Description:

The White House


White House S.S. Agent Acquired Dessert Set Gifted by Future South Korean Diplomat Hong-choo Hyun

 

20th C. Korean 15-pc gilt and cloisonné dessert set gifted by high-level South Korean security officials and acquired by their American equivalent, White House Secret Service agent Warren "Woody" Taylor (born 1936), sometime between 1961-1974.

 

The fifteen gilt utensils have Murano style cobalt blue and silver striped enamel medallions inset at the terminal of each handle. The dessert set is comprised of one cake server, 8" l.; one bon bon shovel, 6.375" l.; one sugar spoon, 5" l.; six dessert spoons, 5" l.; and six dessert forks, 5.25" l. The utensils are in pristine and apparently unused condition, nestling in a custom brown velvet-covered hinged case.

 

Accompanied by period ephemera including a pale blue gift envelope addressed to "Mr. Warren W. Taylor"; two business cards, the first belonging to "Hong-choo Hyun, First Deputy Director, Agency for National Security Planning, Republic of Korea," the second belonging to "Chong Kyu Park, Chief, The Presidential Protective Force, The Blue House, Seoul, Korea"; and a brochure from Korea Cloisonné Art Co., presumably the manufacturers of the utensils.

 

Hong-choo Hyun (1940-2017) first protected South Korea's First Family before representing their interests abroad. He earned an international law degree from Columbia University. A member of South Korea's Democratic Justice Party, Hyun served as a diplomat in Eastern Europe and at the United Nations before serving as South Korean Ambassador to the United States between 1991-1993.

 

Chong Kyu Park resigned from his post as Chief of the Presidential Protective Force after First Lady Young-soo Yuk (1925-1974) was assassinated at a South Korean Independence Day event in August 1974. This was just one instance of politically motivated assassination in 1970s South Korea; President Chung-hee Park was killed at the Blue House compound in Seoul in October 1979.

 

Warren "Woody" Taylor worked in the Secret Service for over 20 years, from 1961-1982. Assigned to Lyndon B. Johnson's Vice-Presidential Detail in the Dallas Motorcade, Taylor witnessed and later testified about the Kennedy assassination.

 

Provenance: Estate of Warren "Woody" Taylor

 



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