The Journey of One Saudi Arabian Man's Costume from Dhahran To

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The Journey of One Saudi Arabian Man's Costume from Dhahran To 9532-06_KHILA_2/2006_07 15-10-2007 16:11 Pagina 137 KHIL{A 2 (2006), pp. 137-148. doi: 10.2143/KH.2.0.2021289 The journey of one Saudi Arabian man’s costume from Dhahran to Leiden Helen SEIDLER, Bethesda, USA Gillian VOGELSANG-EASTWOOD, Textile Research Centre, Leiden In early 1949 Alonzo (“Al”) LePage Seidler, my He went to Arabia six months ahead of my father, accepted a position with the Arabian mother, my brother (7 years old) and me (3 years American Oil Company in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. old). We followed travelling by ship from New York He was the first dentist to join the medical team to Beirut (a 13 day voyage) and then flying across Aramco was assembling to serve the small, but the Arabian peninsula to Dhahran, in the Eastern growing community of Americans and other for- Province on the edge of the Persian Gulf. The story eigners moving to the country to work on the of the costume is told primarily from memory of exploration, refining and shipping of oil. As a result, family conversations around the dinner table about he was also the first Western-trained dentist in the our rich experience from 1949 to 1961 living in country. Saudi Arabia. My father was from Baltimore, Maryland (USA) At that time Aramco was a consortium of four where he was born, raised and educated (Johns U.S. oil companies – Standard Oil of California Hopkins University, 1931; University of Maryland (now Chevron), Texas Oil Company (now Texaco), Dental School, 1937). He married Virginia Standard Oil of New Jersey (now Exxon), and Niedentohl, also a Baltimore native, in 1936, and Socony-Vacuum Oil (now Mobil). The agreement served with the 101st Evacuation Hospital of the with the Saudi royal family of Ibn Saud was that U.S. Army in France and Germany during World Saudi citizens would join the company early on and War II. His wartime experience ignited an interest over time it would become Saudi Aramco, a wholly in cultures and countries around the world that owned Saudi company, which it is today. Dhahran stayed with him the rest of his life. And it also pre- and its neighbouring Aramco towns of Abqaiq and disposed him to the idea of working in Saudi Ras Tanura were almost entirely ex-patriate commu- Arabia, a suggestion made by one of his college nities in the early 1950s, although as Saudis began friends. moving up in the company, they too began living in these towns. In Dhahran my father’s dental offices were pro- vided with the most modern equipment of the day, and he had dental assistants who were initially Indian and then Saudi (fig. 1). He learned basic Arabic, although never to the level of fluency achieved by the geologists working in the field side by side with their Arab counterparts. In those early years of Aramco’s work, the for- eign community was small and exposure to the Saudi royals not uncommon. The first king and founder of the country, Abdulaziz Al-Saud, once visited Dhahran and gave out individual tins of hard candies to all the school children that had assembled on a hill to greet him. We children were more impressed by his retinue than the candy Fig. 1. Dr A. LePage Seidler at work, Dhahran, early itself, but the gesture was most appreciated. The 1950s (photograph by courtesy of H. Seidler) families – including my family – who took up 137 9532-06_KHILA_2/2006_07 15-10-2007 16:11 Pagina 138 horses as a hobby once put on a gymkhana fabric, brass coffee pots and trays, and handsome attended by one of the crown princes. In honour wooden chests from all over the Middle East and of the prince, we were decked out in the colours India. of the Saudi flag with green saddle blankets, white In its negotiations with Aramco over the arrange- outfits and cowboy hats, and green and white rib- ments for its employees and their families, the royal bons in the manes and tails of our beautiful family requested that it have access to Aramco’s Arabian horses. medical personnel in the country, including the The Saudis were eager to introduce the artefacts dentist. So from time to time, my father would be of their culture to the foreigners now living in their asked to examine and treat someone from the fam- land, if not exactly in their midst. Gifts were often ily who was having a dental problem. This almost exchanged, and salesmen laden with pearls and always involved travelling to Riyadh or as far as gold would come to Dhahran, always ready to Jeddah on the Red Sea as the royal family did not make a bargain. But Arab women and children come into the Aramco communities for this pur- were nowhere to be