Getting Out of Saigon
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Getting Out of Saigon by Ralph White
Ralph White tells the remarkable story of his desperate effort as a young banker in Saigon during the final weeks before the city fell to the North Vietnamese to save the entire staff of the Saigon branch of Chase Manhattan bank and their families -- Argo meets The Fall of Saigon.
"Captivating...It’s hard not to admire [White] for his pluckiness in the face of bureaucratic indifference as well as his growth from a risk-taking adventurer into a humanitarian with genuine compassion for the Vietnamese whose lives depended on him." -- Mark Atwood Lawrence * The Washington Post *
“As the subtitle of Mr. White’s recently published book promises, he succeeded. What it doesn’t give away are the overwhelming barriers he faced and the smart, often heart-stopping ways he overcame them. . . . His story is one of courage, resolve, and determination born from challenge.” -- Erin Douglass * The Christian Science Monitor *
"An edge-of-your-seat, too-insane-not-to-be-true story." * OprahDaily.com *
“A must-read for those of us who were there, for those of us who watched the fall of Saigon on the six o’clock news, for all those who lived through that dark period of American history, and for a younger generation who have seen the documentaries and read the books. Ralph White’s Getting Out of Saigon opens old wounds, but also heals. An amazing tour de force and a stunning human drama set against the cataclysm of a lost war.” -- Nelson DeMille, bestselling novelist and former U.S. Army first lieutenant in the First Cavalry Division, Vietnam 1967-1968
"A unique, gripping story from the Vietnam War....White's persona seems like something out of a Terry Southern or Ian Fleming novel—as does his writing. White tells his inspiring story with wit, panache, humility, and a captivating sense of time and place. A fantastic read." * Kirkus Reviews (starred review) *
"By turns harrowing, enchanting, and leavened with a humor as dark as Saigon's quayside alleys, Ralph White's Getting Out of Saigon belongs on your bookshelf between Graham Greene and Neil Sheehan. Like Greene, White is a mesmerizing tour guide whose tale of rescuing over 100 Vietnamese civilians from the besieged capital city is as poignant as it is eerily prescient.” -- Bob Drury and Tom Clavin, coauthors of Last Men Out: The True Story of America's Heroic Final Hours in Vietnam
"[An] enthralling story." * Library Journal (starred review) *
“In the history of the Chase Manhattan Bank, one event stands out as clarifying the bank’s responsibility to its employees. In 1975, Chase sent Ralph White to rescue its Vietnamese employees before the fall of Saigon. Only in retrospect do we now know how desperate those employees were, or how extraordinary were the obstacles White faced in rescuing them.” -- Anthony Terracciano, former vice chairman of the Chase Manhattan Corporation
“Ralph White has written a thrilling account of how he defied the American Ambassador and succeeded in evacuating more than a hundred South Vietnamese employees of the Chase Manhattan Bank in Saigon less than a week before the fall of Saigon. He has succeeded in transforming his own Profile in Courage moment into an inspiring and timeless story that is particularly relevant today, when many in government, politics, and business have been called on to decide whether or not to take great risks and follow the dictates of their consciences.” -- Thurston Clarke, author of Honorable Exit: How a Few Brave Americans Risked All to Save Our Vietnamese Allies at the End of the War
“As the subtitle of Mr. White’s recently published book promises, he succeeded. What it doesn’t give away are the overwhelming barriers he faced and the smart, often heart-stopping ways he overcame them. . . . His story is one of courage, resolve, and determination born from challenge.” -- Erin Douglass * The Christian Science Monitor *
"An edge-of-your-seat, too-insane-not-to-be-true story." * OprahDaily.com *
“A must-read for those of us who were there, for those of us who watched the fall of Saigon on the six o’clock news, for all those who lived through that dark period of American history, and for a younger generation who have seen the documentaries and read the books. Ralph White’s Getting Out of Saigon opens old wounds, but also heals. An amazing tour de force and a stunning human drama set against the cataclysm of a lost war.” -- Nelson DeMille, bestselling novelist and former U.S. Army first lieutenant in the First Cavalry Division, Vietnam 1967-1968
"A unique, gripping story from the Vietnam War....White's persona seems like something out of a Terry Southern or Ian Fleming novel—as does his writing. White tells his inspiring story with wit, panache, humility, and a captivating sense of time and place. A fantastic read." * Kirkus Reviews (starred review) *
"By turns harrowing, enchanting, and leavened with a humor as dark as Saigon's quayside alleys, Ralph White's Getting Out of Saigon belongs on your bookshelf between Graham Greene and Neil Sheehan. Like Greene, White is a mesmerizing tour guide whose tale of rescuing over 100 Vietnamese civilians from the besieged capital city is as poignant as it is eerily prescient.” -- Bob Drury and Tom Clavin, coauthors of Last Men Out: The True Story of America's Heroic Final Hours in Vietnam
"[An] enthralling story." * Library Journal (starred review) *
“In the history of the Chase Manhattan Bank, one event stands out as clarifying the bank’s responsibility to its employees. In 1975, Chase sent Ralph White to rescue its Vietnamese employees before the fall of Saigon. Only in retrospect do we now know how desperate those employees were, or how extraordinary were the obstacles White faced in rescuing them.” -- Anthony Terracciano, former vice chairman of the Chase Manhattan Corporation
“Ralph White has written a thrilling account of how he defied the American Ambassador and succeeded in evacuating more than a hundred South Vietnamese employees of the Chase Manhattan Bank in Saigon less than a week before the fall of Saigon. He has succeeded in transforming his own Profile in Courage moment into an inspiring and timeless story that is particularly relevant today, when many in government, politics, and business have been called on to decide whether or not to take great risks and follow the dictates of their consciences.” -- Thurston Clarke, author of Honorable Exit: How a Few Brave Americans Risked All to Save Our Vietnamese Allies at the End of the War
In 1973, Ralph White joined the Chase Manhattan Bank and worked as a business development officer in Thailand and Hong Kong; during his tenure in Thailand, he was temporarily assigned to Vietnam to close the bank’s Saigon branch as the city fell. Upon return to Chase’s New York headquarters in 1981, he worked in the International Strategic Planning Division and was a Vice President when he left. White subsequently worked as a business development officer with three foreign banks and earned an MBA at Columbia University. In 2009, he founded the Columbia Fiction Foundry, a writing workshop for alumni of Columbia University. Having served as the organization’s president for its first decade, White now serves as its Chairman. He lives in New York City and Litchfield, Connecticut.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781982195175 |
| ISBN 10 | 1982195177 |
| Title | Getting Out of Saigon |
| Author | Ralph White |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Hardback |
| Publisher | Simon & Schuster |
| Year published | 2023-05-25 |
| Number of pages | 320 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |