In 2011, my primary adventure was a 2000 kilometer safari (a real one) through the Arid Lands of Kenya, Ethiopia, and Somalia. That was some of the roughest, god-forsaken terrain I've ever traveled through. Each night we had to weld parts back on to the Land Rovers, install new shock absorbers, or jury-rig some piece that fell off somewhere. But it was an incredible trip with lots of vistas and chan...Expand for more
ges in terrain, crossing the equator twice, going from the cool, snow-covered slopes of Mt. Kenya to the volcanic lava-strewn Chabli Desert along the Ethiopian border to the much hotter Sabena Desert on the Somali-Kenyan border.
Since graduating college in 1968, I've been a soldier, sailor, artist, and a spy. I completed my doctorate in Organizational Leadership and Conflict Resolution--not bad for a kid who flunked out of Berkeley after his first semester of Engineering. I've served in some 20 different wars, revolutions, coups, and other conflicts in every decade since the Sixties, basically going from Vietnam (1969) to Somalia (2011) with stops in conflict and fragile countries that include Laos, Cambodia, Angola, the Western Sahara, Sudan, Lebanon, Afghanistan, El Savador, Nicaragua, Colombia, Guatemala, Panama (Just Cause), Kuwait (Desert Storm), Iraq (Operation Enduring Freedom), Darfur, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, and the Congo.
Throughout all of the travels, including 6 trips to Cuba, and a couple to Moscow, East Berlin, and Budapest in search of answers to some Cold War mysteries, I saw a lot of history and gathered many stories and images for the books I am writing and my on-going paintings of people, places, and events. I've filled up a dozen "moleskin" sketchbooks from my travels around Africa, but one of my best assignements ever was as the Navy's official Combat Artist during the Gulf War in 1991.
After a tour in Iraq for 15 months from 2003-2005, I served from 2005-2010 as the State Department's director of the African Contingency Operations Training & Assistance (ACOTA) program--a $264 million peacekeeper training program in support of the UN and African Union forces--traveling to some 42 African countries throughout the continent.
In January 2010 I finally retired from all the military, defense, intelligence, and diplomatic career tracks, and went back to Africa (Kenya, South Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, South Africa) for about 8 months on two long trips for private companies--and worked for a while as a subject matter expert on Africa and the Middle East. I have a rock-climbing, multi-lingual daughter formerly of the Peace Corps who now resides in San Francisco and a son who is a talented artist who graduated from one of the ranking art colleges in the country and is now working in Fairfax, VA. Our oldest daughter, is an events planner (and VP) for the Auto industry who travels around the country gave us a granddaughter in 2011 and a grandson in 2016, so I've been asked to stick around the States more often--which I am happy to do.
My wife and I are hoping to consolidate as much as we can over the next few years, and move on to some other adventures and maybe a different part of the country. I used Arlington, Virginia as a home base since 1968, but in 2019 it was time to pick up the stakes and move on to our Hillsboro farm in the shadow of the Blue Ridge Mountains. I sold my old house up behind Ventura High in 2005, so the chances of moving back to California seems slim--and expensive.
So far, I am in good health, aside from the cancer scare, have all my hair, and no gut. I'd gave up running marathons in my old age to save my knees to spend more time on rounds of golf, Besides, as a sports drink beer tastes better than Gatorade.
Oh, in 2020 I had a book published called “The Alamo Conspiracy: Mexico’s Covert Subversion of America” by History Publishing Co.
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