GUEST COLUMN: Malakoff native flourishing in China

Dick Dwelle Special to the Review

I was waiting at the counter in Wal-Mart for some pictures when he walked up. As he stood before me, I introduced myself and as we shook hands he said, “I’m Charles Dukes.”

He grew up in Malakoff and today lives in Beijing, capital of China.

The two of us hadn’t met for probably 20 years. Charles joined the editorial staff of The Review in 1985 and remained for 10 years. I was with the paper at the time.

Today he is an editorial consultant for the English-language Beijing This Month Publications and works with the director of the information office of the Beijing Municipal Government. He is also a professional photographer.

Charles and his wife Wang Nanfei left Jan. 18 to return to China following a visit of several days in Athens with his mother, Ruby Dukes, his siblings and their children as well as friends who gathered during their stay. They were to visit his grandchildren and their family in Albuquerque, N.M., and stop off in Hawaii on the way home. Charles’ mother has lived in Athens for about three years. She still attends First Baptist Church in Malakoff.

Wang is a renowned contemporary artist in Beijing. She travels the world and spends considerable time in Europe. In May of 2004 she received a Masters in Arts degree from North Texas University.

In 2007 Charles, his wife and James Surls held an art exhibit at the National Museum of China in Beijing. It was the first such exhibit held at the museum that had been arranged by the artists themselves.

Surls, who lived for some time as a child in Malakoff, now makes his home in Colorado. He is a world-renowned sculptor. In 2011 the three will hold an exhibit at the University of Colorado in Boulder, Dukes said.

Charles told me that he usually spends about an hour in the morning before work photographing throughout Beijing and often returns to the streets at noon or in the evening to continue with the work.

In 1985 Charles was in an Athens grocery store one Saturday when he ran across Jim Goodson, editor of The Review at that time. The two talked the following Monday and Charles went to work that day as a member of the editorial staff. He remained with the paper for 10 years and stayed in the area for another three doing freelance writing, principally for outdoor publications, most of them state owned. For five months early in 1998 he edited The Malakoff News.

Eleven years before going to work for The Review, he had received his degree from the University of Texas in Arlington in journalism. In 1977 he received his masters degree from the University of Hawaii in Asian studies with China being his area of special interest.

He worked on oil wells in 1979 and ’80 and followed this with three years in sales with Bowen Tools of Houston.

In 1983, working directly under the director of the firm, he helped establish a coiled tubing service company in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. He left there in 1984 to return to Henderson County.

A few months after leaving the Malakoff paper, he went to Beijing and to work for China Daily Publications, where he served the publication as a coordinator, writer and editor.

In May of this year he will have been with Beijing This Month Publications for six years, having started in 2004. He is an editorial consultant and works under the direction of Mrs. Shirley Zhang, the publisher.

Among his writings were many of the articles from the 2008 Olympic games which were held in Beijing.

In addition to his work with the publications, he also works under Madame Wang Hui of the Information office of the Beijing Municipal Government.

The most honored award that the city of Beijing can confer on a foreigner, “The Great Wall Friendship Award,” was presented to Dukes in 2005 by then mayor, Wang Qishan, who is now vice premier,

Dukes is interim director of the Surls-Locke Splendora Project in Splendora, Texas. Surls and Artist Charmaine Locke, have conducted a years-long effort to preserve a 150-acre bottomland hardwood forest tract and three historic structures. Dukes has worked with them since 2001.

The recent visit Dukes made to Athens is his second since moving to Beijing in 2003.

He is ever so enthusiastic about the advances China is making, especially in agriculture, business, the housing of the people and industry. He says that the strides made in improving the lives of the people living throughout the Republic of China are evident with the passing of each day and that he is glad to be there observing it and being even a small part of it.

Dick Dwelle is former owner and publisher of the Athens Review.