seen, and aside from the Saudi pose. He reported that he treated women as well as employees of Aramco, most contact with Saudis men, and that when he was treating women he was took place in the near-by market of al-Khobar never alone in the room with them. In fact Aramco where Saudi and Indian vendors vied for the atten- always sent a senior manager to accompany him on tion of the Aramco spouses on their shopping these trips in case any company business would trips. They would return home with jewellery, happen to arise. Fig. 2a-c. Dr. LePage Seidler wearing various combinations of a Saudi khil{a. Fig. 2a (left). Dr. LePage Seidler wearing a white cap (TRC 2005.335d) with a white, summer thawb (current whereabouts unknown). Fig. 2b (middle). The brown winter thawb (TRC 2005.335a) with the matching jacket (TRC 2005.335b) and a white (summer) headcloth (ghoutra, TRC 2005.335i) with gold agal (2005.335f). Fig. 2c (right). The brown winter thawb and jacket, worn with the heavy camel hair bisht, and a red-white, winter headcloth (ghoutra, TRC 2006.058c) and black agal (2006.058d). 138 9532-06_KHILA_2/2006_07 15-10-2007 16:11 Pagina 139 It was in appreciation of his dental work for a tumes in the exhibition, and they admired this out- member of the royal family that he received the fit, and indeed all the costumes, for their intricate beautiful Arab man’s winter costume that is pictured embroidery and rich fabric (finely hand-woven in this article and now housed at the Textile camel’s hair in the case of my father’s bisht). Research Centre in Leiden (fig. 2a-c). My father was The costume passed down to me when first my very pleased to have been given such a special gift, father died (1995) and then my mother (2000). truly an example of a Saudi khil{a. He understood Periodically I go through the papers and artefacts that it was a great honour to receive a costume, and of their full and interesting lives, and in 2005 such a beautiful one at that. He proudly showed it I decided to find a proper home for the costume to anyone who cared to see it and on occasion mod- where it could be appreciated and seen, if possible. elled it for family and friends. Later on, once we Using the internet, I searched for collections or had returned to live in the United States, he showed museums that seemed appropriate and the Textile it to various community groups when from time to Research Centre emerged as a clear first choice. Its time he gave talks on Saudi Arabia and the Aramco specialty in Middle Eastern costumes, its study of experience. the cultural context of clothing and its existing col- By the time our family left Saudi Arabia to lection were all strong factors in its favour. After return to the United States in 1961, many changes contacting Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood by e-mail had occurred since the early days of the 1950s. and determining her provisional interest, I then There was a whole team of dentists serving the sig- took the costume back to the Textile Museum to a nificantly larger ex-patriate community, and my curator who gave me a full description of what father had specialized in orthodontia. The study of I had. At that point I was prepared to make the Arabic language was introduced into the curriculum donation and was very pleased to do so in time for of the Aramco schools, and Arab and American stu- the 2006 exhibition of Saudi dress (Flowing Robes) dents had opportunities to meet and get to know at the National Museum of Ethnology, Leiden, one another. And the small-town feel of the rela- which was curatored by the TRC. I am very privi- tionships between Aramco and the royal family had leged to be part of the story and journey of this cos- transformed into the business-to-business relation- tume, and I am grateful that it is now in its proper ship that led to the development of Saudi Aramco. home. In April and May of 1986 the Textile Museum in Washington, D.C. mounted a small exhibition called “Traditional Costumes of Saudi Arabia” with THE DENTIST’S OUTFIT: 23 costumes from all over Saudi Arabia. At that AN EXAMPLE OF A SAUDI KHIL{A time the director of the Textile Museum was Patricia Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood, TRC Fiske, who also happened to be my mother’s god- daughter and who knew the story of the costume In May 2006 the Textile Research Centre, Leiden given to my father. Her parents and my parents had (TRC) was approached by Helen Seidler, Bethesda, been best of friends since they were children in MD, USA, who kindly offered us a unique outfit, Baltimore, and the families stayed in very close namely, the Saudi Arabian garments given to her touch during the Arabia years as well.
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