George H. W. Bush Papers

This series contains correspondence and administrative files created during George H. W. Bush's service as U.S. Liaison to the People's Republic of China from October 21, 1974 to December 7, 1975. The series contains three subseries: a Correspondence File, the Peking Diary, and a Subject File.

The Correspondence subseries contains correspondence George H. W. Bush received while head of the U.S. Liaison Office. This correspondence partially consists of letters from organizations and individuals requesting information on how to visit China. The remainder of the correspondence is comprised of letters from friends and acquaintances of George H. W. Bush. These friends wrote to provide updates on personal and political matters, and in some cases to request information on visiting China. In many cases a carbon copy of Bush's typed response has been attached to the incoming correspondence.

The Peking Diary subseries consists of a diary of George H. W. Bush's personal thoughts during his tenure as head of the U.S. Liaison Office in Peking. This diary covers George H. W. Bush's reactions to all aspects of life in Peking, including his opinions of public officials and diplomats, politics, family matters, international affairs, and life in China.

The Subject File subseries consists of files maintained by George H. W. Bush and his immediate office staff from 1974 to 1976. This material includes administrative files, personal files, correspondence files, and press clipping files. A portion of these files deal with the daily operation of the Peking Liaison Office, including the purchase of provisions. The subseries also contains personal files of George and Barbara Bush, including banking files, files on their Chinese language lessons, personal correspondence, and files related to personal effects. There are also files in this subseries related to Bush's official duties as head of the Liaison Office, including files dealing with Bush's official travels and correspondence dealing with Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's visit in November 1974 as well as the visit of President Gerald Ford and Kissinger in December 1975. Other files deal with social aspects of the Liaison Office, including correspondence related to friends who visited the Bushes, information on visiting Congressional delegations, material related to diplomatic receptions both hosted and attended by Bush, and the Fourth of July cookout hosted by George H. W. Bush in 1975. There is also a file containing press clippings primarily from Chinese news sources.