Pop Buell

The Hmong army held off the North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao for many years, but with the Paris Peace Accords of 1973 U.S. military aid and most economic aid to Laos ceased. The position of the Hmong army and the Royalist government became increasingly untenable. In 1974, Pop was out of a job with the Hmong and the U.S. government. He worked briefly as a teacher in Vientiane, but the American Embassy there soon learned that his name was on a list of people to be murdered by the Pathet Lao and the North Vietnamese who were completing their conquest of the country. Continental Air Services, Inc. pilot Les Strouse evacuated Buell from Laos by dressing him in a pilot's uniform, driving him to the airport, and flying him to Bangkok, Thailand. Everything Pop owned fit into three suitcases. Pop lived in Bangkok the rest of his life. He died December 29, 1980 while visiting a friend in Manila, Philippines. He is buried beside his wife Mattie in Edon Cemetery, Edon, Ohio.

In 1967, author John Steinbeck remarked during a visit to Laos. "I think Pop is an example of how the ancient Gods were born... Whether you believe it or not, there are still giants in the earth."

In the early 1960s the CIA was building up its secret Hmong army on the Plain of Jars where Pop lived. Laos' isolation and low international profile changed dramatically with a coup d'état in 1960 and the entry of Laos on the world stage as a pawn in the Cold War struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union.

In 1958, Buell volunteered with the International Voluntary Services (IVS), a Bible Belt edition of the Peace Corps, at the salary of sixty-five dollars a month. In May 1960, he left Indiana for an orientation course in Washington, D.C., and then flew to Laos (his first time out of the United States) for his new job.

Edgar "Pop" Buell (April 26, 1913 – December 30, 1980) was a humanitarian aid worker in Laos. He worked as a farmer in Steuben County, Indiana until the age of 47, but following the death of his wife in 1958 he joined the International Voluntary Services, a precursor to the Peace Corps, which offered him a job as an agricultural adviser in Laos. Buell worked in Laos through the Laotian Civil War, organizing relief aid to refugees and isolated villages. He was forced to flee Laos in 1974 when the Communist Pathet Lao gained control of the country.